Trump’s Gerrymandering Has Been A Boondoggle. Now DeSantis.
Senior Republicans in Washington are ramping up the pressure on Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to redraw his state’s US House map after Virginia Democrats flipped potentially four seats in their favor.
With just six months until the midterms, Republicans see Florida as their last major chance to make gains in the redistricting war President Donald Trump launched last summer. They hope to pick up as many as three seats in the Sunshine State, which would give Republicans back their slight advantage from redistricting, though much smaller than they’d once hoped. With Tuesday’s referendum passing in Virginia, Democrats are estimated to have drawn 10 seats in their favor nationwide compared to the Republicans’ nine.
“Florida has the right and the intention to do it. And my view is that they should,” Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters on Wednesday. Asked if the Florida legislators should redraw the state’s maps before the midterms, Johnson said: “Yes, absolutely.” By
Gerrymandering is the process of disenfranchising certain groups of voters for the who don’t generally vote the way the gerrymanderer wants. This phenomenon has played out as long as Americans have been voting. Coming up with ways to make sure your candidate has an edge and disregarding the will of the general public is engrained in American politics from the outset of the Republic. The current Administration put that into overdrive in a brazen effort to gerrymander the elections in many different states but that has been met with a successful tit for tat from the Democrats. The saga’s next chapter now turns to Florida and Gov. DeSantis.
