Florida passes new House map; Mills exits Maine Senate race
The NPR Politics Podcast
NPR
4.4 • 25.7K Ratings
🗓️ 30 April 2026
⏱️ 20 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This episode: voting correspondent Miles Parks, political correspondent Ashley Lopez, and senior political editor and correspondent Domenico Montanaro.
This podcast was produced by Casey Morell and Bria Suggs, and edited by Rachel Baye.
Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey there. It's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Miles Parks. I cover voting. |
| 0:08.2 | I'm Ashley Lopez. I cover politics. And I'm Domenico Montanaro, senior political editor and correspondent. |
| 0:13.2 | Today on the show, Florida is the latest state to enter the redistricting arms race. |
| 0:18.5 | Yesterday, the state's legislature approved a new congressional map |
| 0:22.5 | meant to boost Republicans' chances of keeping control of the U.S. House of Representatives. |
| 0:27.7 | Ashley, what can you tell us? |
| 0:28.8 | So top line, this map would create about four more seats that could favor Republicans in the |
| 0:35.6 | midterms this year. And the way Republicans are doing this is by |
| 0:39.4 | breaking up some Democratic districts in Broward County, as well as some districts in the Tampa and |
| 0:44.9 | Orlando areas. These are some of like the fastest growing parts of the state. Also really diverse. |
| 0:50.2 | Used to be really important during presidenials when Florida was a swing state. This is known as the I4 |
| 0:53.9 | corridor. So it is kind of interesting that they're messing with that part of the state because swing voters lately have been swinging back to the Democratic Party. So that's something to watch. But yeah, there are a couple of long-term members of Congress there that could be poised to lose their seat depending how things shake out this year. Just want to jump in here really quickly. |
| 1:11.4 | Me and you, both from Florida. |
| 1:12.6 | And this is a really, I can't believe this hasn't happened before. |
| 1:14.8 | Then we're talking Florida on a pod. |
| 1:16.2 | Not to leave you out, Domenico, but I don't know, feels good. |
| 1:20.2 | Domenico, for people who are trying to keep a tally of where this redistricting arms race has gone, where are we at at this point? Who has the advantage? |
| 1:31.9 | Well, we thought things were trending in Democrats' direction after the Virginia redistricting ballot |
| 1:37.8 | initiative passed narrowly that would allow Democrats to redraw that state and maybe get |
| 1:43.8 | something like four seats out of Virginia. |
| 1:47.2 | But now it looks like the pendulum swung back a little bit more in Republicans' favor again with this Florida map if it goes through. |
| 1:55.6 | And with the Supreme Court case this week that essentially said that there are racially gerrymandered |
... |
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