Florida voters given a reprieve — for now
May 1, 2008 at 8:11 am by Wayne Garcia
Today was supposed to mark yet another black day for Florida voters and democracy in this important swing state; Secretary of State Kurt Browning had announced that he would begin enforcing a controversial “third-party registrant” law that has the effect of shutting down voter registration drives like those done by the League of Women Voters.
Now, we all know what a commie organization the LWV is, so of course, we’re grateful for this Republican-led crackdown that amounts to, at best, a solution in search of a problem and, at worst, totalitarian control of the ballot box. After all, we have only about 50 percent of the eligible voters in the state actually registered to vote, and in many elections, fewer than one-third of those who are registered actually vote.
The law was passed first in 2006 and again, with changes, in 2007. But the LWV of Florida sued to stop the 2006 law and won a temporary injunction and an agreement from Browning not to enforce that law. But the Legislature reconstituted the law, which includes possibly hefty fines for making mistakes while getting folks registered to vote, in 2007 and the process begins anew.
The LWV has won another reprieve, until July of this year at least, according to an announcement on its website. It filed a lawsuit against the 2007 law on Monday.
Florida already has among the most restrictive voter registration procedures in the nation, including long lead times to register for an election and no ability for same-day registering on Election Day.
Good story on WMNF Evening News on this earlier this week. You can download the entire newscast here.
(photo by Jonas Luster)Â
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