A federal three-judge panel has upheld Florida’s congressional map after finding no constitutional problems with the state’s removal of an African-American performing district in the Big Bend but the broader legal fight isn't over.
Two years ago, Gov. Ron DeSantis signed his own congressional map into law after rejecting the legislature's bipartisan plan that would’ve preserved African-American voting power in North Florida. At a press conference Thursday, DeSantis defended his past decisions.
“We were right in 2022 to veto the map. We were right to sign the revised map, and we were right when we said that they would be upheld in the courts as being constitutional. And so that's just where we are two years later," he said.
Following a trial last fall, a U.S. District Court in Tallahassee found no evidence showing that the state legislature had acted with racially-discriminatory intent when voting to pass the governor’s map. Michael Li is a redistricting legal expert with New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice. Li says he’s read the court’s roughly 100-page ruling a couple times since it was issued Wednesday.
“The governor is very much a part of the legislative process," said Li. "And yet the court seemed to take the governor almost wholly out of it and say, ‘It only matters what happens within the the two chambers of the Florida legislature.’”
The governor’s map removed former Congressional District 5 — which stretched from Gadsden County to eastern Duval County — and favored Democrats. The legislature at first attempted to preserve the district, until the governor got involved.
The lead plaintiff in the federal lawsuit in Florida is Common Cause, a nonpartisan nonprofit that aims to protect democracy.
“We're concerned that this is how tyranny takes root. When the judicial and legislative branches cede power to a zealous executive, we all have to be worried," said Kathay Feng, Vice President of Programs for Common Cause.
Feng described the federal district court’s decision as "dangerous" and said a lot of the evidence that could’ve been used to show racially discriminatory intent was never presented. She says that includes text messages, emails, witness testimony and other evidence that could’ve shed light on conversations that were happening behind the scenes as Republican state lawmakers were working with the governor’s office to pass a map.
“Because the state legislature was able to effectively hide all of those conversations from the court’s view, it meant that the court had no evidence, no direct evidence to be able to show what its intentions were," she said.
Feng says they’re still deciding whether they’ll appeal the district court’s ruling. For now, she says she’s hoping for a better outcome in a state case that’s before the Florida Supreme Court.
"Racial and partisan gerrymandering are illegal in the state of Florida. We are hopeful that the state case will give voters justice and see the lines be redrawn so that Black voters are not denied the right to full representation.”
The state Supreme Court will likely hear arguments in that case this summer.
