How a Florida fight could help Democrats win Congress or bring a constitutional clash

A fast-tracked Florida Supreme Court decision on whether a North Florida congressional district drawn by Gov. Ron DeSantis is legally valid could either help Democrats retake Congress in 2024 or set up a historic showdown between the state and U.S. constitutions.

The state has appealed a state circuit judge’s ruling from this past weekend that the map designed to eliminate a Black district was in violation of Florida law.

The high court, which contains a supermajority of conservatives appointed by DeSantis, could uphold that decision or strike down the state’s Fair Districts Amendments, which have acted as a bulwark against gerrymandering since their passage by voters in 2010.

“The Florida Supreme Court could decide to overturn their own precedent because that was a Democratic majority” that previously ruled on the issue in 2015, said Michael McDonald, a professor of political science at the University of Florida. “Now we have a Republican majority.”

Circuit Court Judge J. Lee Marsh used the amendments as the basis for his ruling on Saturday. Marsh decided that the map pushed through by DeSantis last year, in an unprecedented involvement by a governor into the redistricting process, “results in the diminishment of Black voters’ ability to elect their candidate of choice in violation of the Florida Constitution.”

The map eliminated a Black majority seat in North Florida, represented by former Democratic U.S. Rep. Al Lawson, that connected Black neighborhoods from Jacksonville to Tallahassee. DeSantis called the seat “a 200-mile gerrymander” that violated the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause.

Marsh ruled the Legislature must redraw its congressional lines to restore a Black voter majority seat. And he warned that he would order it done if the Legislature failed to act.

A similar ruling a decade ago led to a court-led redrawing of Florida’s entire congressional map, including creating seats eventually won by Central Florida Democrats Val Demings and Stephanie Murphy.

This time around, an agreement between the plaintiffs, including Black Voters Matter and the League of Women Voters, would limit any changes to North Florida, despite concerns about Demings’ seat being redrawn with a plurality of white voters.

Cecile Scoon, the co-president of the League of Women Voters of Florida, said the decision to drop Central Florida from the case was a strategic one.

“The legal analysis that was used to prove the diminishment in North Florida requires no intent,” Scoon said. “In other words, we don’t care if you meant to do this or not. You did it…. When you don’t have to prove intent, that’s an easier case.”

More Democrats?

DeSantis’ map helped give Florida Republicans four additional seats in Congress, which almost by itself made up the five-seat difference in the GOP taking over the chamber. A restored Democratic seat, along with court rulings in Alabama and Louisiana and a new map in New York, could play a role in Democrats retaking power next year.

“There’s still a lot to be decided,” said Matt Isbell, a Democratic elections analyst who runs the MCIMaps site. “But in what’s likely to be a very narrow Congress, these individual rulings are going to have impacts in many different states.”

Republicans, meanwhile, “are surely going to be trying to angle the gerrymander in other states like Ohio and North Carolina,” Isbell said.

McDonald said that even though the ruling only officially affects the North Florida seat, it could ultimately have a trickle-down effect on Central Florida.

“Basically, everything north of Orlando is going to be reconfigured,” McDonald said. “But it could actually affect some of the Orlando area and even over in Tampa districts too. It’s a shuffling of furniture, but there’s only certain places where you can put the furniture.”

The state has appealed Marsh’s ruling, triggering an automatic delay.

“We submitted an appeal because we believe the appeal will be successful,” said governor’s office spokesman Jeremy Redfern. Both Redfern and the notice of appeal, filed Monday, did not add any additional arguments.

Now attention turns to the state Supreme Court, which can either uphold the lower court ruling or issue its own decision by the end of the year.

Scoon said both sides have agreed to expedite the process by skipping the lower appellate court “in the interest of getting an answer … so that everybody will be in a good position to know what to do for the upcoming elections.”

Sidestepping the issue

Isbell said the court could decide to sidestep the issue and rule the state has no right to appeal.

“If the Florida Supreme Court doesn’t want to strike down Fair Districts, but also doesn’t want to defy the governor and maybe skate on this political hot-button issue, they could simply say the state has no standing and the lower court’s decision is affirmed,” Isbell said.

McDonald, though, said there was a better than-even chance that the court would instead take the case.

“That means worse news for the plaintiffs because now the Florida Supreme Court [could] be looking to reverse that earlier precedent and reverse the decision of the lower court,” McDonald said. “It doesn’t guarantee that’s what’s going to happen. It’s just that there’s a much greater likelihood.”

McDonald said there was always a risk for election rights groups that a suit could endanger Fair Districts.

“[But] if you don’t litigate, then the Constitution is impotent,” McDonald said. “… If you don’t try to enforce what the Constitution does through litigation, then you’ve already basically de facto neutered the Florida Constitution.”

Scoon said her group and others were aware of the risk. But she said a decision against Fair Districts “would be literally be flying in the face of the United States Supreme Court.”

U.S. Supreme Court ruling

The U.S. Supreme Court’s 2018 decision in Rucho v. Common Cause specifically mentions Fair Districts, stating the amendments are enforceable and recommending similar measures in other states.

“It would be pretty amazing for our Supreme Court to fly in the face of all of that,” she said. “But if that happened, it would be truly a sad day. And would be invalidating the precedent laid down already.”

Even if the plaintiffs are successful, there’s still the potential for the Republican-led Legislature to try to run out the clock and not pass a new map reviving the old district in time for the election year, as is happening in Alabama.

A federal court rejected that state’s new map on Wednesday for not drawing a second Black district as required.

Scoon said the plaintiffs’ agreement with the state has a “very specific deadline.”

“If legislators don’t take action by a certain time, then it can be taken from them and expedited,” Scoon said. “I think our lawyers really looked down the line.”

Isbell said he was intrigued by what DeSantis may do if a new map reversing his own arrives on his desk, especially in the midst of his presidential campaign.

“All of this stuff stemmed from DeSantis working to try to ingratiate himself with conservative voters,” Isbell said. “… But by the time there’s actually maps being drawn, I presume DeSantis will have already flamed out in all the early primary states. I don’t think it’ll matter at that point.”

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