A crossroads moment for Broward Democrats | Editorial
By Sun Sentinel Editorial Board | Sun Sentinel
PUBLISHED: May 23, 2026 at 9:40 AM EDT | UPDATED: May 23, 2026 at 10:33 AM EDT
Debbie Wasserman Schultz has never backed down from a fight, and she’s not about to start now.
She is the obvious target of an illegal redrawing of Florida congressional districts, orchestrated by Gov. Ron DeSantis and his hyperpartisan Republican allies in the Legislature.
In a rushed special session, they chopped Broward into multiple pieces to weaken the influence of Florida’s most heavily Democratic and cohesive urban county.
Wasserman Schultz’s southwest Broward district no longer exists. That area is now tethered to an oddly-shaped Republican district stretching across the Everglades and west to Marco Island near Naples, then north to Lake Okeechobee.
If this bizarre map survives court challenges, Broward will be a political orphan split among five different districts: the 20th, 22nd, 24th, 25th and 26th.
Marginalizing Broward
That’s no accident.
It’s a calculated strategy to marginalize the state’s strongest Democratic county by making it an afterthought, an appendage of districts tied to neighboring counties.
Voters in Broward must do all they can to make sure that does not happen.
Wasserman Schultz announced Friday what was seen as inevitable: She will seek a 12th term in Congress, this time in the 20th District, the only one entirely within Broward.
Its voting age population is 42% Black, 30% white and 23% Hispanic, a microcosm of the county.
A crossroads moment
This is a crossroads moment in Broward County’s evolution. Democrats have to decide what is more important — a candidate’s race or the breadth and depth of experiece in public office. No one else comes close to Wasserman Schultz.
For more than three decades, much of the contested territory was represented by Alcee Hastings, a political icon who died of cancer in 2021.
Since then, the district’s representation has been either nonexistent or deplorable.
DeSantis waited nearly a year to call a special election after Hastings’ death. The eventual winner, Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, was forced to resign last month following her indictment on federal fraud charges.
Wasserman Schultz, 59, is far and away Broward’s best-known political leader. Her institutional knowledge, experience and seniority are especially valuable during this time of upheaval.
“There’s a lot at stake. I’ve had so many people say that we can’t afford to push the reset button,” Wasserman Schultz said. “We can’t afford to start from scratch, in who represents us. That’s the feedback I’m getting.”
Never lost an election
In a 34-year career, Wasserman Schultz has never lost an election. She has been a champion of abortion rights, better healthcare, child drowning prevention, equal pay, and maternal and child health. She worked with Hastings to ease community tensions after an officer shot an unarmed Black man in Missouri a decade ago.
She was first elected to the state House at age 25. She’s a mother of three children, including twins, and is a breast cancer survivor.
As her Broward district became increasingly diverse, she took Spanish immersion lessons to better relate to her Hispanic constituents. She has regularly attended church services across Broward, including at The Faith Center, a Sunrise church with a large Black and Caribbean congregation (at the site of the former Sunrise Musical Theatre).
She works diligently to stay in touch with constituents, but this may be a campaign like no other, because the highly sensitive and polarizing issue of race hovers over the district.
Black candidates will portray Wasserman Schultz as a carpetbagger who is parachuting into the district to prolong her political career.
Sen. Rosalind Osgood, D-Fort Lauderdale, said she considered running for Congress, but said on Friday she plans to remain in the Legislature. Osgood said Wasserman Schultz will face a much tougher fight than she’s expecting.
“I’m not being racist. It’s just a different lived experience,” Osgood said. “I’m for fair representation of all communities.”
A need to coalesce
If Black political leadership in Broward County wants to prioritize Black representation in Congress, then those leaders need to coalesce around one credible candidate with support across racial and ethnic lines.
So far, that person has not emerged.
Instead, a thin field of Democratic rivals is lining up to stop Wasserman Schultz.
They include the rapper and youth coach Luther Campbell; Elijah Manley, who has run for Congress before; and former Broward Mayor and commissioner Dale Holness, who has strong supporters and equally strong detractors.
Then there’s Cherfilus-McCormick, who represented the previous 20th District for about five years. Awaiting trial on federal fraud charges, she resigned and says she will campaign to win it back. It seems highly implausible on its face.
If Wasserman Schultz were to be forced to step aside because of partisan gerrymandering, it means DeSantis wins. Is that what the people of Broward County want?
If she’s forced out, Broward — and Florida — will lose seniority on Capitol Hill that cannot be replaced. Wasserman Schultz is the senior Democratic member of Congress from Florida, second only to Republican Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart of Miami.
The frustration and resentment felt by many in the Black community in Broward is completely understandable. But their anger should be directed at DeSantis — not Wasserman Schultz.
The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writers Pat Beall and Martin Dyckman, and Executive Editor Gretchen Day-Bryant. To contact us, email at letters@sun-sentinel.com.