(The Center Square) – Voting rights advocates want the U.S. Supreme Court to allow up to 1.4 million felons to cast ballots in 2020 elections while their restored voting rights are deliberated in court.
Campaign Legal Center and Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) attorneys are among plaintiff lawyers who filed the request this week after the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals announced it would hear Florida’s challenge to U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle’s ruling on Aug. 18 – the same day as Florida's primary elections.
The Atlanta-based appellate court granted Gov. Ron DeSantis’ motion for a hearing before its entire 10-judge bench and a for a stay suspending Hinkle’s injunction that prohibited Florida from using appeals to block eligible felons from voting during 2020 elections.
Unless the Supreme Court lifts the stay, it will be in place on July 20, the deadline to register for state primaries. If a ruling is not issued by Oct. 5, the registration deadline for the Nov. 3 general election, as many as 774,000 Florida felons projected as likely to vote would be barred from the polls.
The Campaign Legal Center said the stay blocks more than 85,000 voters who already are registered from participating in August’s primaries and, potentially, hundreds of thousands from casting ballots in November.
“With impending registration deadlines and a primary to be held next month, the urgency is ratcheted up,” SPLC Deputy Legal Director Nancy Abudu said. “We are asking the Supreme Court to maintain the district court’s order, which set clear, direct guidelines for the state and counties to follow after months of delay on the state’s part, so all eligible Floridians can cast a ballot in the 2020 elections.”
Nearly 65 percent of Florida voters in November 2018 approved Amendment 4, which restored voting rights for felons, excluding those convicted of murder and sexual assault, after “completing sentences.”
During the 2019 legislative session, the Florida Legislature adopted Senate Bill 7066 as enabling legislation, which interpreted “completing sentences” to mean paying all legal obligations, including court fees, fines and restitution.
SB 7066 was challenged immediately by an array of groups, launching a near year-long legal battle that culminated in an eight-day trial in Hinkle’s Tallahassee courtroom.
Throughout the proceedings, Hinkle was critical of the state’s inability to create a process to determine how much felons owed and what their voting status was while the state demanded felons paid what they owed before voting eligibility was verified.
In his May 24 decision, Hinkle called SB 7066 a “pay-to-vote system” that imposes “a tax by any other name” and required the state to ascertain how much a felon owes within 21 days of a status request or voting rights are automatically restored.
In February, a three-judge 11th Circuit panel unanimously upheld Hinkle’s October ruling that SB 7066 denies voting rights of felons “genuinely unable” to pay court costs and upheld his injunction preventing the state from barring 17 plaintiffs from voting.
Hinkle later granted class certification for one consolidated case, Jones v. DeSantis. On June 14, Hinkle denied Florida’s request to lift October’s injunction and to stay his May ruling.
Wednesday’s filing urges the Supreme Court to restore Hinkle’s injunction and allow eligible felons to vote regardless of the unresolved appeal.
“This case involves three-quarters of a million people who are otherwise eligible to vote but for the state’s system of wealth discrimination, imposition of an unconstitutional poll tax and the incapable administration of a system that deprives people notice of their eligibility, forces them to risk prosecution if they hazard the wrong guess and deters eligible citizens from voting,” the filing argued.