Ben Albritton just said the quiet part out loud

Senate President Ben Albritton wisely sent a memo to his colleagues on Wednesday reminding them to “take care to insulate themselves from partisan-funded organizations and other interests that may intentionally or unintentionally attempt to inappropriately influence a potential mid-decade redistricting process.”

He also smartly cautioned that all electronic communications related to redistricting may be of archival value and that they should be preserved accordingly.

But the astute reminder was not what had folks in The Process face-palming.

That, instead, would be Albritton’s declaration that there is no ongoing work on redistricting currently taking place in the Senate and that the “Governor has expressed a desire to address this issue next Spring.”

For those who need help reading between the lines, that means he is all but surrendering the upper chamber’s independence to the executive branch. Hence, he said the quiet part out loud.

Most of us remember from various grade school lessons pertaining to civics and American national government that there are three separate, but coequal branches of government: the executive, legislative and judicial.

Albritton’s carefully chosen words quietly erase the “separate” portion of that particular lesson. It silently declares the Senate as an agency of the Governor’s Office, with Albritton as its Secretary.

To be clear, I do not entirely disagree with DeSantis’ push to redistrict, if the intent is to account for the significant migration to Florida seen in recent years. And I don’t necessarily disagree that drawing lines in the Spring is the appropriate timetable, because love him or hate him, the U.S. Supreme Court case out of Louisiana could have sweeping implications on the Voting Rights Act, specifically as it pertains to majority minority districts.

If Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were overturned, it would erase a portion of the law that ensures racial minorities have an opportunity to represent an electoral majority or plurality in at least some areas. So the outcome of that case could have a significant impact on new maps.

However, a legislative leader all of a sudden throwing himself — and, by extension, his entire chamber — into lockstep with the Governor’s Office does not bode well for the 2026 Legislative Session.

We already saw last Session — which went way too many days into overtime to even bother recounting — what happens when the chambers are at odds.

Albritton’s memo puts the chambers at odds yet again, as the House does not agree with DeSantis’ position on mid-decade redistricting.

“Given the fact that we are less than a year away from the election, not to mention the fact the candidate qualifying period for federal offices in late April, it would be irresponsible to delay the creation and passage of a new map, especially until after Session,” Rep. Mike Redondo said Thursday.

It does create a pickle for incumbents and would-be challengers. With redistricting dangling off in the distance, it’s not clear what districts might look like come voting time. How can you campaign when you don’t know where to run? And how can you run if you don’t know whether you’ll have to run somewhere else, or if you’ll stand a snowball’s chance in hell of winning?

Does that disagreement spell disaster for other pressing issues facing the state? An affordability crisis looms. Property taxes are up for a huge debate.

Maybe it sorts itself out, but the writing on the wall — or at least the subtly written shoutout to DeSantis — suggests we may be in for another doozy of a 60 (or more) days.