2020 Census and Redistricting Thread: Florida

[Nyvin]

With Salazar and Giminez both winning, I do wonder how the GOP handles south Florida, I don't think they can save both districts for 10 years, but would they even try?

I honestly don't know, it's not like anyone can really predict how the south Florida hispanic vote is going to go over the next decade.

[Nyvin]

I don't see them dropping the FL-5 AA seat.  Minority access seats pretty much never go away.   Even with the R State Supreme Court it'll exist in some fashion somewhere.  The optics of drawing it out to replace it with a bunch of 55% R seats is absolutely horrible.

[Nyvin]

I don't see them dropping the FL-5 AA seat.  Minority access seats pretty much never go away.   Even with the R State Supreme Court it'll exist in some fashion somewhere.  The optics of drawing it out to replace it with a bunch of 55% R seats is absolutely horrible.

Yes because the current fl5th looks so clean and nice on the optical side to the average voter.

The much more moderate GA gop was also willing to draw out the similarly non sensible Ga 12th even if it was a minority access seat.

Democrats could argue for a seat purely based in Jacksonville and that had a chance in a lawsuit. I do not see current courts requiring Fl 5th in current form.

Pretty shape of a district < Denying Blacks representation

I'm not sure GA-12 is fitting the role of "minority access" either.  It was a new seat when they drew it and only lasted two elections.   If it was it was a really terrible one.

[Nyvin]

Fair enough. With FL-13, what I do is make one entirely Pinellas based CD, and the leftovers “just happen” to be FL-14. I really do hope you’re right that the courts will enforce the law, to help mitigate the gerrymander a bit.

That requires splitting St Pete though,  Pinellas is about ~70k short of it's own district without St Pete. 

[Nyvin]

That can't possibly be real.

[Nyvin]

From this article




Does anyone know for sure who actually drew these maps?

In that sentence they're referring to the current district map that was redrawn in 2015,  the FL Supreme Court choose the map the Women's LoV drew.  

It's not referring to the draft map that came out today.

(I agree the article is worded very poorly though)

[Nyvin]

Bruh even if they're playing it safe why would they draw 3 Biden seats in Tampa, when 2 is easy to do and perfectly legal, and one could argue better represents the interests of minority voters.

Even if Rs do end up playing this one safe I'd expect them to make a few minor changes at the very least, especially when it comes to the I-84 corridor.

Tampa is pretty much a Democratic gerrymander, lol.

[Nyvin]

https://twitter.com/MappingFL/status/1465340478686044167

This is what I was expecting from the beginning.   

It seems Sabatini's unpopularity with the FL GOP is what's keeping them from cracking FL-7,  this is the only map that does it.

[Nyvin]

That really seems like red meat to throw to conservative voters.   It completely spits on the Fair Districts Amendment everywhere and most likely violates the VRA in regards to black voters as well.

Also I don't believe the Florida Governor holds veto power over the maps anyway.  

[Nyvin]

Ron DeSantis' Press Secretary has made the following statement re: FL-05

“The northern Florida district is an unconstitutional gerrymander that unnaturally connects communities in Jacksonville with communities hours away in Tallahassee and Gadsden counties,” Pushaw wrote. “We eliminated this flagrant gerrymander. We believe our map is within constitutional requirements and performs better than the other maps on Tier 2 constitutional requirements, including compactness and preservation of boundaries, all while increasing the number of minority districts.”

The FDA literally states that the maps must produce districts that racial minorities can elect candidates of their choice.   Blacks in the Panhandle deserve a candidate of their choice, it's an obvious COI.   Florida has had a black opportunity district in the northern part of the state for decades, well before the FDA.  Are they seriously going to make the argument that blacks in northern/Central Florida get NO seats?  That's absurd.

FDA language-

Districts shall not be drawn to deny racial or language minorities the equal
opportunity to participate in the polit ical process and elect representatives of their choice.

Who would've thought a constitutional amendment that literally writes out protection for racial minorities' representation would be used to potentially remove their representation!

[Nyvin]

Ron DeSantis' Press Secretary has made the following statement re: FL-05

“The northern Florida district is an unconstitutional gerrymander that unnaturally connects communities in Jacksonville with communities hours away in Tallahassee and Gadsden counties,” Pushaw wrote. “We eliminated this flagrant gerrymander. We believe our map is within constitutional requirements and performs better than the other maps on Tier 2 constitutional requirements, including compactness and preservation of boundaries, all while increasing the number of minority districts.”

The FDA literally states that the maps must produce districts that racial minorities can elect candidates of their choice.   Blacks in the Panhandle deserve a candidate of their choice, it's an obvious COI.   Florida has had a black opportunity district in the northern part of the state for decades, well before the FDA.  Are they seriously going to make the argument that blacks in northern/Central Florida get NO seats?  That's absurd.

FDA language-

Districts shall not be drawn to deny racial or language minorities the equal
opportunity to participate in the polit ical process and elect representatives of their choice.

Who would've thought a constitutional amendment that literally writes out protection for racial minorities' representation would be used to potentially remove their representation!

Please explain to me the difference between NC12 and FL05.
Desantis's map is way less likely to get struck down than the senate map if either are sued.

Ummm....yes.  Blacks can elect the candidate of their choice from a district entirely within Mecklenburg county (hence Alma Adams).   They cannot do so (at least not ensured to do so) in a district in Duval County or out of Leon and surrounding counties.   I don't know how that isn't obvious but okay.

[Nyvin]

Desantis's map is way less likely to get struck down than the senate map if either are sued.

lmao what

I mean. Maybe that turns out to be true because the FLSC is stacked with hacks, but that's. Not what I imagine the legal consensus is.

Miller v Johnson. See how the Dekalb Savanah district got struck down by the conservatives on SCOTUS in the 1990's. Note that the map was designed by the GOP.

...you know that the FLSC drew the current configuration in the North right?

This isn't about the FLSC. This is about FL05 being illegal federally.

There is no federal mandate about compactness for congressional districts.   Certainly no mandate about not linking geographically separated minority populations.

[Nyvin]

Desantis's map is way less likely to get struck down than the senate map if either are sued.

lmao what

I mean. Maybe that turns out to be true because the FLSC is stacked with hacks, but that's. Not what I imagine the legal consensus is.

Miller v Johnson. See how the Dekalb Savanah district got struck down by the conservatives on SCOTUS in the 1990's. Note that the map was designed by the GOP.

...you know that the FLSC drew the current configuration in the North right?

This isn't about the FLSC. This is about FL05 being illegal federally.

There is no federal mandate about compactness for congressional districts.   Certainly no mandate about not linking geographically separated minority populations.

I have to disagree with this one here - Gingle's says minority district's cannot be unnecessarily uncompact. Essentially, don't draw districts across the length of the state so as to create minority seats if that is the only option. Or be unnecessarily uncompact to pack in as many PoC as possible when a compact performing alternative exists - the NC 2016 situation.

But of course by Florida redistricting law FL-05 isn't uncompact - especially when we remember that the old FL-05 was more uncompact and signed into law in 2010. This version actually stays in north Florida whereas the previous version went into the I4 and two cities in between.

Any argument about FL-5 not being allowed under the VRA is moot because the district as drawn in the 2000's and 2010 (pre-2016) were much more stretched out and dispersed than it is now and the courts never struck it down then.

[Nyvin]

Desantis's map is way less likely to get struck down than the senate map if either are sued.

lmao what

I mean. Maybe that turns out to be true because the FLSC is stacked with hacks, but that's. Not what I imagine the legal consensus is.

Miller v Johnson. See how the Dekalb Savanah district got struck down by the conservatives on SCOTUS in the 1990's. Note that the map was designed by the GOP.

...you know that the FLSC drew the current configuration in the North right?

This isn't about the FLSC. This is about FL05 being illegal federally.

Then why wasn't it ruled illegal decades ago?

No one has bothered suing. The FL GOP legislatively certainly wouldn't benefit as they get a lot of gerrymander benefits from these maps.

Martinez v. Bush - 2002

[Nyvin]

Now it removes FL-5 as an AA seat AND crosses the Tampa Bay to make a Dem vote sink,  what a surprise!

[Nyvin]

FL-5 was always going to be the hardest district to get through the courts.   They can probably get away with the Tampa seats and FL-7.

[Nyvin]

Now that the crackpot theorycrafting by DeSantis is dead via Allen v. Milligan not going his way, the defendants realize the North Florida districts (not having any black opportunity district) are indefensible due to the retrogression (or "diminishment") wording in the Fair Districts amendment.  

So now the FLGOP wants to declare the entire retrogression section of the Fair Districts amendment (along with any racial representation rules) unconstitutional, which is idiocy.

[Nyvin]

It takes Thomas and Alito judicial standards to make the argument that the 14th Amendment - passed in the wake of the Civil War to end the slavery of African Americans in the country - guarantees the right of lawmakers to discriminate against blacks in redistricting congressional maps.

[Nyvin]

The state's argument that the old FL-5 is non-compact is also total crap because they themselves drew the current FL-20 district which is most definitely less compact than the old FL-5.

https://twitter.com/MappingFL/status/1694713369285296598

[Nyvin]

Even if the judges on the State Supreme Court are all Partisan R Hacks, the FLGOP still has an extremely tough case on it's hands for this.   All the plaintiffs need to prove is that the result of the new map diminished black voter's ability to elect a candidate of their choice.   The old map gave them a candidate, the new map didn't.   Simple as that.  The intention of the map drawers doesn't matter.   

Even if they go back to the pre-2016 map, the black voters in Duval still had the opportunity to elect a candidate.   It's hard to imagine a redistricting case being any easier.   

The equal protection charges the Republicans are putting forward don't seem very credible.  It seems like they're trying to do a spin off of the affirmative action case with university admissions, but that's a very apples and oranges comparison to drawing congressional districts.

If the R judges on the FLSC do find a way to strike down the ruling for FL-5, it'll definitely be a case summary with lots of clever legalise and crafty wording, that's for sure!

[Nyvin]

Do the Republicans have any type of rebuttal to the point that a D-leaning seat fully in Duval County can be easily drawn? Because that's not only obviously true it completely invalidates any "compactness" claims they're making.

Ig that even though a Duval based seat itself is compact, it forces another district to be uncompact? You either need a wrap-around suburban Jacksonville seat or a rural district that grabs Nassau County. Still a pretty weak argument though.

The state senate did propose a Duval only district in 2021, so obviously they thought it would work at some point.  I *think* the only real argument against it would be that african americans wouldn't have sufficient numbers to reliably control the Dem primary...?

[Nyvin]

The trial is starting.   The judges kinda seem hostile to the plaintiffs at first, but that's not surprising considering they're all R judges.

[Nyvin]

That was a weird trial.   Section 5 district are only valid if they're brought about by a Section 2 claim???  WTF??

Also the case isn't even dealing with the VRA but the fair districts amendment in the FL constitution, which wasn't brought up at all, why?

The judges interrupted the lawyers so much they practically were just spewing their own narrative and not letting the lawyers get anything to say at all.  What a joke of a court.