Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Dems launch ‘voter protection’ program
The Florida Democratic Party on Monday launched a “voter protection” program in response to what they say is a “growing threat to Floridians’ right to vote” because of stricter deadlines for mail-in ballots.
The initiative, which will be led by Voter Protection Director Brandon Peters, an attorney and adjunct professor at Florida A&M’s College of Law, comes in response to legislation approved this month that in addition to the mail-in ballot changes adds fines and restitution onto what ex-felons have to pay before regaining their right to vote.
Democrats claim that the bill (SB 7066), which creates a shorter time limit for voters to update their signatures on file with elections offices, would have invalidated 53,929 ballots if it were law during the 2018 election.
The bill creates a new deadline to update any signature on file. Now updates must be made before a mailin ballot is received by the election supervisor’s office, instead of when a local canvassing board starts counting ballots after an election.
While the deadline to update signatures has been reduced on the front end, the new law does allow more time on the back end following an election for a voter to file an affidavit to “cure” any problems with a signature on file. That affidavit also counts as an update for the next election.
Democrats described the changes to the law as part of “Florida Republicans’ long history of voter suppression.”
“Today in Florida, there is no greater assault on our Democracy than the continued efforts to restrict the right to vote,” Florida Democratic Party Chair Terrie Rizzo said in a statement.
“And while Democrats have long stood against voting restrictions implemented by Republicans in the Florida Legislature, we need a sustained yearround effort to make voting easier, more transparent, and ensure that every legal vote is counted,” Rizzo said. “… If the 2019 legislative session, driven by Governor [Ron] DeSantis and the Florida GOP, has taught us anything, it is that voter suppression doesn’t just happen on Election Day.”
Spokespeople for Florida Republican Party Chair Joe Gruters and the governor’s office did not respond to a request for comment Monday. The Democrats said Peters will oversee a team of grass-roots activists and legal professionals. Alma Gonzalez, who works for Hillsborough County and is a former AFL-CIO counsel, will serve as senior legal adviser, and Charles Lichtman, a veteran of the 2000 presidential recount in Florida, will serve as chief legal counsel.
The issue of mail-in ballots being rejected for signature mismatch issues was a major controversy after the 2018 election, with a federal judge ruling that the imposes “a serious burden on the right to vote.”
Many voters found out about the rejections too late to do anything about it. The deadline to “cure” ballots, 5 p.m. on Nov. 5, came a day before the deadline for elections offices to even receive the ballots in the first place, at 7 p.m. on Nov. 6.
An ACLU study on voteby-mail ballots conducted by University of Florida politics chair Daniel A. Smith early last year found voteby-mail-ballots had a much higher rejection rate than votes cast in-person at voting sites.
The study also concluded that “younger and racial and ethnic minority voters were much more likely to have their VBM ballots rejected … and less likely to have their VBM ballots cured when they are flagged for a signature problem.”
The requirement that exfelons pay all fines and restitution also has been controversial, with Democrats calling it a “a poll tax.” But Republican state Rep. James Grant said the Legislature followed the definition of what constitutes a “sentence” and did not include civil and private fees.