Florida Supreme Court To Hear Arguments in Congressional Redistricting Case
The Florida Supreme Court on Thursday will hear arguments in a lawsuit led by Black Voters Matter (BVM) alleging the state’s Republican-drawn congressional map unconstitutionally diminishes Black voting power in North Florida.
Although Floridaians will vote under the contested map this November, the state Supreme Court’s ultimate decision following this week’s argument could alter district boundaries for the 2026 election cycle and beyond.
Florida trial court Judge Lee Marsh struck down the map last year after concluding that the state unconstitutionally diminished Black voting power in Jacksonville and Tallahassee. But shortly thereafter, a conservative state appeals court reversed the ruling, leaving the districts in place for 2024.
Florida’s GOP-controlled legislature enacted the discriminatory map at the behest of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) during an April 2022 special legislative session — brazenly ignoring objections to the elimination of North Florida’s historically Black-performing 5th Congressional District.
In dismantling the longstanding 5th Congressional District most recently represented by Rep. Al Lawson (D-Fla.), the DeSantis’ map spread Black voters in North Florida across four separate districts. The move deprived Black voters of the ability to elect their preferred candidate in any one district and put an end to almost three decades of Black representation.
According to BVM’s lawsuit, the map violates the Florida Constitution’s Fair Districts Amendment — a set of redistricting reforms approved by voters in 2010. The amendment, among other provisions, outlines a “non-diminishment standard,” whereby districts cannot be drawn in a manner that “diminishes” the ability of minority voters to elect their preferred candidate.
In a phone interview with Democracy Docket, April Albright, BVM’s National Legal Director, explained that her organization’s lawsuit is in part “an effort to fight back against rogue elected officials seeking to diminish the voices of Black voters and undo the will of Floridians,” who overwhelmingly voted in favor of the Fair Districts Amendment fourteen years ago.
As part of its appeal to the Florida Supreme Court, BVM and its co-plaintiffs argue the justices should reinstate Marsh’s opinion striking down the current map, which they say constitutes a “textbook violation” of the Fair District Amendment’s non-diminishment provision.
BVM asserts that in upholding the DeSantis’ map, the 1st District Court of Appeal uprooted existing Florida Supreme Court precedent by improperly grafting a set of preconditions used in cases involving the federal Voting Rights Acts onto the plaintiffs’ state-level non-diminishment claim.
Additionally, BVM maintains that the appeals court flouted an earlier agreement between the parties, in which the state conceded that the new congressional map fails to provide Black voters with an opportunity to elect their preferred candidate in North Florida. The agreement, if adhered to, would have also allowed for the case to proceed on an expedited basis to the Florida Supreme Court for resolution prior to this year’s elections.
On the other hand, those defending the map, including Florida Secretary of State Cord Byrd (D), counter that the plaintiffs’ “non-diminishment theory would compel the State to perpetuate a grotesque racial gerrymander.”
The state reasons that the creation of a majority-Black North Florida congressional district would amount to a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause, which prohibits race from predominating over the redistricting process.
But as BVM asserts, state officials wrongly “conflate racial consciousness in redistricting, which is entirely permissible, with racial predominance,” adding that “Florida’s non-diminishment provision does not require race to predominate its redistricting process.”
“All that’s being asked of the court is to follow its own precedent and apply this very important constitutional amendment to Florida’s congressional map…It is not anything extraordinary, ” Albright said.
In light of the parties’ dispute over the Florida constitution’s non-diminishment standard, Thursday’s argument will turn on the question of how the provision should be applied to the state’s redistricting processes going forward.
Former Florida elected officials, in an amicus brief, urged the state Supreme Court to strike down the DeSantis map, writing that the “case raises important legal issues about the ability of communities of color to have meaningful and sustained representation at all levels of government in Florida.”
“We all have a vested interest in the outcome because representation matters deeply to us and our communities. A long history of discrimination, voter suppression, violence, and entrenched inequality has resulted in the underrepresentation of Black voters at all levels of government,” the brief continues.
Earlier this year, a federal three-judge panel rejected a separate case from civil rights groups challenging the congressional map under the U.S. Constitution. The panel acknowledged that even though DeSantis acted with a discriminatory purpose in creating the map, the plaintiffs did not adequately demonstrate that the Legislature had a similar motive.
Albright hopes the Florida Supreme Court will “adhere to precedent and follow the undisputed facts in the case…so Black Floridians can get that very important district back in place.”
Florida’s congressional district lines are set for the upcoming election, but Albright underscored that 2024 is nevertheless an “important year to help continue to bring the changes that are needed in Florida.”
“This case is a way to fight back against an abuse of power and serves as an example of accountability, quite frankly, to other rogue governors and activist courts that want to upend precedent instead of moving this country forward.”