{"id":110083,"date":"2026-01-08T06:39:15","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T06:39:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/110083\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T06:39:15","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T06:39:15","slug":"ben-albritton-following-gov-desantis-lead-wants-wait-and-see-approach-with-congressional-redistricting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/110083\/","title":{"rendered":"Ben Albritton, following Gov. DeSantis’ lead, wants wait-and-see approach with congressional redistricting"},"content":{"rendered":"

Senate President Ben Albritton said the upper chamber of the Legislature isn\u2019t moving yet on congressional redistricting. But he is working with Gov. Ron DeSantis while closely following court developments.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs I\u2019ve previously stated, there is no ongoing work regarding mid-decade redistricting taking place in the Senate at this time,\u201d Albritton said in a memo to all Florida Senate members. \u201cI\u2019ll continue to monitor legal developments and will keep you updated.\u201d<\/p>\n

He sent the message\u00a0the same day DeSantis proclaimed a Special Session<\/a> on redistricting, effective\u00a0April 20.<\/p>\n

That incidentally is just four days before the expected qualification day for federal candidates, but DeSantis\u2019 proclamation also moved qualifying week for congressional contenders to June 8 through 12, the same as candidates for the Florida Legislature.<\/p>\n

As timing goes, DeSantis has always eyed Spring<\/a> for drawing new cartography. But that has put him on a different page with House Speaker Daniel Perez, who already appointed a House Redistricting Committee<\/a> that has held two meetings in hopes of crafting a map during the regular Legislative Session<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Perez earlier this week told Florida Politics, \u201cMembers can expect the process will unfold thoughtfully, deliberately and transparently.\u201d His office offered no further comment after the Governor issued his call for a Special Session. Perez spokesperson Amelia Englehart said she was informed of the coming proclamation on Wednesday morning.<\/p>\n

DeSantis has cited a pending U.S. Supreme Court case\u00a0from Louisiana<\/a> that could provide more explicit guidance on\u00a0the redistricting process.<\/p>\n

Albritton signaled he supports patience and wants to follow the Governor\u2019s lead on the process.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Governor stated the Legislature should wait as long as feasible before redrawing Florida\u2019s congressional district boundaries in order to take advantage of any further guidance from the United States Supreme Court,\u201d Albritton wrote.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, he urged lawmakers to be careful about any public statements about the process.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cSenators should be aware that in prior cycles, significant litigation has followed passage of new maps. The Florida Supreme Court has previously limited the scope of legislative privilege when it comes to redistricting,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cSitting legislators may be compelled to produce records or be subject to questioning under oath about conversations with colleagues, with legislative staff, or with outside parties who may attempt to persuade the Legislature to pass maps that favor or disfavor a political party or incumbent.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the Democratic side, Senate Minority Leader\u00a0Lori Berman on Wednesday blasted<\/a> DeSantis\u2019 mid-decade redistricting push as \u201cclearly illegal.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Senate President Ben Albritton said the upper chamber of the Legislature isn\u2019t moving yet on congressional redistricting. But…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":110084,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[4218,39199,6059,28,30,29,47277,412],"class_list":{"0":"post-110083","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-ben-albritton","9":"tag-congressional-redistricting","10":"tag-daniel-perez","11":"tag-florida","12":"tag-florida-headlines","13":"tag-florida-news","14":"tag-lori-berman","15":"tag-ron-desantis"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110083\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110084"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}