Florida’s “electoral police” are threatening suffrage, groups warn

FloridaThe state legislature has approved the establishment of a new office dedicated to investigating election-related crimes amid the latest Republican efforts at the state level focused on suffrage and electoral administration.

Voting rights and civic groups warn that such legislation – also proposed by GOP officials in Arizona and Georgia – could ultimately criminalize the foundation of democracy and be used to intimidate voters not to vote.

Florida Senate Bill 254 – calls republican governor Ron DeSantis, which is expected to sign the law and approve $ 2.5 million for the Office of Electoral Crimes and Security within the State Department, the first such office in the country. The office – subordinate to the governor – will employ 25 people to run a voter fraud phone number and investigate reports of possible fraud and other election-related violations.

Kirk Bailey, political director of the ACLU in Florida, said “there is absolutely no reason for the Electoral Police.”

The bill “would create an electoral police force that could only be described as a solution in finding the problem,” he said in a statement. “A handful of cases of intentional violations that have been prosecuted in the past year prove that the existing system works. There are no safeguards in this legislation to prevent the proposed office from becoming politicized. We have real needs in Florida that we need to address, and this is not one of them. “

Genesis Robinson, political director of the black-led non-partisan rights group Equal Ground Action Fund, reiterated these criticisms in comments to Congress, calling the bill a “ridiculous solution to a problem that doesn’t exist.”

The bill is nothing more than a tool to further isolate Republican political power at the expense of Floridian’s voting rights, she said in a statement to The Independent.

“We already have safeguards in place to investigate and prosecute those who violate our electoral law, and in a country that boasts fiscal responsibility, this new electoral police is wasting tax dollars,” she said. “Our political climate has become so polarized and disruptive that we at Equal Ground are seriously concerned that this new agency will be armed to attack political enemies and divert attention and resources from actual work to make voting more accessible to those who want to participate. . in a democratic process. “

Legislation also requires election officials to perform annual maintenance of electoral registers rather than biennial checks that could wipe out thousands of registered voters from the registers.

It also increases criminal sanctions for returning ballots not issued by a family member – what critics of the GOP call “collecting ballots”, but is often used by community organizations, churches and other election campaigns that rely on volunteers to collect ballots for the elderly and disabled. . people, among others, who need help with voting. Under the new law, such conduct carries a fine of up to $ 50,000 and five years in prison.

The bill also prohibits voting by choice and imposes new restrictions on the registration of third-party voters.

The legislation “creates new, costly, unnecessary and deliberate barriers to voting,” says the Florida Voters Association.

“During the 2020 presidential election, Gov. Ron DeSantis declared the Florida election process a ‘gold’ standard across the country,” the group said in a statement. “While we can all agree that the security of elections is of the utmost importance, these additional confusing and unnecessary steps will deter voters from participating in the democratic process. We must do everything in our power to protect our freedom to vote in safe and secure elections. “

Bipartisan efforts to protect and expand suffrage in the 2020 election caused some problems in that year’s elections, but the unfounded narrative promoted by Donald Trump and his allies, which allegedly caused massive voter fraud and “stolen” results spurred a wave of legislation sponsored by the Republican Republic in most state legislatures to withdraw access to the vote and leave election control to Republican legislators.

The Florida Department of State received 262 complaints of electoral fraud in 2020 and referred 75 to law enforcement, while more than 11 million Florida voters participated in that year’s presidential election.

“Electoral fraud is a very rare question, why spend millions of dollars and the police on it? Dangerous, ” said Bernice KingExecutive Director of the Center for Nonviolent Social Change Martin Luther King Jr.

Last year, United States Center for Democracy identified 262 laws in 41 countries that would interfere with the electoral administration, and at least 32 of these proposals will become law in 17 countries by the end of 2021.

In 2022, state legislators in at least 27 states introduced, pre-filed or passed at least 250 laws with restrictive voting rights, compared to 75 such laws in 24 countries by the same time last year, reports Brennan Center for Justice.