Issue #214: The Double Standard of Ron DeSantis' timing for Special Elections
Partisanship clearly at play, but not a shock
Its been a chaotic few weeks in Florida political circles as Donald Trump works to fill appointments to his incoming administration. So far, Donald Trump has been selecting heavily from his home base of Florida.
The first major Florida pick was Mike Waltz, the Congressman for the Daytona area, to be National Security Advisor. This was actually a pick that upset some of Trump’s biggest pro-Russian backers; as Waltz historically has a hawkish view on the Ukraine War. That said I’m not holding my breath on Trump taking anything but a pro-Putin outlook. Either way, this pick is not especially controversial - especially compared to the choice of Syrian and Russian asset Tulsi Gabbard to be head of National Intelligence.
Trump then picked Marco Rubio to be his Secretary of State. This, like Waltz, was a fairly uncontroversial pick. Of course, the appointment of Rubio is sparking an internal battle between DeSantis and Trump over who the Governor should appoint to fill the seat.
The other selection, however, was ripe with controversy, and has triggered a special election in just a few months.
The Matt Gaetz Trial Balloon
This section here is going to give a quick recounting of the Matt Gaetz saga. I may do a much more detailed piece down the line.
Congressman Matt Gaetz, representing the Pensacola region, was initially named Trump’s choice for Attorney General. This pick was met with shock from many Republican senators; who felt that they could never vote for the man to any cabinet post. In addition to not being qualified and being so obnoxious most members hate his guts, Gaetz is also a known sexual deviant. A man who is known for countless affairs, often with college aged girls, and who loves to brag about and share his exploits. While in the State House, Matt Gaetz was one of just two members to vote against a law that criminalized revenge porn.
The other NO vote was Rep John Tobia, who granted voted against many broadly popular bills at the time because he was a cranky conservative that hated the leadership. Gaetz, meanwhile, was on the floor insisting that photos sent to him were his to do with as he pleased. Tobia’s NO vote also is suspicious because he and Gaetz were former roommates. Tobia, who went on to become a Brevard County Commissioner, just lost a primary to become Brevard’s Supervisor of Elections, so he’s out of office.
Gaetz was subject to a Department of Justice probe over him being implicated in paying women to travel for sex; with the focus being on a woman who was 17 at the time! Criminal charges would not come as the DOJ found they did not have enough direct evidence for a trial. However, the scandal was subject to a massive ethics investigation; which Gaetz was still under when Trump nominated him to be AG. Gaetz then immediately RESIGNED from his congressional seat. The resignation came as the Ethics committee was scheduled to vote in just days on releasing their findings. By resigning, the committee was not obligated to release the report; which the Republican-controlled body opted not to do.
However, items from the report began to leak; and all painted damning evidence against Gaetz. As the days went on, it seemed highly questionable if Gaetz could get the votes for confirmation. Then on Thursday, Gaetz announced suddenly that he was withdrawing as Trump’s AG pick. The withdraw came hours after Gaetz was asked to comment on a story about leaked ethics reports showing Gaetz had more than one sexual encounter with the 17 year old that had initially sparked the DOJ investigation. Trump quickly named former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi as his new AG.
Gaetz had already resigned from his current Congressional term, however, he in theory could have taken the oath for his new term on January 3rd. However, on Friday, Gaetz made it clear he was leaving congress entirely. The same day, DeSantis announced dates for the special election for his seat.
The Special Election for the 1st District
When Gaetz and Waltz were initially named for Trump’s administration, Ron DeSantis announced he was asking Secretary of State Cord Byrd to work on getting special elections set as soon as possible.
Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson is eager for both seats to be vacant as little as possible. Right now the House breakdown is still undecided, with Republicans declared winners in 219 seats, Democrats winning 213, and 3 undecided. Right now it feels like Democrats have a decent chance to take 2 of those and Republicans take the last. Meaning the House results would settle at 220 to 215; with 218 votes being needed for majority control. That gives the Republicans just two votes to spare! However, Gaetz has already resigned. Additional resignations could come as Trump picks appointees and they get confirmed. Granted as the number of members drops, the majority threshold can lower to 217, 216, and so on. The broad point is, any vacancies in GOP seats only puts pressure on a very small Republican majority.
Now Waltz is still in Congress, and he may not actually resign until he is confirmed to the cabinet. However, Gaetz is gone, and won’t be there on January 3rd. Both of their districts are full expected to remain in Republican hands; as both the 1st and 6th voted for Trump by 30% or more.
While we wait to see on when Waltz will announce his resignation, things are moving forward with the special election for the 1st district. How it voted in the Presidential election can be seen below.
With the house majority surely in mind, DeSantis released the special election schedule.
Qualifying will be December 5th and 6th
Primary Election absentee ballots will go out overseas on December 14th, with domestic ballots going on December 19th
Primary election is January 28th
General Election absentee ballots go out overseas February 15th, with domestic ballots going on February 20th
General Election is April 1st
This was realistically the earliest timeline possible for the race, as laws regulate that overseas absentee ballots must go out 45 before an election. The county election leaders also need time to organize for the surprise election. Funny enough, many hardcore Trump fans that still hate DeSantis for challenging their guy have claimed this schedule is purposely long in order to hurt Trump’s agenda in Congress.
Well I can tell you that definitely is not the case, as this special election calendar is light years ahead of the last time a special election for Congress was needed.
When DeSantis delayed Special Elections
Back in April of 2021, the 20th Congressional district became vacant when longtime Congressman Alcee Hastings passed away from cancer. Hastings’ district was majority-Black; connecting Black communities of Broward and Palm Beach counties.
The district’s shape obviously seems odd, but this version was far more compact than the original 1990s versions of the district. This seat stems from the Voting Rights Act mandates for Black representation. The first version of the seat was drawn by a court in 1992; which I covered in this Redistricting History article. Hastings won the 1992 election for the seat and had no trouble holding it afterward. He maintained a strong presence in the district and a base of loyal followers.
In January of 2019, Hastings announced he had prostate cancer. Initial speculation was that he would not run in 2020. However, perhaps due to the pandemic, Hastings wanted to keep serving his district and steer aid toward it. In the 2020 Democratic Primary, the only race that mattered, Hastings defeated businesswoman and now-Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick with 70% of the vote. Sadly, on April 6th of 2021, months after winning re-election, Hastings passed away.
A special election could have been called quickly after this announcement. When Bill Young, Florida’s last congressman to die, passed away in 2013, Governor Rick Scott announced the special election 12 days later. This time, DeSantis did and said nothing for the entire month. No announcement of dates, nothing. Congressional Democrats began to make loud noise about it 10 or say days after the death; with Hasting’s colleagues pointing out the district deserved speedy representation. On April 29th, a candidate for the seat, Elvin J. Dowling, filed a lawsuit over the delay. Finally on May 4th, DeSantis announced the special election for the seat. It had taken him nearly a month.
The dates of the election were a further delay tactic. DeSantis scheduled the Democratic primary, which was the race that really mattered, for November 2nd. The general election would be held on January 11th. This would leave the seat vacant for between 9 and 10 months! For comparison, Young’s seat in 2014 was filled 5 months after his passing. This came despite both county election departments insisting they could hold the election earlier.
The delay tactic wasn’t the first time such a nefarious move was made. A detailed look at special election timing by Nathaniel Rakich at FiveThirtyEight showed that partisanship often could factor in special election wait times. Since 2003, four of the longest wait times coming from black-performing seats where Republican Governors got to set the data.
The article data is here. So DeSantis was following a mold that already existed.
If the Congressional delay was not enough, DeSantis engaged in even more shenanigans with more special elections in Black state legislative seats.
More Delays for Black Legislative Districts
When the Congressional special election was announced, several Black state legislative lawmakers announced they would run for the district. The crowded primary would see two county commissioners, one state senator, two state state members run. All these elected officials had to resign their seats to make the Congressional run. All three legislative districts: Senate 33, House 88, and House 94 were solidly Democratic and Black districts.
In addition to the five folks then in elected office, businesswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick was self funding a serious effort. I did a full preview of the candidates heading into the primary here. Check that for even more information on the 20th district.
In the case of the county commission districts, DeSantis got to appoint people until the next regular elections. Legislative seats, like congress, require special elections. Often when down-ballot lawmakers run in special elections for Congressional seats, the governor times it so elections are all held the same day. In other words, the primaries for these legislative seats could have been the same time as the Congressional primary - and the same for the generals.
Had DeSantis scheduled the legislative special elections for the same time as the Congressional race, the winners would be able to participate in most of the 2022 legislative session; which began in January. However, like his delays with the Congressional vacancy, DeSantis did not announce has special elections for well over a month after the lawmakers submitted their resignations. Heading into September, no dates had been announced. I wrote about it at the time.
It was not until another lawsuit was filed against DeSantis that actually finally took action. Spurred by State House candidate Elijah Manley, the Harvard Election Law clinic filed a suit on October. In the suit, the plaintiffs pointed out the average time delay between resignations and calling of a special was just over 7 days. By the time of the suit, it had been 88 days. Finally on October 28th, DeSantis announced the special elections. The primaries would be January 11th and general would be March 8th. As a result, the winners would barely have the chance to participate in the regular legislative session.
Whenever DeSantis Wants
If the last 6 years as shown as us anything, its that DeSantis will do what he wants when he wants. There was a similar bit of nonsense with special election timings just last year when DeSantis had to call special elections for two state house seats, one Safe GOP seat and one swing seat. DeSantis scheduled the safe seat, HD118, for December of 2023, but schedule the swing seat, HD35 until January 16th. Why did he do that? Because HD35 had a good chance of flipping to Democrats, and January 16th was a day AFTER the Iowa caucuses. Basically, DeSantis did not want the risk of a story about his party losing a seat before the critical Iowa vote. In the end, DeSantis got trounced in Iowa, and one day later HD35 did flip to Democrats.
DeSantis will do what DeSantis wants. Right now, getting these special elections out as quick as possible is best for him. Ironically he probably wishes he could move quicker so that no MAGA fanboy could accuse him of delaying. Ironically, this time one can say DeSantis is trying to fill this as quick as possible.
What a shock.
