With his latest move to suspend Monique Worrell, the elected prosecutor for Florida’s 9th Circuit which encompasses Orange and Osceola Counties, Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, a man desperately trying to tread water in a failing presidential campaign, has removed two of the three Black prosecutors Florida voters put into office in the last election cycle.
Florida has 20 judicial districts. After the last election, three state attorneys races were won by Black candidates, all Democrats: Andrew Warren in the 13th Circuit, Monique Worrell in the 9th , and Harold F. Pryor in the 17th. DeSantis removed Warren and replaced him with a white woman. He replaced Worrell with Andrew Bain, a Black Federalist Society judge DeSantis appointed to the 9th Circuit in 2020 who was previously better known for his time on the Florida A&M football team. Worrell, a liberal, won her position with two-thirds of the vote; Bain, a conservative, has no public support.