legislature

The Virginia Supreme Court on Friday struck down a voter-approved Democratic congressional redistricting plan, delivering another major setback to the party in a nationwide battle against Republicans for an edge in this year’s midterm elections.

The court ruled that the state’s Democratic-led legislature violated procedural requirements when it placed the constitutional amendment on the ballot to authorize the mid-decade redistricting. Voters narrowly approved the amendment April 21, but the court’s ruling renders the results of that vote meaningless.

“This violation irreparably undermines the integrity of the resulting referendum vote and renders it null and void,” the court said in its opinion.

Democrats had hoped to win as many as four additional U.S. House seats under Virginia’s redrawn U.S. House map as part of an attempt to offset Republican redistricting done elsewhere at the urging of President Donald Trump. That ruling, combined with a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision severely weakening the Voting Rights Act, has supercharged the Republicans’ congressional gerrymandering advantage heading into this year’s midterm elections.

Legislative voting districts typically are redrawn once a decade after each census to account for population changes. But Trump started an unusual flurry of mid-decade redistricting last year when he encouraged Republican officials in Texas to redraw districts in a bid to win several additional U.S. House seats and hold on to their party’s narrow majority in the midterm elections.

California responded with new voter-approved districts drawn to Democrats’ advantage, and Utah’s top court imposed a new congressional map that also helps Democrats. Meanwhile, Republicans stand to gain from new House districts passed in Florida, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio and Tennessee. They could add even more after the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in the Voting Rights Act case, which has prompted some other Republican states to consider redrawing their maps in time for this year’s elections.

Virginia currently is represented in the U.S. House by six Democrats and five Republicans who were elected from districts imposed by a court after a bipartisan redistricting commission failed to agree on a map after the 2020 census. The new districts could have given Democrats an improved chance to win all but one of the state’s 11 congressional seats.

Under the Demcoratic-drawn map, five districts would have been anchored in the Democratic stronghold of northern Virginia, including one stretching out like a lobster to consume Republican-leaning rural areas. Revisions to four other districts across Richmond, southern Virginia and Hampton Roads would have diluted the voting power of conservative blocs in those areas. And a reshaped district in parts of western Virginia would have lumped together three Democratic-leaning college towns to offset other Republican voters.

The state Supreme Court’s seven justices are appointed by the state legislature, which has toggled back and forth between Democratic, Republican and split control over recent years. Legal experts say the body doesn’t have a set ideological profile

The case before the court focused not on the shape of the new districts but rather on the process the General Assembly used to authorize them.

Because the state’s redistricting commission was established by a voter-approved constitutional amendment, lawmakers had to propose an amendment to redraw the districts. That required approval of a resolution in two separate legislative sessions, with a state election sandwiched in between, to place the amendment on the ballot.

The legislature’s initial approval of the amendment occurred last October — while early voting was underway but before it concluded on the day of the general election. The legislature’s second vote on the amendment occurred after a new legislative session began in January. Lawmakers also approved a separate bill in February laying out the new districts, subject to voter approval of the constitutional amendment.

Judicial arguments focused on whether the legislature’s initial approval of the amendment came too late, because early voting already had begun for the 2025 general election.

Attorney Matthew Seligman, who defended the legislature, argued that the “election” should be defined narrowly to mean the Tuesday of the general election. In that case, the legislature’s first vote on the redistricting amendment occurred before the election and was constitutional, he told judges.

An attorney for the plaintiffs, Thomas McCarthy, argued that an “election” should be interpreted to cover the entire period during which people can cast ballots, which lasts several weeks in Virginia. If that’s the case, he told justices, then the legislature’s initial endorsement of the redistricting amendment came too late to comply with the state constitution.

In January, a judge in rural Tazewell County, in southwestern Virginia, ruled that lawmakers failed to follow their own rules for adding the redistricting amendment to a special session last fall. Circuit Judge Jack Hurley Jr. also ruled that lawmakers failed to initially approve the amendment before the public began voting in last year’s general election and that the state had failed to publish the amendment three months before the election, as required by law. As a result, he said, the amendment is invalid and void.

The Virginia Supreme Court placed Hurley’s order on hold and allowed the redistricting vote to proceed before hearing arguments on the case.

Lieb writes for the Associated Press.

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — The Florida Legislature approved a new congressional map intended to maximize Republicans’ advantage in the state as part of the national redistricting battle that President Trump launched ahead of this year’s midterms.

The vote came just two days after Gov. Ron DeSantis unveiled his proposal and the same day that the U.S. Supreme Court rolled back a key provision of the Voting Rights Act. The decision could make it harder for Democrats to challenge Republican efforts to redraw congressional districts in ways that limit the influence of nonwhite voters.

DeSantis’ map could increase Republicans’ advantage in Florida’s House delegation to 24 to 4, up from the current split of 20 to 8. The potential four-seat gain is the same as what Virginia Democrats expect from a recent redistricting referendum, which is being challenged in state court there.

Florida’s new districts are certain to face lawsuits as well, especially because the state constitution prohibits redistricting for explicitly partisan purposes. DeSantis and his aides believe those provisions will not be a legal barrier because they have been weakened previously by the Florida Supreme Court and again by Wednesday’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling.

Florida Republicans, comfortable in their supermajority in both legislative chambers, said little about the new districts during the whirlwind special session. The measure’s sponsor, Rep. Jenna Persons-Mulicka (R-Fort Myers), limited her remarks to careful answers about an “evolving legal landscape” as Democrats’ asked her about the redistricting effort.

“I believe that there is a likelihood that that map will be upheld against legal challenge,” Persons-Mulicka said.

Opposition was vocal but futile

Democrats, activists and some citizens to decried the process as a partisan power play to satisfy Trump, boost DeSantis’ future ambitions and hurt the majority of registered Florida voters who are not Republicans.

“Y’all are doing this because y’all’s daddy in the White House is injecting national political objectives into what should be a state-driven process,” Rep. Michele Rayner (D-St. Petersburg) told her Republican colleagues before an 83-28 vote in favor of the measure.

The Florida Senate later approved the plan in a 21-17 vote.

Rep. Angie Nixon, a Jacksonville Democrat, chided Republicans for yielding the redistricting process to DeSantis, whose second term expires in January.

“Last time I checked, we’re the ones who were supposed to be drawing the map,” she said, “and yet we are allowing y’all to continue to hold the water of the governor, who is a lame duck and just trying to figure out what his next job is going to be.”

Democrats diminished in metro areas

The new map reshapes districts in Democratic areas around Orlando, the Tampa-St. Petersburg area and in south Florida around Palm Beach, Fort Lauderdale and Miami. The changes could cost Reps. Jared Moskowitz and Debbie Wasserman Schultz, among others, their seats.

DeSantis and his aides said before and during the session that new map is necessary to account for population growth in suburban and exurban areas since the 2020 census and to ensure Florida has a “race-neutral” congressional plan.

The proposal presumed the outcome of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Wednesday decision, which specifically struck down a Louisiana congressional district drawn for the electorate to be majority-Black. Historically, Black voters have aligned more with Democrats, while a majority of white voters lean toward Republicans.

The changes in Florida include the effective elimination of one nearly majority Black south Florida district that was represented by Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, a Black Democrat, until her resignation earlier this month.

Lawmakers fast-tracked the measures

From the session’s opening bell Tuesday morning, Republican leaders moved swiftly.

In one of just two committee hearings, Senate Rules Chair Kathleen Passidomo (R-Naples) said she wanted “everybody who has taken the time and effort to come to Capitol to have an opportunity to speak.” Then she declared each speaker would have 30 seconds.

“I know that doesn’t seem like a lot but it actually is, uh, if you’re concise,” she said.

Deborah Courtney drove more than two hours from from Jacksonville and noted that all citizen speakers expressed opposition.

“Why are you doing this redistricting now?” she asked senators. “I doubt that your phone have been ringing off the hook from your constituents going, hey, we need some new maps.”

Rob Woods came from the Tampa area, which under the new map could have no Democratic representation in the U.S. House. A Black man, Wood told senators he was a veteran who said he “bought in from elementary school” on notions of the U.S. as an equal-opportunity democracy.

Now, he said, “it seems as if we are back in that period of Reconstruction, moving back to Jim Crow.”

On the House floor, Persons-Mulicka sidestepped specifics about what factors went into the map. She repeatedly called it “race-neutral,” citing testimony from DeSantis aide Jason Poreda, who took sole credit for the map during the session and did not disclose the names of any architects. But asked about Poreda’s admission that he examined party affiliation and voting patterns, Persons-Mulicka balked.

“I cannot speak to the intent of the map drawer,” she said.

DeSantis unveiled the map on Fox News

Persons-Mulicka and Sen. Don Gaetz, who sponsored the map in the Senate, deflected questions about why DeSantis unveiled the plan on Fox News.

Gaetz, a Crestview Republican, confirmed he had no part in drafting the map and forwarded the governor’s proposal to other senators as soon as he received it late Monday morning.

There’s no guarantee that new maps across the country will play out the way two parties hope. For example, Texas based its revised lines largely on Trump’s performance in 2024, redistributing the president’s voters across more districts to pull them into the Republican column. But Trump’s popularity has waned since his reelection, including among Latino voters who figure prominently in the state.

Florida could face a similar conundrum. Creating more majority-Republican districts could leave margins thin enough to allow for Democratic victories, especially if there’s an anti-Trump backlash at the polls this year.

Some Republicans have expressed worry about that possibility, and a handful voted against the measure in the Florida Legislature.

The governor already took a hit because of the session. He had wanted lawmakers to adopt state regulations on artificial intelligence, ostensibly protecting minors from harmful material, while rolling back vaccine mandates for students in Florida’s public schools. House Speaker Daniel Perez, a Republican but not a DeSantis ally, spiked both ideas.

DeSantis called it “political shenanigans.”

House Minority Leader Fentrice Driskell (D-Tampa) lamented that Republicans still delivered DeSantis the big-ticket item that he wanted.

“On destroying our democracy, they’ve been aligned,” she said, “and that’s what we did here today.”

Barrow writes for the Associated Press.

April 29 (UPI) — The Florida legislature approved a new congressional map proposed by Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday, sending the redistricting plan back to the governor’s office for a signature.

The new congressional map would allow the Republican Party to pick up an expected four more seats in Congress, Politico reported. In total, the party would have 24 seats to four that would lean Democrat. Currently, Florida Republicans hold 20 seats in Congress and Democrats have seven.

DeSantis submitted his proposal Monday as the state legislature convened a special session.

“Our new map for 2026 makes good on my promise to conduct mid-decade redistricting and it more fairly represents the makeup of Florida today,” DeSantis told Fox News earlier in the week.

Florida lawmakers fast-tracked the proposal ahead of Novembers midterms, The Hill reported. Committees in both the House and Senate advanced the map within hours of the start of the special session.

Lawmakers approved the map mostly along party lines, with some Republican senators voting against it.

Dave Wasserman with Cook Political Report said Reps. Kath Castor, Darren Soto, Jared Moskowitz and Debbie Wasserman Schultz, all Democrats, are now in danger of losing their seats come November.