Newly Redrawn Congressional District Has 1,200-Mile Border, Population Of 11, All Distantly Related To Committee Chairman

JEFFERSON CITY, MO — The state legislature's redistricting committee approved a new congressional map Monday that carves out a district with a 1,200-mile perimeter, a population of 11, and a family tree that resolves into a single Thanksgiving table.

The district, known on paper as District 6 and known to cartographers as "the lightning bolt that got into a fight," follows a route that includes committee chairman Wendell Purcell's lake cabin, his brother-in-law's bait shop, a cousin's taxidermy studio, and a six-inch strip of shoulder on Route 9 connecting them all. It excludes, by roughly four feet, the home of Purcell's 2024 primary opponent.

"People keep calling it gerrymandering, and I understand why, because it is," Purcell told reporters, tracing the district's outline with his finger for nearly ninety seconds before losing his own place twice. "But I'd ask folks to look past the shape and focus on the fact that every single resident already agrees with me on everything, which, frankly, should be the goal in any democracy."

Redistricting consultant Marla Osgood, hired by the committee to defend the map in court, said she had personally driven the entire border and could confirm it was, "compact in the sense that a coat hanger is compact, if you really pull on it."

The map's sole disputed household belongs to Purcell's second cousin Dale, who was excluded from District 6 after a mapping error placed his driveway nine feet into District 4. Dale has filed for an emergency amendment. "I've voted for Wendell in every election since 1994," Dale said, "and now I'm being told I live in a district represented by a man I've never met and, frankly, don't trust with a boat."

A study released Tuesday by the University of Missouri's Center for Electoral Geometry found the new district has a Reock compactness score of 0.03, the lowest ever recorded for a shape that is not, technically, a spiral. Lead researcher Dr. Priya Nakamura said her team had to invent a new metric, the Purcell Index, "specifically to describe how a line can visit someone's driveway twice without ever actually turning around."

Purcell's office released a statement defending the map as "responsive to community ties," noting that all eleven constituents share not only a bloodline but a group chat, which Purcell described as "basically a town hall that never stops."

At press time, the committee had begun work on a companion Senate map reportedly shaped like Purcell's signature.