By Fredreka Schouten, Ethan Cohen, Renée Rigdon, CNN
(CNN) — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has signed into law a map he designed to give Republicans an edge in as many as four seats now held by Democrats.
State lawmakers approved the new boundaries just hours after the US Supreme Court issued a decision limiting the reach of the Voting Rights Act in redistricting cases. DeSantis had used the pending decision as one justification for pursuing a mid-decade redistricting in his state.
The court’s move has set off a fresh round of attempts to draw new lines in several southern states controlled by Republicans.
Voting rights groups have vowed to fight the Florida map in court, arguing that it still violates a provision in the state constitution that restricts partisan gerrymandering. But the US Supreme Court’s ruling Wednesday could make challenging the new map much harder.
The map targets Democratic seats near Orlando, in the Tampa Bay area and in South Florida.
Here’s a look at the communities affected and the map’s impact on incumbents in those areas.
Targeting a majority Latino district in Orlando
The map dramatically reconfigures Rep. Darren Soto’s 9th District, removing parts of the Orlando area and stretching it some 150 miles south into deeply red rural counties. One section projects to the east, extending to Vero Beach on the Atlantic Coast.
The map also alters the demographic makeup of a majority Hispanic district, taking it from nearly 52% Hispanic to 39%, a CNN analysis shows. Soto, the first Floridian of Puerto Rican descent to serve in Congress, has represented the district for nearly a decade.
Under DeSantis’ map, the seat in the 10th District held by Democratic Rep. Maxwell Frost – the first member of Gen Z elected to Congress – would become a sole blue spot in a sea of Republican districts surrounding the Orlando area.
The plan largely leaves undisturbed the 7th District in Orlando’s northeastern suburbs held by embattled Republican Rep. Cory Mills. The third-term Mills – a top campaign target for Democrats this year – is under a House ethics committee investigation related to allegations of sexual misconduct and campaign finance violations.
He has repeatedly denied the allegations against him. Mills recently drew a Republican primary challenger, former Orlando-area news anchor Ryan Elijah.
Splitting a district in Tampa-St. Pete
Rep. Kathy Castor, a 10-term incumbent, currently represents both Tampa and St. Petersburg, cities on either side of Tampa Bay.
The DeSantis plan breaks up Castor’s 14th District. It removes St. Petersburg and shifts much of it into the 16th District now held by GOP Rep. Vern Buchanan, who is retiring from Congress at the end of this term.
And it splits Tampa into three, sending northern parts of the city into two districts now held by Republican incumbents, Reps. Laurel Lee and Gus Bilirakis. That could pose some risk to those GOP lawmakers as they take in more Democratic voters into their revamped districts. Lee’s 15th District was already among those targeted by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s “Districts in Play” project.
Another Democratic target, Rep. Anna Paulin