Eric Holder brings Democrats’ redistricting fight to Florida

A national organization that helped pave the way for Democrats’ sweeping state legislative victories last month in Virginia is turning its focus to Florida ahead of the 2020 Census and a looming redrawing of state and congressional districts.

The National Democratic Redistricting Committee, led by former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, plans to promote and support the Census next year in one of the most important battleground states in the nation, Holder said Wednesday during a round table at the Biscayne Shores headquarters of the liberal grassroots non-profit New Florida Majority.

Holder said his organization — which sued successfully in Virginia to overturn state legislative maps drawn to pack in minority voters and then raised money for Democratic candidates — also plans to pressure Florida lawmakers to create constitutionally sound congressional and legislative maps once the new Census data leads to reapportionment.

“Virginia was a target state for us in 2019 in the way that Florida is a target state for us in 2020,” Holder, who served in former President Barack Obama’s cabinet, told reporters Wednesday.

Holder’s prioritization of Florida — a state where progressive activists sued to overturn the congressional and legislative maps drawn by Florida’s Republican-controlled Legislature after the 2010 census — reflects a new urgency by Democrats around down-ballot races.

Democrats lost ground to Republicans in state capitals in Florida and around the country in the 2010 midterm elections, and now argue that those losses led to Republican gerrymandering of state and congressional districts in states where lawmakers control redistricting.

In Florida, former gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum recently announced plans to campaign for Democratic state House candidates in cooperation with Forward Majority, a national political group that also aims to end Republican gerrymandering.

Holder said Wednesday that his organization, which spent $500,000 supporting Gillum and the Florida branch of the nation’s largest liberal grassroots organization, For Our Future, will likely spend about that much in the state in 2020.

But regardless of what happens in the 2020 elections, there aren’t enough competitive seats up for grabs for Democrats to seize the state House in Florida the way they did in Virginia last month. So, Republicans will still control all three chambers and likely the redistricting process.

Ellen Freidin, the Miami attorney who led the 2010 Fair Districts campaign that created a constitutional amendment prohibiting the creation of districts to favor a party or incumbent, attended Holder’s round table and said afterward in an interview that she hopes lawmakers will follow the law.

After voters approved the constitutional amendment, Freidin’s non-partisan organization, Fair Districts Now, sued the state over the maps drawn in 2012 and forced a redrawing of several congressional and Senate districts.

“We want them to do the right thing” on the next round of redistricting, Friedin, a prominent progressive booster, said Wednesday. “Only time will tell. We don’t know what to expect.”

Spokespersons for the Florida House and Senate did not respond to emails Wednesday seeking comment on Holder’s appearance in Miami and his redistricting campaign. Attempts to reach the Republican Legislative Campaign Committee were unsuccessful.

Kimberly Strassel, a conservative columnist for the Wall Street Journal, wrote last month following Democrats’ legislative victories in Virginia that Holder’s redistricting committee had laid the groundwork for the results of the election by overturning Republican-drawn maps. Democrats now control the House, Senate and governor’s office heading into redistricting, although the state recently began a push to move that responsibility to the hands of a bipartisan committee.

“They will redraw Virginia’s legislative district lines after next year’s Census,” Strassel wrote, arguing that Holder’s committee is actually interested in districts that favor Democrats. “This was Mr. Holder’s plan.”

Holder said Wednesday that he’s only seeking “fair” districts to ensure fair representation.

“If the system is fair,” he said, “people will be treated fairly.”

Activists warned Holder Wednesday that Florida is one of just a handful of states that doesn’t have a complete count committee to help promote and support the federal count, which helps decide how hundreds of billions of dollars in federal grants are distributed and which states add — or subtract — congressional districts.

Expectations are that Florida, one of the fastest growing states in the country, will gain two new congressional seats following the 2020 census.

Holder, speaking on behalf of his redistricting organization’s grassroots advocacy wing, All on the Line, said he’s concerned that an aborted push by President Donald Trump’s Department of Commerce to place a citizenship question on the Census has already damaged the 2020 count by intimidating undocumented citizens. He worried that Florida, a diverse state with millions of immigrants, will suffer if people are afraid to cooperate with the Census for fear of repercussions.

But he encouraged the activists in the room to promote the Census and then pressure politicians on redistricting, saying he hopes to repeat Virginia’s results without repeating the lawsuits.

“What happens in this state has national consequences,” Holder said.