Followup: Florida press unites against looming GOP voter restriction bill
Here's a follow-up to my piece on Tuesday about a major -- but under-reported, at least nationally -- story coming out of Florida: A last-minute bill pushed by Republicans to put new restrictions on voting.
To recap, Senate Bill 956 and House Bill 7149 surfaced in the final weeks of the Florida legislature and shot of their respective committees in dubious circumstances. In the case of the House, the GOP-led Elections and Ethics Committee limited debate to six minutes before voting to advance the bill to the floor.
Scanning this week's editorial pages, Florida newspapers are united in opposition to the legislation -- both for the process that created them as well as the content.
The massive bills, which are nearly identical, contain an array of provisions to restrict voting, including eliminating two forms of ID used by the elderly, making it illegal for voters to cast ballots if they move 29 days before an election, and barring groups like election monitors from interacting with voters within 100 feet of polling sites.
At the same time, the bill also loosens restrictions on out-of-state PAC spending to influence Florida elections.
The response of Florida's papers has been fast and furious:
FORT MEYERS NEWS-PRESS: "It's as if legislators compiled a list of every bad election law imaginable and threw them together in these 11th-hour bills."
ORLANDO SENTINEL: "An assault on voting. [T]he Legislature's Republican majority has sucker-punched Floridianswith a last-minute plan that would throw new obstacles in the path ofcitizens registering to vote. The voting plan's partisan motivations are transparent."
SARASOTA HERALD-TRIBUNE: "The proposed revisions of the election code range from marginallydefensible to utterly unnecessary. Many of them will increaseenforcement costs. How can those be justified as the state cutsbillions from its budget?"
MIAMI HERALD-SUN: "[A] flagrant example of power politics at its worst ... This is not legislation about which Gov. Charlie Crist or any legislator, Republican or Democrat, should be proud."
GAINSEVILLE SUN: "Legislators should kill this embarrassing and self-serving piece ofmischief that only disenfranchises voters and enriches incumbentpoliticians."
Now, all eyes are on Gov. Charlie Crist -- the self-styled moderate Republican with bigger political ambitions (hello, Senate). The bill isn't popular -- will he veto it? Will he get the GOP to water it down and pass through some token restrictions? Will he sign it to placate the GOP base?
Whatever happens, it puts him and his political future in a difficult position.
To recap, Senate Bill 956 and House Bill 7149 surfaced in the final weeks of the Florida legislature and shot of their respective committees in dubious circumstances. In the case of the House, the GOP-led Elections and Ethics Committee limited debate to six minutes before voting to advance the bill to the floor.
Scanning this week's editorial pages, Florida newspapers are united in opposition to the legislation -- both for the process that created them as well as the content.
The massive bills, which are nearly identical, contain an array of provisions to restrict voting, including eliminating two forms of ID used by the elderly, making it illegal for voters to cast ballots if they move 29 days before an election, and barring groups like election monitors from interacting with voters within 100 feet of polling sites.
At the same time, the bill also loosens restrictions on out-of-state PAC spending to influence Florida elections.
The response of Florida's papers has been fast and furious:
FORT MEYERS NEWS-PRESS: "It's as if legislators compiled a list of every bad election law imaginable and threw them together in these 11th-hour bills."
ORLANDO SENTINEL: "An assault on voting. [T]he Legislature's Republican majority has sucker-punched Floridianswith a last-minute plan that would throw new obstacles in the path ofcitizens registering to vote. The voting plan's partisan motivations are transparent."
SARASOTA HERALD-TRIBUNE: "The proposed revisions of the election code range from marginallydefensible to utterly unnecessary. Many of them will increaseenforcement costs. How can those be justified as the state cutsbillions from its budget?"
MIAMI HERALD-SUN: "[A] flagrant example of power politics at its worst ... This is not legislation about which Gov. Charlie Crist or any legislator, Republican or Democrat, should be proud."
GAINSEVILLE SUN: "Legislators should kill this embarrassing and self-serving piece ofmischief that only disenfranchises voters and enriches incumbentpoliticians."
Now, all eyes are on Gov. Charlie Crist -- the self-styled moderate Republican with bigger political ambitions (hello, Senate). The bill isn't popular -- will he veto it? Will he get the GOP to water it down and pass through some token restrictions? Will he sign it to placate the GOP base?
Whatever happens, it puts him and his political future in a difficult position.
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Chris Kromm
Chris Kromm is executive director of the Institute for Southern Studies and publisher of the Institute's online magazine, Facing South.