Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

Expert: Law blocks most Florida felons from regaining voting rights

Expert: Law blocks most Florida felons from regaining voting rights

Clarence Singleton registers to vote under a new Florida law allowing convicted felons to regain their voting rights. This summer Gov. Ron DeSantis signed legislation that requires felons to first pay all outstanding fines and fees, prompted several lawsuits claiming discrimination.

Joe Raedle/Getty Images

The new law requiring felons in Florida to pay all their fines and court fees before getting their voting rights restored would leave about 80 percent of them unable to register, according to research that is part of a legal challenge to the law.

Professor Daniel Smith, chairman of the University of Florida political science department, also found that black convicts would be more likely to be left on the sidelines during elections than white convicts.

Smith submitted his testimony on behalf of several convicted felons who would be blocked from restoring their voting rights as well as the NAACP and the League of Women Voters.


Nearly two-thirds of Florida voters supported an amendment passed last November to restore convicted felons' voting rights. But on June 28, Gov. Ron DeSantis signed legislation requiring repayment as a condition of registering to vote.

Within days several lawsuits were filed. They have been combined, and a hearing is set for Oct. 7 on the plaintiffs' request for a preliminary injunction blocking implementation of the financial requirements.

The suits claim that the requirement to pay fines and fees is tantamount to an unconstitutional poll tax, something that was used to prevent black people from voting in many states until the 1960s. They also claim that it violates the Voting Rights Act because black and Hispanic citizens would be disproportionately affected.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

Plaintiff Kelvin Jones, a 46-year-old black man who lives in Hillsborough County, owes more than $50,000 in fines and court costs. He is disabled and unable to work, making it impossible to pay the money or to hire an attorney to ask that the fines be converted to community service. Even if that were to happen, his disability prevents him from doing the community service.

Smith emphasizes throughout his filing that the conclusions he draws are only estimates because no statewide database is available showing how many convicted felons still owe fines or fees. Nevertheless, using data from 48 of Florida's 67 counties, Smith estimates only about 20 percent of the more than 375,000 people with felony convictions owe neither fines nor fees and therefore could have their voting rights restored.

By extrapolating his findings to cover the entire state, Smith estimates that 8 percent of the more than 140,000 black felons who have finished their sentences have paid off all the fines, while 13.5 percent of nearly 180,000 white convicts have no outstanding fees and fines and therefore are eligible to regain the vote.

Shortly after the law passed, the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, the driving force behind passage of the amendment, announced a fundraising campaign to help convicts pay off their fines. The goal was to raise $3 million.

Meanwhile, officials in Miami announced a plan that would allow felons who still owe fines and fees to petition the court to modify their sentences, including converting some or all of what they owe into community service.

Read More

"Vote Here" sign
Grace Cary/Getty Images

The path forward for electoral reform

The National Association of Nonpartisan Reformers hosted its post-election gathering Dec. 2-4 in San Diego. More than 120 leaders from across the country convened to reflect on the November elections, where reform campaigns achieved mixed results with multiple state losses, and to chart a path forward for nonpartisan electoral reforms. As the Bridge Alliance Education Fund is a founding member of NANR and I currently serve on the board, I attended the gathering in hopes of getting some insight on how we can best serve the collective needs of the electoral reform community in the coming year.

Keep ReadingShow less
Peopel waiting in line near a sign that reads "Vote Here: Polling Place"

People wait to vote in the 2024 election at city hall in Anchorage, Alaska.

Hasan Akbas/Anadolu via Getty Images

How Alaska is making government work again

At the end of a bitter and closely divided election season, there’s a genuine bright spot for democracy from our 49th state: Alaskans decided to keep the state’s system of open primaries and ranked choice voting because it is working.

This is good news not only for Alaska, but for all of us ready for a government that works together to get things done for voters.

Keep ReadingShow less
people voting
Getty Images

How to reform the political system to fight polarization and extremism

On Dec. 19, at 6 p.m., Elections Reform Now will present a webinar on “How to Reform the Political System to Combat Polarization and Extremism.”

In 2021, a group of the leading academics in the United States formed a task force to study the polarization of the American electorate and arrive at solutions to the dysfunction of our electoral system. They have now written a book, "Electoral Reform in the United States: Proposals for Combating Polarization and Extremism," published just this month.

Keep ReadingShow less
a hand holding a red button that says i vote
Parker Johnson/Unsplash

Yes, elections have consequences – primary elections to be specific

Can you imagine a Republican winning in an electoral district in which Democrats make up 41 percent of the registered electorate? Seems farfetched in much of the country. As farfetched as a Democrat winning in a R+10 district.

It might be in most places in the U.S. – but not in California.

Republican Rep. David Valadao won re-election in California's 22nd congressional district, where registered Republicans make up just shy of 28 percent of the voting population. But how did he do it?

Keep ReadingShow less