PA To Lose 1 House Seat After 2020 Census Apportionment

PENNSYLVANIA — The Keystone State is set to lose a seat in Congress, the U.S. Census Bureau announced Monday afternoon.

The results of 2020's Constitutionally mandated 10-year census serve as the basis of each state's representation in Congress. The numbers will shape politics over the next decade as 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives are divvied up through a process called apportionment.

Based on the results, Pennsylvania will go from having 18 seats to 17 seats in the 2022 election.

Secretary of Commerce Gina M. Raimondo said she transmitted the 2020 census population and apportionment counts to the president on Monday and assured him they were complete and accurate.

According to the 2020 census, there are 331,449,281 people living in the United States, about 7.4 percent more than during the 2010 census — the second-slowest growth rate in U.S. history and only a tenth of a percentage point higher than that seen between 1930 and 1940.

Six states will gain seats in Congress, while seven will lose seats. Officials said the difference between keeping or losing a seat was as small as 89 people in the case of New York.

States gaining seats in Congress:

• Texas (2)
• Colorado (1)
• Florida (1)
• Montana (1)
• North Carolina (1)
• Oregon (1)

States losing seats:

• California (-1)
• Illinois (-1)
• Michigan (-1)
• New York (-1)
• Ohio (-1)
• Pennsylvania (-1)
• West Virginia (-1)

With reporting by J. Ryne Danielson of Patch