Supreme Court temporarily blocks felons from voting in Florida

[iluvtennis]

WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court refused Thursday to let Florida felons who completed their sentences vote in a primary without first paying fees, fines and restitution, as the state requires.

Voting rights groups challenged the requirement as unconstitutional, given that state voters approved a constitutional amendment in 2018 giving hundreds of thousands of felons the right to vote. The requirement will remain in effect while the case is heard next month by a federal appeals court.

The unsigned order was opposed by liberal Associate Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Elena Kagan. Sotomayor said it "prevents thousands of otherwise eligible voters from participating in Florida’s primary election simply because they are poor."

"Under this scheme, nearly a million otherwise-eligible citizens cannot vote unless they pay money," Sotomayor said, calling it a "voter paywall."

The dispute over the voting rights of Florida's felons could be crucial in this fall's elections because of its perennial status as a swing state. There are about 775,000 felons in the state who have completed their prison sentences, including about 85,000 who registered to vote.

Most states restore felons' right to vote after their sentences, along with time on parole or probation, are complete. Many states impose additional requirements. Florida is among 11 states with the most restrictive rules, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

....continued at link

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/07/16/supreme-court-temporarily-blocks-felons-voting-florida/5442603002/

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ore voter suppression. The ppl voted to allow ex felons to vote in Nov 2018 and there were no restrictions on their right to vote. rethugs came up with this repayment system to prevent these folks from voting.

[secondwind]

1. They should be called ex felons... not felons.. and they paid their dues.

[RANDYWILDMAN]

2. out of the 85,000 felons who are registered to vote ?

do you think they alone could swing Florida, yep you betcha....Repubs have to put up so many blocks or they will never control this state again.

Shenanigans inFlorida again, I'm shocked

[gratuitous]

3. Why did USA Today say "temporarily"?

The real kick in the head for citizens trying to get their right to vote back is that many of them can't get a straight answer out of the state of Florida for what they owe. There's no comprehensive system for figuring that out, and the person doesn't know if he's paid all the fines, all the fees, all the penalties, all the restitution, and all the whatever else the state has levied against him for his special crime. The state of Florida doesn't know if a person's totally paid up. So they remain in limbo.

Thanks to an activist Supreme Court, the original amendment to the state constitution has been subverted to include these requirements, requirements larded on by the Republican leadership of the state, requirements that the people of Florida specifically did not authorize when they passed the amendment.

[mr_lebowski]

9. Presumably the voting rights group was denied some kind of fast-track override from SCOTUS

to let the ex-felons vote in the primary.

"The requirement will remain in effect while the case is heard next month by a federal appeals court."

That's the 'temporarily' part. The overall case is not decided.

This sounds like a super-shitty situation. But then ... Florida.

[secondwind]

4. How does this differ from other folks who owe back taxes or other debts? This is NOT EQUITABLE

[RANDYWILDMAN]

7. it's a fake hurdle

They just did to trip them up and stop them from voting, if they were voting repub, they would have made it easy for them.

[NoMoreRepugs]

5. Rump lite AKA DeSantis is behind this.

[jimfields33]

10. I am surprised with justice Buyers

I think this is the second decision he made with conservatives this year.

[doc03]

6. So does this mean Trump won't be able to vote?

[lpbk2713]

8. The SC doesn't seem to have changed much since Y2K.

They paved the way for Shit-for-Brains to steal the sElection.