Florida Democratic House leader calls plan to redraw congressional map 'illegal'
A special report on the G.O.P.'s plan to gerrymander the state even more than it already is. A committee meets this week. Major protests are planned.
By Mitch Perry
President Donald Trump’s unprecedented plan to redraw state congressional maps to preserve the GOP’s narrow majority in the U.S. House ahead of the 2026 election has hit some bumps, but Republicans appear confident they can flip several Democratic seats in Florida, where the first steps in that process will begin this week.
A select House committee on congressional redistricting will convene Thursday afternoon in Tallahassee. It’s the first legislative meeting on the issue since Gov. Ron DeSantis said in July that it would be “appropriate to do a redistricting” in the middle of the decade. He followed up on that in August, saying that he and Attorney General James Uthmeier supported an update to the 2020 Decennial Census.
DeSantis said Florida had been “shortchanged in the reapportionment stemming from the last census” in 2020, although no new update to that census has taken place.
Florida House Democratic Leader Fentrice Driskell slammed the proposal Monday, saying the only reason it is happening is because Trump wants to “rig” next year’s midterm elections because “he wants to stop Americans from holding his administration accountable for their bad decisions.”
‘Swamp-like cynical behavior’
“Any attempt to draw new maps in Florida right now is a direct response to the president’s pressure to stack the deck before the midterms, and that is illegal in Florida,” Driskell said on a Zoom press conference for Florida reporters.
“The Fair Districts amendments to the Florida Constitution outlaw drawing maps to benefit one party over another. Redistricting decides who represents us in our government. A process that must serve the people, not politicians. This isn’t something that the people asked for. This is just the swamp-like cynical behavior that people hate about politics.”
Florida’s Fair District amendments prohibit line-drawing that intentionally favors or disfavors a political party or incumbent.
With the Democrats in superminority status in both chambers of the Legislature, Driskell acknowledged her party can’t stop GOP members but said she is putting some hope in the Senate rejecting the move.
“We don’t have the numbers to stop this, but we haven’t seen what’s going to happen in the Senate yet and, interestingly, more and more we’re watching our state Senate become a backstop to guard against some of the more dangerous whims of the legislation that we see coming out from the House.”
Senate Republicans, who hold a 26-11 advantage over Democrats in that chamber, haven’t said much about the idea of congressional redistricting since the governor’s comments over the summer.
“I’d like to see some data on the magnitude of people in the state of Florida who might be here illegally who have been part of the calculation on redistricting,” Pinellas County Republican state Sen. Nick DiCeglie told the Phoenix last month.
“I think that we should have redistricting based on United States citizens, and we’ll see how that plays out here, if possible. It’s always good to focus on U.S. citizens and see exactly what needs to be done to accomplish that.”
Senate President Ben Albritton hasn’t made any comments about redistricting, and no committee that would oversee the issue has been formed yet in that chamber.
Driskell said she has taken solace from the fact that several Republicans in Indiana have spoken critically of congressional redistricting in their state. However, after pressure from the White House, Indiana House Republicans Monday proposed a redrawing that would let their party control all nine House seats (Democrats hold two of the state’s nine seats).
The first congressional redistricting took place in Texas earlier this year. That came after Trump said during the summer that Republicans were “entitled to five more seats” in the Lone Star State.
A federal court blocked Texas last month from using its new map, ruling that it is likely an unconstitutional racial gerrymander, and ordered the state to use its previous map in the 2026 election. The new map is now back in place, at least temporarily, after Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito granted the state’s request to pause that federal court’s ruling.
Tampa Bay-area Democratic U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor says Tallahassee Republicans should be focused on lowering Floridians’ property insurance and electricity bills, not redistricting. “I think it’s a waste of time and money,” she told the Phoenix last week.
Florida Republicans represent 20 of the state’s 28 congressional districts.
Ahead of the committee meeting Thursday, a group of voting and civil rights organizations calling themselves the “No Partisan Maps” coalition are scheduled to hold a protest in front of the Capitol. The Florida House Select Committee hearing on congressional redistricting will begin at 1:30 p.m.
This article is republished by Tropic Press courtesy of Florida Phoenix, a Tallahassee-based independent nonprofit news site.
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Protest planned at state Capitol
Indivisible, the same organization that planned all those nationwide No Kings Day rallies, is urging Floridians to show up in Tallahassee this week to protest efforts to further gerrymander Florida’s congressional districts.
Here’s the info on how to attend and how to get further information on what you can do.
The goal of the Tallahassee event is “to make our voices impossible to ignore and send an unmistakable message to our state legislators: Floridians will not tolerate illegal partisan gerrymandering.”
Thursday, Dec. 4, starting at 12 p.m.
Mass Protest at the Capitol from noon to 1:30 p.m. at Florida Historic Capitol, 400 S. Monroe St.
Visit Your Legislators’ offices any time before or after the protest or the committee hearing.
Hearing of the Select Committee on Congressional Redistricting is from 1:30 to 3 p.m. at 102 House Office Bluilding, Reed Hall - 402 S. Monroe St, Tallahassee, FL 32399-1300.
What to Expect
After signing up:
Indivisible will send you talking points to share with your legislators.
They will share messaging to use in commenting during the hearing.
Need to find your legislators’ offices?
Click here for your Florida House Representative
Click here for your State Senator
Why It Matters
“A partisan, mid-decade redraw would silence Black, Brown, and working-class communities across Florida—undermining fair representation in the 2026 and 2028 elections.”
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Very nice article. Thank you for some real information.
Sorry it says superminotity
My bad