Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
It's Today Explained. I'm Sean Ramos from and I'm joined by our senior reporter, Miles Bryan. What are you reporting on? Sean, I'm here to talk to you about redistricting. A very popular trend in the United States right now. Yes, we're in the middle of a redistricting war, as you might have heard, Republicans versus Democrats.
Chapter 2: What is redistricting and why is it controversial?
I heard. But, but it's not always that simple. Okay. Take Mike Beltran. He's a Puerto Rican guy, lives near Orlando. Republican lawmakers blew up the old congressional district he was in to make it harder for the Democrat to win.
I think it's a little messed up.
I think they're trying to dilute the minority votes, especially the Hispanics. Okay, Sean, but who do you think he supported for president? Man, Florida. Florida man, Donald Trump. You're supposed to say Kamala, but it was Trump. I did vote for Trump. Yes, sir. The same guy who kicked the redistricting wars off.
I went to Florida to report on the Trump voters who got the short end of the stick in redistricting. And I'm going to tell you about it. On Today Explained from Vox. Yes, sir. Support for today's explain comes from Fetch. Fetch is pet insurance, if you hadn't figured it out. Do you have a pet?
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The House will be in order. The clerk may call the roll.
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Chapter 3: How are Trump voters affected by new congressional maps?
I should tell you where I went first. I went to Kissimmee, Florida. Kissimmee? We're colleagues, buddy. Kissimmee. No way. Kissimmee, Kissimmee, Kissimmee. Mike from the billboard helped me out with this one. Say it for me. Kissimmee. Kissimmee. I keep thinking about it. Kissimmee. Kissimmee. Kissimmee. Where is Kissimmee? Is that like which part of the boot?
Kissimmee is a city outside of Orlando. If you close your eyes and think Florida, it's basically what comes up. There's lots of palm trees, lots of parking lots. Crossing any road means dodging like six lanes of traffic.
Chapter 4: What are the implications of gerrymandering in Florida?
It's really close to Disney World. So you see a lot of Disney people around. Did you go? I did not because I'm a reporter and I was focused on the story. And what defines Kissimmee politically is that it's the hub for a large and growing Latino population.
Nice. Actually, I grew up in Puerto Rico. I'm from Puerto Rico. My family is from Calle, Puerto Rico. And it's been an army family for decades.
That's Ricardo. He's 50. He's a retired infantry officer and still looks the part. Dude is built like a brick house. Kissimmee. Yeah. Ricardo actually moved to Orlando in 2001 after he left the service. But we were chatting in Kissimmee, which is right next door and in a county called Osceola. Back then, Osceola was about a quarter Hispanic. But since then, the area has grown exponentially.
And Hispanic people make up most of that growth, Puerto Ricans especially. Relief flights have been heading to Puerto Rico daily since Hurricane Maria hit the island. Florida officials say more than 160,000 now have arrived here in the state since the storm. I read that a lot of people came from the island after Hurricane Maria. Have you noticed that in your own life? Oh, of course.
My mother is a survivor of the Hurricane Maria incident. Now, Ricardo's always been pretty conservative, but all these new Puerto Rican voters helped elect Florida's first Puerto Rican congressperson, a Democrat named Darren Soto. He was elected in 2016, and he's been in office since then. Okay, so a Democrat, even though Florida now a red state.
Yeah, and this is where the story gets tricky because Osceola County, this area, they voted for Biden in 2020, but then flipped to Trump in 2024. Yeah, it was mentioned in a lot of stories about the great racial realignment, you know, Latino voters moving towards Trump for populist reasons. Did Brickhouse Ricardo vote for Trump, too? Yes.
Ricardo, you know, he was skeptical of Trump initially in the first term, but by 2024, he was excited about Trump and making it 2019 again. What were his policies that really appealed to you?
Just being aggressive, the aggressiveness that he has in regards of business growth, the plan.
You know, during his first term, everything was great to me as a business owner. So Ricardo helps get Trump elected. He's a conservative guy. He's a Republican. He even did some organizing with the party. But right now, he is extremely mad at the Florida Republicans. Frustrated, angry, concerned, upset. Because gerrymandering? Yeah.
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Chapter 5: How are Hispanic voters responding to redistricting changes?
will be, I am sure, met with a MAGA primary. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis changed the congressional map for this area to include more rural, more Republican, and more white voters. Basically, spread Latino voters out over a bunch of districts, dilute them as a voting bloc. The new map actually drew Ricardo out of his old district, which is currently represented by Darren Soto.
Really pissed him off.
That's one of the things I'm upset about because this realignment takes me out of the district. And as a Republican, as a voter, I think they're breaching my trust. No matter if you're Hispanic or not, or Puerto Rican or not, you don't get the right to choose.
OK, so Ricardo likes Trump, but then this gerrymandering thing happens in Florida and he's not into it. He's having his Puerto Rican block diluted before his eyes. Are his neighbors feeling the same way? Yeah, I met a lot of Hispanic voters who voted for Trump, but were disturbed by the redistricting.
People like Mike from the top of the show, who's Puerto Rican, or Yolanda, who's an immigrant from Mexico and owns a nail boutique in town. She told me it was really important for this area to have a Hispanic representative because the Hispanic population was so big. Another voter I want to tell you about I met at an event for Congressman Soto in Kissimmee. Thank you, Congressman.
My name's Keith DiNatale.
He's a guy named Keith DiNatale.
Cool Keith.
Keith is not Puerto Rican. He's a transplant from Michigan. He kind of looks like Ned Flanders. Hi. Yeah, he leans Republican. He told me he voted for Trump.
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