Gov. Ron DeSantis said he’s prepared to redraw Florida’s congressional districts – with or without new census numbers.
“I don’t know how quick they can do it but if they did do it and came up with something in the next six months and they gave us a seat that would require us to redraw the lines,” DeSantis told reporters at an Aug. 11 event in Melbourne.
“Short of that, we’re in a situation where we believe there’s defects in the current map … even if they don’t revise the current census, I think it is appropriate to be doing it.”
The census is conducted once every 10 years but President Donald Trump called for a redo last week, claiming the U.S. Census Bureau produced faulty numbers that hurt Republican-run states.
At the heart of the push for a new census is Trump’s push to get GOP-led states to redraw their congressional districts to gain more Republican seats in the U.S. House ahead of the 2026 mid-term elections.
Texas is already in the middle of a mid-decade redistricting session. Such a move could cement GOP control of the chamber, although Democratic governors, including Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, have said they intend to draw more Democratic seats in their states if the Republicans conduct partisan gerrymanders throughout the country.
Republicans currently hold a 220-212 advantage over Democrats in the U.S. House. Three Democrats have died in office sine the start of the year, and if Democrats were to win those special elections they would need to gain three seats in the mid-terms to win control of the chamber.
New census wouldn’t be ready for ’26 elections
A completely new census would likely be a lengthy process that wouldn’t produce new numbers in time for the mid-term elections in November 2026. But Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier says he has a way to produce new census numbers without the hassle of counting every person all over again.
“We should not have to wait until the next complete, fifty state census hoping that – this time – the bureau will get it right and allocate the congressional seats and federal funding allocation to which they are entitled,” Uthmeier wrote in a letter to U.S. Commerce Department Secretary Howard Lutnick on Aug. 11. “Steps must be taken now to right these wrongs.”
The last U.S. census started in 2019, when the federal government started setting up field offices and hiring workers. The count was conducted in 2020, when Trump was in his first term, finishing in October that year.
But some Republicans, including DeSantis and Uthmeier, have noted the results from the census weren’t released until 2021, four months after President Joe Biden, a Democrat, had succeeded Trump in the Oval Office.
Undercounts, overcounts in last census, review found
They point to a 2022 review done by the U.S. Census Bureau showing several Republican-led states were undercounted and many Democrat-led states were overcounted. In the 2022 mid-term elections, the first after the census was done, Republicans gained nine U.S. House seats and retook control of the chamber.
In his letter, Uthmeier recommends using that review, the Post-Enumeration Survey (PES), to conduct a “tailored and streamlined manual recount” in the states that had undercounts and overcounts. That would mean recounting the parts of Florida, Texas, Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas and Illinois (undercounts), as well as Utah, Hawaii, Minnesota, Ohio, New York, Delaware, Massachusetts and Rhode Island (overcounts) that the Survey found with incorrect numbers.
DeSantis said he thought Florida could receive up to four new districts if an entire new census were done, but it’s unclear if the revised count Uthmeier suggests would actually yield that many new districts for the Sunshine State in reapportionment, the process of determining the number of U.S. House seats each state should get based on their populations.
Even if the PES isn’t used for a new round of reapportionment, Uthmeier stated it could still be used to update the formulas used to distribute federal funding, which rely on census data. The U.S. Constitution calls for a census to be done every 10 years. A mid-decade census has never been done.
Florida appears to be preparing for a redistricting special session. Florida House Speaker Daniel Perez, R-Miami, announced the creation of a special redistricting committee. But DeSantis, who has clashed with Perez on numerous issues this year, said he “wasn’t privy” to the move.
Gray Rohrer is a reporter with the USA TODAY Network-Florida Capital Bureau. He can be reached at grohrer@gannett.com. Follow him on X: @GrayRohrer.
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Florida Gov. DeSantis says he’s ready for redistricting – with or without new census
Reporting by Gray Rohrer, USA TODAY NETWORK – Florida / Tallahassee Democrat
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