Florida Approves Map That Solves Neither Of The Issues DeSantis Complains About | EUROtoday

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida lawmakers Wednesday rubber-stamped a brand new congressional map that fails to resolve both drawback cited by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis as justifications for an unprecedented mid-decade redistricting — even because it flouts a state constitutional ban on partisan map drawing by possible giving Republicans extra House seats, as demanded by President Donald Trump.

Exactly 53 hours after the brand new map made its first look exhibiting a sea of 24 crimson districts with 4 small blue dots on Fox News, the Florida Senate permitted on a 21-17 vote a map created fully by DeSantis with zero enter from lawmakers or the general public. It now goes to DeSantis for his signature.

“Let me tell you what this is about. This is about fear. Not just any fear ― panic, the kind of panic that comes from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue when the ground is shifting beneath you and you can’t win in a fair fight,” mentioned Orlando Democratic state Sen. LaVon Bracy Davis.

Brian Nathan, a Democratic Navy veteran who unexpectedly gained a Tampa state Senate seat in a latest particular election, mentioned none of his new constituents has requested for a brand new map. “We are here because of two people. The president asked explicitly for more Republican districts, and the governor is happy to oblige,” he mentioned.

The state House, which has a fair stronger Republican majority than the Senate, voted 83-28 in favor of the map hours earlier, whilst lawmakers had been studying via the U.S. Supreme Court choice within the much-anticipated Callais case that dramatically weakened protections for minority districts underneath the Voting Rights Act.

That choice, nonetheless, possible has little impact on the congressional map in Florida, due to the state Supreme Court having dominated final 12 months that protections towards weakening minority districts violated the U.S. Constitution.

That language was a part of the Fair Districts Amendment on congressional districts that Florida voters handed overwhelmingly in 2010, and that 2025 Florida excessive court docket ruling is the idea for DeSantis’ authorized principle that the putting down of a part of the Fair Districts provisions means the complete modification is null and void.

The essential a part of the voter initiative bans efforts to guard incumbents or a selected get together, whereas a separate part mandates the drawing of districts that, to the extent doable, doesn’t break up up counties and cities. Jason Poredo, the DeSantis staffer who drew the brand new map, advised lawmakers Tuesday that he used partisan information in drawing the districts and conceded that the brand new map splits up extra counties and cities than the present map.

DeSantis’ outdoors lawyer dealing with the redistricting matter, Mohammad Jazil, in the meantime testified that there was no have to abide by the voter-approved partisan intent ban. “Our legal position is that you do not need to comply,” he advised lawmakers.

Poredo’s testimony additionally conceded that he used the identical Census information for the brand new map that was used within the present map — that means the brand new districts no extra mirror the present inhabitants of Florida and up to date inner migration patterns than do the present districts.

DeSantis has been arguing, falsely, for months {that a} new congressional map was crucial as a result of Florida was shortchanged within the 2020 Census, that the state has seen an unlimited inflow of inhabitants within the years since, and that huge numbers of Floridians have moved from one a part of the state to a different.

“All of you know that this doesn’t address anything about an alleged census undercount. We’re not getting an extra seat in Congress,” Orlando Democratic Sen. Carlos Guillermo Smith advised his colleagues. “That is a completely spurious point.”

DeSantis’ arguments had been however repeated ceaselessly by Republican legislators.

“There is obviously the argument that, because so many people have moved to Florida, that these congressional districts are not perhaps accurately representing the electorate in the best way possible,” mentioned Ana Maria Rodriguez, a state senator from Doral. “So I think these new maps will give voters an opportunity to have more representation and more voices in Congress.”

Pensacola Republican Don Gaetz, who sponsored DeSantis’ map for him on the Senate flooring, additionally cited these claims. “In our state, as the governor has indicated, his words, not mine, surges in population that, in his view, are leaving some Floridians underrepresented,” Gaetz mentioned.

Gaetz, the daddy of former U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, conceded that the brand new map didn’t and couldn’t tackle that concern, after which referred additional inquiries to the Capitol’s first flooring, the place DeSantis has his suite of places of work. “Go to the plaza level. Ask the governor,” he mentioned.

DeSantis’ workplace didn’t reply to HuffPost queries on the matter.

He first started talking in regards to the want for a brand new Florida congressional map two weeks after Trump publicly demanded that Republican-led states, beginning with Texas, draw new maps to create extra Republican seats to enhance the get together’s possibilities of holding the House within the November midterm elections. Texas rapidly complied, as did Republicans in North Carolina and Missouri.

Democrats, nonetheless, responded with their very own new maps in California and Virginia, each of which obtained voter approval to provide extra possible Democratic seats, though the method used to create Virginia’s map is at the moment being reviewed by that state’s Supreme Court.

The new map in Florida is nearly sure to attract authorized challenges of its personal, notably the brazenly partisan intent that went into drawing it that instantly violates the Florida structure.