Florida Gop House Speaker Insists White House Is Not Pushing Redistricting

TALLAHASSEE, Florida — The state’s Republican House speaker insisted Wednesday that he is not under any pressure to move ahead with a new congressional map in the nation’s third-largest state, where some Republicans are hoping to pick up anywhere from three to five seats during the midterms.

House Speaker Daniel Perez, in an interview with POLITICO, said he has not had any direct or indirect conversation with the White House about mid-decade redistricting. But Perez said the House is forging ahead in response to a state Supreme Court decision last summer that undercut some of Florida redistricting standards.

“I am not being pushed by outside forces to push redistricting,” said Perez, a Miami Republican. “We believe that redistricting is a conversation that should take place. This is a reaction to the recent decision.”

But Perez, who noted that the House has yet to begin working on a new map, said his chamber would not wait until later in 2026 to act — as suggested by both Gov. Ron DeSantis and state Senate President Ben Albritton. Albritton earlier this week told reporters it made sense for Florida to hold off while awaiting a U.S. Supreme Court decision in a crucial Louisiana case over whether states can consider race when drawing district lines. DeSantis has made similar comments.

“We don’t really see the need to go out and do these things yet,” said Albritton. He added later that “it makes sense to me in my mind to wait and garner all the information we can.”

Perez doesn't share that viewpoint.

“We can start to get the ball rolling,” Perez said. “We don’t have a map. We haven’t started to draw a map, but it doesn’t mean that we can’t start to have that conversation.”

Perez added: “I think it's inconsiderate of our members to say that in May, when hopefully we're home, you're going to have to come back to Tallahassee and take a week off or whatever you have going on with your family because certain parties didn't want to address an issue that was before us right now in the immediate moment. I think that's irresponsible. And so the House isn't going to take that.”

Perez made his comments the same morning that the House redistricting committee held its second meeting this month. The panel, which took no public testimony, reviewed recent court cases involving redistricting. Democratic legislators tried to press a House-hired lawyer on whether there is any need to go forward now and confirmed the Legislature would rely on census data from 2020 if it goes ahead.

Florida could be considered the crown jewel of the redistricting sweepstakes sparked by President Donald Trump and the White House. The GOP already has a 20-8 edge due to a map muscled into law back in 2022 by DeSantis after he vetoed an initial map that had been drawn up by the Legislature.

DeSantis has for months now floated the idea of joining other states engaged in mid-decade redistricting. But one complicating factor remains: The state has strict voter-approved anti-gerrymandering standards that could trigger immediate litigation if lawmakers go ahead. Those standards prohibit drawing new districts strictly for partisan gain.

Those same voter standards had minority protection standards modeled after the Voting Rights Act. Civil rights and voter rights groups challenged the state’s current map because it dismantled a north Florida seat that was held by a Democrat and connected minority communities from Jacksonville to Tallahassee.

The Florida Supreme Court, however, ruled that the old seat failed to meet equal protection standards under the U.S. Constitution. Andy Bardos, an attorney working on behalf of the House, told the redistricting committee Wednesday that the ruling added more clarity to how maps are drawn but pointed out that decision had not been applied to other districts in the state.

Democratic legislators, however, remain skeptical of the need to make any changes now.

“[The Florida Legislature] doesn’t care about what the courts are going to say,” said state House Minority Leader Fentrice Driskell. “[The Legislature] wants to do this because they want to satisfy Donald Trump. Let’s be very clear about it. The president said that he wanted to keep a partisan majority in the midterms and that is what happened in Texas, and that is what is happening in Florida.”