The Florida legislature begins their annual session tomorrow (when considering redistricting, session begins in January rather than the usual March start).
Today the House reduced the number of congressional plans to 3 to go along with the 1 plan being promoted by the Senate. Most of the difference between the plans are in SW, Central and NW of Orlando areas. There is no difference between the 3 House plans in SE Florida and very little difference in SE Florida with the Senate plan.
For Allen West, things do not look good.
West's current district had a 4.1% point advantage for President Obama in 2008. Under the Senate plan, this advantage increases to 12.3% points. Under the House plan, it's 13.8% points.
The current district has a 0.1% point Democratic registration advantage over Republicans. Under the Senate plan, this increases to 7.4% points; the House plan has an 8.5% point advantage.
West won by 8.8% points over incumbent Ron Klein during the GOP tidal wave of 2010.
The difference between the two plans is minimal, as the following picture shows:
There aren't a lot of options available to make this a friendlier district for West because of population shifts. Except to the north, the district is surrounded by very Democratic areas. And shifting to the north is not a likely option, because it would make Republican districts in Palm Beach county more challenging.
The Broward Republican Party is in full panic mode, actually writing a detailed letter to the legislature outlining their concerns (see the link here.) They try and frame their argument without implying that they are trying to improve an incumbent's district. That is now strictly prohibited by the Florida constitution because of the Fair Districts Amendments we passed in 2010. However, if the legislature were to suddenly revise their plans with the result of improving CD22, it could only be interpreted as an effort to help the incumbent and open the resulting plan to a court challenge.
There is good news for me, personally, however. My home is being moved into CD22 under these proposals, which will give me a personal interest in flipping this district. While I will miss being represented by the world's greated congressperson, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, seeing this district flip in November would bring total satisfaction.
Nothing is finalized yet, but I'm sure the West camp in starting to panic, which can only bring a smile to my face.