Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis Announces Special Session For Redistricting
The nationwide redistricting continues into the new year, as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis calls for a special session focused on redistricting.
According to AP News, Republicans already control 20 of Florida’s 28 districts, so it’s unclear how many seats they intend to gain with a new map. While the legislative session doesn’t start for a week, DeSantis called the special session to get ahead of a Supreme Court ruling over a key provision in the Voting Rights Act that bars discrimination in voting systems. “I don’t think it’s a question of if they’re going to rule. It’s a question of what the scope is going to be,” DeSantis said at a news conference on Tuesday. “So, we’re getting out ahead of that.”
Florida is only the latest state to join the prolonged, nationwide redistricting battle. This all began last July when Texas Gov. Greg Abbott used the Kerr County floods to launch a special legislative session focused on redistricting. Typically, redistricting only occurs every 10 years in response to new Census data. President Donald Trump has no respect for norms or precedent, though, and pressured Abbott into the redistricting effort.
Republicans currently hold a narrow majority in the House, with Democrats initially only needing a net gain of three seats to flip control. With Trump’s policies proving deeply unpopular, and midterms historically favoring the opposition party, the GOP has decided that the only way to win is to manipulate voting maps in their favor.
After Texas successfully passed a new map that created five new seats in districts favored for Republicans, several Republican state legislatures began redistricting efforts of their own. Missouri and North Carolina both passed new Congressional maps that give Republicans an extra House seat in each state.
The Republican redistricting effort hasn’t gone on without any speed bumps, though. Missouri voters introduced a ballot petition that would place the new map on the ballot for the 2026 midterms, meaning that the state would have to conduct its election using the old map. Republicans in Indiana rejected a redistricting attempt that would give the state another House seat.
Democratic state legislatures have also responded to the redistricting push with their own redistricting efforts. California Gov. Gavin Newsom introduced Prop 50 in response to Texas’ redistricting effort. The proposition, which voters overwhelmingly passed during a November special election, temporarily transfers control of the state’s congressional maps from an independent redistricting committee to the state legislature. California has implemented a new map that neutralizes the gains made in the Texas redistricting effort.
Virginia announced a surprise redistricting effort in November, and with Democrats maintaining control of the General Assembly and taking the Governor’s office, they intend to implement a map that gives Democrats two to three new House seats.
When it comes to Florida, the success of its redistricting effort may not be so cut-and-dry. Miami-Dade just elected the first Democratic mayor in nearly 30 years, signaling the Republican stronghold could gradually revert to its former status as a purple state. The refusal of Republican congressmembers to extend Affordable Care Act subsidies affected Florida voters the most, as the state had the highest number of people insured through the ACA.
They can redraw the districts all they want, but if the 2024 election taught us anything, it’s that people vote with their wallets, and Republicans made it significantly more expensive for Florida voters to access decent health insurance. No amount of redistricting can change that.
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