Dept of Justice orders Florida to stop voter purges.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Yesterday, the Justice Dept ordered the state of Florida to immediately cease its voter purge, citing it as a violation of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and the 1993 National Voter Registration Act, which governs voter purges for Federal elections. A Federal Court also threw out part of Florida's new voter registration laws, in a compliant brought against the state by the League of Women voters. The state had passed new requirements that voter registration drives by requiring certification with arcane procedures with severe penalties for non-compliance. High school student registration drives by civic clubs, church groups, and even the League of Women Voters, and "Rock the Vote" along with several county registrars complained that the new law was clearly meant to curtail any new registration drives. In fact, two high school teachers faced severe legal penalties for their voter drive that did failed to meet the 48 hour requirement.



The judge agreed and noted in the ruling:

The statute and rule impose a harsh and impractical 48-hour deadline for an organization to deliver applications to a voter registration office and effectively prohibit an organization from mailing applications in. And the statute and rule impose burdensome record-keeping and reporting requirements that serve little if any purpose, thus rendering them unconstitutional even to the extent they do not violate the [National Voting Rights Act].

Florida voter registration laws have been struck down before in violation of constitutional rights, and for violation of the Civil Rights Act before. Earlier this year, Governor Rick Scott signed a bill restricting early voting in the state, and revoked voting rights of 90,000 previously convicted felons (non-violent crimes), reversing previous Republican governor Charlie Crist's policy. Florida is a key battle ground state, with the race tightening and many recalling the voter purges prior to the 2000 election and the close race that was ultimately decided by the Supreme Court in favor of George Bush. So I think this is good news for protecting the voter franchise, particularly when there has been no demonstration or evidence of any voter fraud (which is the typical explanation offered by those seeking to limit voter access). In fact in the previous overturning of a Florida law, a circuit judge ruled that the state had offered very little proof of any voter fraud.

Comments

[dexeron.livejournal.com]

I think you mean Rick Scott, not Rick Perry.

Otherwise, I like this news. About time.

[dwer.livejournal.com]

It's easy to get those guys confused. Scott's the one without the hair. :P

[telemann.livejournal.com]

lol DOH! And resembles a character right out of The Simpsons.

[soliloquy76.livejournal.com]

This kind of shit, for partisan purposes, needs to be prosecuted. I know that legislators are usually immune, but this nonsense should not be tolerated.

[dwer.livejournal.com]

we can not suffer another Florida 2000 style debacle. Never mind the clearly partisan nature of what's going on, never mind the poor judgement of the elected officials who are insisting on doing this, never mind the evidence that shows that this clearly breaks down on racial and class lines...

at it's most FUNDAMENTAL, we must always remember that infringing the rights of others is to be avoided as much as possible, and that it's almost certainly better to let a few people defraud the system by voting illegally (a problem that has never been significant, nor fundamentally proven to be pervasive) than to deny thousands of people their franchise. The right to vote is political speech at it's most profound, and I am consistently disgusted that members of the party who always want to call other people un-american would be engaged in such activity, even if it's NOT partisan.

Which, of course, it clearly is.

[aelf.livejournal.com]

Where I live, an audit proved that people voted multiple times in the 2008 election. None of these deliberate cases were prosecuted. I suspect that's at least in part why the State Board of Elections found that the 2008 election had a 30% increase over the election of 2006, when it came to such fraudulent votes. While right now, they say it's small enough to be irrelevant (.01 of 1%), I think they're just setting the situation up to get worse. If they don't enforce the law, what stops people? An unenforced law is a disregarded law. And these are just the obvious ones. I wonder how many "well... maybe" there were. By not stopping the obvious ones, you increase the gray-area ones as well.

I like to think my vote's important. Not enforcing the law contributes to disenfranchising me. How do you walk that line?

(http://arbutus.patch.com/articles/voter-roll-irregularities-alleged-in-baltimore-county link provided for informational purposes)

[dwer.livejournal.com]

so, I'm all in favor of making sure that the voter rolls are accurate.

But look at the numbers. Nearly 500,000 registered voters in Baltimore County when the article was written. 1700 registrations initially reviewed, and just over 800 challenged -- and no proof that ANYONE tried to vote as any one of these people.

Now, compare that with the thousands of people who have simply been removed from the rolls in, say, Florida, without any real proof that they're criminals or dead.

It is better to let a hundred murderers go free rather than execute an innocent man, it is sometimes said. Well, better to let a dozen or two (and those are the kinds of numbers you're talking about) people vote fraudulently than disenfranchise thousands for political gain, says I.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Coming from a state that elected a known criminal to its governor, this is hardly a surprise.

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

Yay! Thank you!

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

Really? Hilary gets shotgun?

[op-tech-glitch.livejournal.com]

Nor do Barack's hands and face match especially well, if you take a closer look.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

I guess I didn't miss the point after all.

[kayjayuu.livejournal.com]

I think voter purges should be done immediately after an election, so the job does get done and no one complains because their votes, legal or otherwise, were able to be cast and counted.

That said, anecdata time. My hosts on my vacation related a story to me regarding a young woman who came to vote here in Minnesota, stating that she was "Jane Smith" and her address was "1234 Main St". Unfortunately for her, my host was two persons behind her and actually lives at 1234 Main St., having bought the house from the estate of the person she was claiming to be. When he spoke up, the young woman ran.

Voter fraud clearly happens. I don't believe we should impinge on anyone's right to cast a ballot. But I have yet to see anyone who decries the purges of dead people, dogs and cats, felons (where it is illegal to vote as one), and fictitious characters, give specific examples of what to do about the problem.

Doesn't mean they haven't done so, I just haven't seen anything offered. Thoughts?

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

I like the idea of the roll purge happening right AFTER an election.

I also think that if we are going to purge rolls the process has to be much more intensive and hands on. Generate your list of suspected ineligible voters using computer metrics. Then task the Secretary of State's office in each state with hiring enough people to investigate each name of that list and to include multiple attempts to reach the person on the list at the listed home address.

States should face a high burden in this process to avoid the incorrect result of purging voters who are entirely entitled to their registration.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

I disagree. I think people should take care of their registrations. If we did a purge after the election, and sent notices to each person purged, letting them know that they can re-register (include the form), that's entirely adequate.

[paft.livejournal.com]

K: That said, anecdata time. My hosts on my vacation related a story to me regarding a young woman who came to vote here in Minnesota, stating that she was "Jane Smith" and her address was "1234 Main St". Unfortunately for her, my host was two persons behind her and actually lives at 1234 Main St., having bought the house from the estate of the person she was claiming to be. When he spoke up, the young woman ran.

You know someone who said they saw...

Classic.

[kayjayuu.livejournal.com]

Paft, I said it was anecdata. What more do you want from me. Personal stories from posters to this community are no less relevant than the ones reporters use for their lead-ins all the time.

I know someone to whom this happened and they just happened to tell this to me the day before I read this post. They were the one affected by someone who tried to fraudulently to use their address and the name of a person undeniably dead, and who then ran away -- perhaps they were seized by an urge to jog at that moment.

You are more disturbed by the fact that I bring it up, properly labeled, than the fact that someone for some reason tried to vote in a dead person's name. For shits and giggles? Probably not. For money or other payment? Maybe. Who pays that money and why? Out of the goodness of their heart?

[dwer.livejournal.com]

it should be MUCH MUCH harder to remove someone from the rolls than to add them. That's my thought.

Also, you are literally the first person I've ever met who can actually tell a story about someone attempting to vote illegally.

[kayjayuu.livejournal.com]

Glad to be of service, but for some reason Paft thinks it's "classic."

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

Good thing the Justice Dept actually sees this for what it is, instead of the completely unfounded claim of the 'government just doing its job.'

[il-mio-gufo.livejournal.com]

Florida discriminates against it's citizens? Get out.

Wait is that the State...didn't something happen there when Bush Jr....was 'voted' in?

oh gosh :/ is something going to happen there again?

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

I believe your compliant should be a complaint.

Has Florida fixed the chad problem they had back in 2000?

The thing that fascinates me about the whole process is how one state can make so much of a difference. I grew up in the Keystone State. It seems weird that Florida has served that role in the electoral capacity.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Florida Secretary of State said on Saturday they were going to ignore the DOJ, and procede, but the lawyer for the Supervisors of Elections for Florida's cities and counties has said they're going to ignore their own state official and abide by the DOJ request. Ironic, Florida tweeked their nose at the feds, and local counties are going to ignore the state. Ironic.

Of course, the Feds should send in some marshals now ;)

[ford-prefect42.livejournal.com]

Why is it that democrats are so blatantly in favor of voter fraud? Why is it accepted that that is the case?

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

Since you're not in favor of universal suffrage I assume any votes by poor people is considered voter fraud.