TAMPA, Fla. — Five Tampa Bay residents filed a federal lawsuit to redraw Florida’s state Senate map.
The 31-page complaint states Districts 16 and 18 are racially gerrymandered. The American Civil Liberties Union and the Civil Rights & Racial Justice Clinic at New York University School of Law firms filed the suit on Wednesday on behalf of the residents from Hillsborough and Pinellas counties.
The complaint states that District 16 packs more than half of the region’s Black residents into that district resulting in District 18 being “artificially stripped of Black residents, diminishing their influence and voice in elections there.”
District 16, represented by Sen. Darryl Rouson, D-St. Petersburg, currently encompasses parts of Tampa spanning across the bay and connects to residents in St. Petersburg. District 18, represented by Nick DiCeglie, R-Belleair Bluffs, encompasses parts of Pinellas County including Largo, Seminole, Pinellas Park and St. Pete Beach.
"Black residents deserve equitable representation in the Florida Senate," Jarvis El-Amin, a local civil rights leader, Tampa resident, and plaintiff in the case said in a statement. "We demand to have our voices heard and our votes fairly represented—not diminished, diluted, cracked, or packed."
The legislature approved the redrawn districts in 2022 as required once every 10 years after the U.S. Census.
Senate President Kathleen Passidomo and Secretary of State Cord Byrd are listed as the defendants in their official capacities.
Senate President Pro Tempore Dennis Baxley issued a memorandum about the suit where he questioned why it was filed two years after the Senate unanimously approved the map and the Florida Supreme Court declared it constitutional.
He wrote that opposing groups had “ample opportunity” to challenge the constitutionality of the map but no group opposed it during the review process.
Baxley also questioned the timing of the suit, which follows the death of Passidomo’s husband.
“It defies reasonable understanding and basic human decency that after more than two years and approval by the Florida Supreme Court, the plaintiffs have chosen the days following the tragic and sudden passing of the First Gentleman of the Florida Senate, even prior to the funeral, to bring forward a lawsuit against President Passidomo that is not time-sensitive,” he wrote.
Passidomo’s husband died on April 3 from injuries he suffered after falling while hiking in Utah.
The attorneys for the plaintiffs propose a new map in the suit that doesn’t have a district spanning over the Bay and doesn’t affect other districts greatly.
The proposed map would have District 18 expand to cover all of south Pinellas and District 16 would expand a little bit West to make up for losing St. Petersburg. Districts 20, 21 and 23, which are all represented by Republicans, would be affected if the map changed.
The suit calls for special elections to be held if the ruling favors the plaintiffs if districts are not up for re-election at the same time as the ruling.