DeSantis targets Florida congressional districts, seeks changes that could aid Republicans

Gov. Ron DeSantis launched a multi-pronged attack on the state’s congressional districts on Wednesday, offering justifications for a mid-decade redistricting that is all-but-guaranteed to send more Republicans to Congress from Florida.

DeSantis also made clear the part of the state he wants to concentrate on is South Florida — the region that is home to most of the remaining Democrats in the Florida congressional delegation.

The Republican governor’s move comes amid unprecedented and spreading efforts to change congressional districts across the country. First, Texas began work to comply with a demand from President Donald Trump to draw congressional boundaries that would send five more Republicans and five fewer Democrats to Washington.

Then California moved to create five more Democratic and five fewer Republican districts.

Now DeSantis wants in on the action.

The governor repeatedly cited the Broward-Palm Beach County district represented by U.S. Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick as the one that he believes is unfairly drawn, and should be changed.

He acknowledged that any changes to Cherfilus-McCormick’s district would involve changes to neighboring congressional districts — likely including the one represented by another Broward-Palm Beach county Democrat, U.S. Rep. Jared Moskowitz.

DeSantis didn’t cite Cherfilus-McCormick by name or district number. But he described the shape of the district in a way that left no doubt which one he was talking about.

Sean Foreman, a political scientist at Barry University, said the implications of DeSantis’ statements are clear. “He is setting the state for the upcoming mid-decade redistricting, which is coming to Florida. He’s laying out the conditions so Republicans can justify the need to do this in Florida,” Foreman said.

“They’re going to do it either way, with the justification or not. We’re watching what is happening in Texas, California and elsewhere. It was just a matter of time before Florida would join the fray because we have a Republican majority Legislature,” Foreman said. “This is consistent with what we’ve seen in recent years.”

DeSantis’ criticisms of the state’s congressional districts are notable, among other reasons, because he was largely responsible for the districts three years ago. He vetoed the first congressional district map and ordered Republicans in the Legislature to approve one that his office developed. The Legislature complied.

Under that map, the Florida delegation has 20 Republicans and eight Democrats. Five of the eight Democrats are from Broward, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties.

The governor came to Palm Beach State College just west of Lake Worth Beach on Wednesday to discuss the issue, including his claim that Florida was shortchanged after the 2000 Census and should have gotten one more congressional district.

DeSantis brought with him, and called to the lectern to speak, Attorney General James Uthmeier who went farther than the governor in his arguments.

“It’s clear that there’s been for a long time now a deep state effort to manipulate the Census and shift electoral power to blue states to sanctuary states,” Uthmeier said. He claimed that Democrats are upset by deportation of people in the U.S. illegally because they wanted those people to increase their population numbers and get them more congressional districts

“They are freaking out because they realized the jig is up,” Uthmeier said. “They had a deep-seated plan” that is being thwarted by deportations.

He offered no evidence to back up his statements. Uthmeier, appointed attorney general earlier this year by DeSantis, is the governor’s former chief of staff and was one of the managers of DeSantis’ unsuccessful candidacy for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination.

Cherfilus-McCormick’s district, included in the map DeSantis signed three years ago, was crafted — the way it has been for decades — with the specific intention of making it all-but-certain that voters would elect a Black representative.

Under mid-1980s revisions to the federal Voting Rights Act, congressional boundaries have been drawn with a goal of increasing the chance that someone from a minority group can win an election and bring a voice that otherwise wouldn’t be heard to the halls of Congress.

Until those changes were implemented in the 1992 redistricting, Florida hadn’t sent a Black representative to the U.S. House since 1877, when the post-Civil War era of Reconstruction ended.

DeSantis said that shouldn’t be allowed, and he hopes that the U.S.Supreme Court invalidates such districts. He also cited a recent Florida Supreme Court opinion upholding the current map provision that eliminated a north Florida district that in the past had been crafted to increase the chances voters would elect a Black member of Congress.

The state Supreme Court ruling was 5-1, with the five-member majority all DeSantis appointees.

DeSantis said another reason Florida should change its congressional districts is because that state’s population has grown since the 2020 Census and shifted within the state. Since districts are drawn based on Census numbers, DeSantis didn’t explain what basis would be used for crafting new districts based on population shifts since then.

A major reason for the federal Census is to come up with population numbers for districts that are used for the subsequent 10 years.

The Florida Democratic Party called it an “unethical power grab” and party Chair Nikk Fried said DeSantis’ move is “speculative, corrupt, and a complete waste of taxpayer dollars.”

“Floridians are facing increased costs of living, meanwhile, Ron’s trying to stir chaos to distract from his failures, all in pursuit of Gavin Newsom-style headlines. Floridians deserve leaders focused on lowering costs, strengthening schools, and protecting freedoms, not political theater,” she said in a statement.

Newsom is the California governor spearheading his state’s efforts to counter Texas redistricting.

Cherfilus-McCormick’s communications director declined to comment.

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Staff writer Abigail Hasebroock contributed to this report.

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