The Florida Legislature on Wednesday approved a new congressional map designed to maximize the Republican Party’s advantage in the state, potentially adding four GOP seats to its delegation. This move is part of a national redistricting battle initiated by President Donald Trump ahead of this year’s midterms. The approval came on the same day the U.S. Supreme Court rolled back a key provision of the Voting Rights Act, a decision that could further hinder challenges to Republican efforts to redraw districts in ways that limit the influence of nonwhite voters.
Governor Ron DeSantis’s proposed map, unveiled two days earlier, could shift Florida’s House delegation from a current split of 20 to 8 in favor of Republicans, to a dominant 24 to 4. This potential four-seat gain mirrors what Virginia Democrats anticipate from a recent redistricting referendum, which is currently facing legal challenge in state court. The new Florida districts are expected to face lawsuits, particularly because the state constitution explicitly prohibits redistricting for partisan purposes. However, DeSantis and his aides assert that these constitutional provisions will not pose a legal barrier, citing their prior weakening by the Florida Supreme Court and the recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling.
Consolidating Capital's Political Power
Florida Republicans, holding a supermajority in both legislative chambers, offered minimal commentary on the new districts during the special session. Rep. Jenna Persons-Mulicka, R-Fort Myers, the measure’s sponsor, confined her remarks to “careful answers” regarding an “evolving legal landscape” when questioned by Democrats about the redistricting effort. Persons-Mulicka stated, “I believe that there is a likelihood that that map will be upheld against legal challenge.” The measure passed the House with an 83-28 vote, followed by a 21-17 approval in the Florida Senate.
Democrats, activists, and citizens decried the process as a partisan power play intended to satisfy Trump, advance DeSantis’s future ambitions, and disenfranchise the majority of registered Florida voters who are not Republicans. Rep. Michele Rayner, D-St. Petersburg, addressed her Republican colleagues, stating, “Y’all are doing this because y’all’s daddy in the White House is injecting national political objectives into what should be a state-driven process.” Rep. Angie Nixon, a Jacksonville Democrat, criticized the process, saying, “Last time I checked, we’re the ones who were supposed to be drawing the map, and yet we are allowing y’all to continue to hold the water of the governor, who is a lame duck and just trying to figure out what his next job is going to be.” House Minority Leader Fentrice Driskell, D-Tampa, concluded, “On destroying our democracy, they’ve been aligned, and that’s what we did here today.”
The State's Role in Electoral Engineering
The new map redraws districts in historically Democratic areas, including those around Orlando, the Tampa-St. Petersburg area, and south Florida regions such as Palm Beach, Fort Lauderdale, and Miami. These changes could result in the loss of seats for incumbents like Reps. Jared Moskowitz and Debbie Wasserman Schultz. The plan also includes the effective elimination of a nearly majority Black south Florida district, which was previously represented by Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, a Black Democrat, until her resignation earlier this month. DeSantis and his aides maintained that the new map is necessary to account for population growth since the 2020 census and to ensure a “race-neutral” congressional plan, despite the clear partisan and racial implications.
The proposal anticipated the outcome of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Wednesday decision, which specifically struck down a Louisiana congressional district drawn to be majority Black. Historically, Black voters have aligned with Democrats, while a majority of white voters tend to support Republicans. Republican leaders moved swiftly from the session’s opening on Tuesday morning. During one of only two committee hearings, Senate Rules Chair Kathleen Passidomo, R-Naples, limited each citizen speaker to 30 seconds. Deborah Courtney, who traveled over two hours from Jacksonville, reported that all citizen speakers expressed opposition. Rob Woods, a veteran from the Tampa area, expressed disillusionment, stating that he had “bought in from elementary school” on notions of an equal-opportunity democracy, but now “it seems as if we are back in that period of Reconstruction, moving back to Jim Crow.”
On the House floor, Persons-Mulicka avoided specifics regarding the factors that influenced the map, repeatedly calling it “race-neutral.” This claim was made despite testimony from DeSantis aide Jason Poreda, who took sole credit for the map and admitted to examining party affiliation and voting patterns. Persons-Mulicka stated, “I cannot speak to the intent of the map drawer.” Persons-Mulicka and Sen. Don Gaetz, a Crestview Republican who sponsored the map in the Senate, deflected questions about why DeSantis unveiled the plan on Fox News. Gaetz stated he had no part in drafting the map and merely forwarded the governor’s proposal.
The new map could face challenges similar to those in Texas, where revised lines were based on Trump’s performance in the second year prior, redistributing his voters to bolster Republican representation. However, Trump’s popularity has waned, including among Latino voters prominent in Florida, potentially leaving margins thin enough for Democratic victories if there is an anti-Trump backlash. Some Republicans expressed concern about this possibility, with a handful voting against the measure. Internal factionalism also emerged as House Speaker Daniel Perez, a Republican not allied with DeSantis, blocked DeSantis’s proposals for AI regulations and rolling back vaccine mandates, which DeSantis termed “political shenanigans.”