By Mandi Rice, St. Louis Public Radio
ST. LOUIS – Senator Kit Bond has cast doubt on speculation that Missouri will soon lose a congressional seat.
Earlier this week a political consulting firm predicted Missouri would fall to eight seats during upcoming redistricting.
Senator Kit Bond says the population figures the firm used don't include troops serving abroad, which could make a difference.
"One of the big question marks is whether we can count military personnel overseas who are not included in the estimate," Bond said.
The U.S. Census Bureau will include those service members in its calculation of Missouri's population. Final Census numbers will be announced in December and used to determine any redistribution for 2012.