Posted on 01/29/2012 5:56:40 PM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Jacksonville,FL- After last night’s Republican Presidential debate, the candidates’ respective spinmeisters made their cases to the media as to why their guy won the debate. One of Governor Mitt Romney’s spokesmen was Florida Representative Will Weatherford, and during the course of his remarks in the “Spin Room”, he shed a very dim light on the ongoing redistricting process in the Florida Legislature. Over the past several weeks, many Republicans have voiced their disappointment towards the Republican legislature after the release of the preliminary redistricting maps. Much of the ire concerns the proposed boundaries of Congressman Allen West’s 22nd Congressional District that would be redrawn to include far more registered Democrats.
West’s congressional district inexplicably sheds the most Republican electoral support, in comparison to all other incumbent Republican and Democrat Congressman. A few weeks back we quoted an unnamed legislator saying that, “Allen West was screwed”, a statement which was originally made about made five months before the proposed maps were made public, leading insiders to believe that the fix was in against Allen West. But in light of Weatherford’s comment, it is increasingly clear that this is a fait accompli. (Read more-Allen West is Screwed)
According to Weatherford, those preliminary maps will not change- at the most, any additional changes would be minimal, and those changes would not make any appreciable difference from the preliminary maps. In addition, Weatherford stated that a deal was struck between him, Senate President Mike Haridopolos, and Senator Don Gaetz to finalize these maps and push them through as soon as possible. Weatherford also said that the proposed maps are in legal compliance with both the Voting Rights Act and Amendment 6.
So based on Weatherford’s comments, the 22nd Congressional District is now very much in play for the Democrat Party, and West is at an even larger disadvantage than he was previously- it will be a very difficult and expensive seat for Republicans to defend.
Part of the challenge we with the new amendments, 5 and 6 that past, it created clear standards about how we draw districts. So, we can’t draw districts for any partisan reasons, we can’t draw districts based upon what a candidate wants, or what a party wants. We have to draw them based upon what the law said, so it took away a lot of the flexibility normally a legislature would have . And so in doing that, we felt that the maps we did draw, were the most legally compliant possible. There were winners and losers in that, unfortunately. But, I think that what we wanted to do was take the maps that we could send to the court, and hopefully get through the court, and I think we did that.
I think our plan is to pass it through(Allen West’s map) It complies with the Voting Right Act, it complies with Amendment 6, which is also something we have to follow. Drawing districts is not as easy as doing what you want, you have to look at cities, you have to look at county boundaries, you have to make population exactly the same in a congressional district, its not easy when you have two new districts that come into the state, that makes eveyone elses district a little bit smaller.
It’s a challenging process, but I think that what Senator Gaetz and I, and the Speaker and the President negotiated is a map that is fair and is legal. We allowed everyone to have a say. Republicans had a say, Democrats had a say. If people wanted to file amendments to make the districts different, they could, but everything we did was based on how to make the maps as legal as we possibly could.-Rep. Will Weatherford (R)
Or, perhaps the newly-drawn District will see his merits as a leader of individuals and give him their vote.
I’ve got a feeling Arizona is going to have more commie ‘RAT Reps. after the next election too. Barry’s commandos came in here and turned our districts into a joke. The so called “courts” liked the new map though.
Of course it is a mysterious coincidence that West is outspoken (mouthy in Republican elite speak).
I don’t like any politician to have an easy time getting reelected. I can’t stand how gerrymandered our congress has become. I say start completely over and make it extremely difficult to be reelected for all of them. They get lazy and make dumb decisions if they know they don’t have to work for reelection.
Heck, even Cuba is promoting term limits for their politicians
As I said in another thread on this topic, this must be stopped. Floridians need to call their state legislators and demand that this be remidied.
As I understand it, Tom Rooney’s brother has a desire to get a seat in congress and it would be that district. Brian Rooney moved to my district in Michigan just days before announcing a 2010 run (Which failed)
Brian Rooney proved himself to be a RINO favorite during that race by running around with the main st republicans.
RINO Establishment types cannot stand conservatives, especially conservative minorities.
NAACP would be pounding the pavement. The usual faces would be in all the camera. BET would be running special programming.
Speaking ahead of Newt on Saturday, West was right to call Democrats the party of racism. He has become uppity, dared to step out of line, he doesn't know his place and he must be eliminated for fear others might follow his lead.
Friggin amendment 6, it’s sickening to see redistricting fouled up by this nonsense in Republican states.
Last week it happened in Texas..in Texas! I was blown away. If they don’t win by the rules, they change the rules to win. We are prisoners of folks with entirely too much power. I was against term limits for some time, but now they are looking good.
Last week it happened in Texas..in Texas! I was blown away. If they don’t win by the rules, they change the rules to win. We are prisoners of folks with entirely too much power. I was against term limits for some time, but now they are looking good.
Just like lawyers.
Bastards
They don’t go after liberal Dems this way. :(:(:(:(:(
This is just the beginning of the GOP establishment’s attempt to purge the party of conservatives, Tea Party activists, libertarians and anyone who is not willing to kiss the ring of whichever patrician liberal these elites anoint to go down to glorious defeat against corrupt Democrat presidential nominees. This is what National Review, Townhall.com, the Wall Street Journal, Drudge, Fox News, etc., want. A nice clean, well behaved, compliant party, who will do their bidding without question and who will not “embarrass” them during their meetings with Democrats. If Newt goes down, Allan West should be nominated to run a 3rd party ticket.
My understanding was the West was SOL when Democrats got Amendments 5 & 6 passed by referendum. His current district is a gerrymandered area surrounded by Democrat voting precincts and with the new constraints, district lines similar to his current ones would have been illegal.
There's a reason Democrats pushed for those amendments.
Maybe West can survive, maybe he will lose and get a cabinet post. He'd make a terrific Secretary of State.
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