Fears about massive voter disenfranchisement,
particularly of minority voters, continue in Florida. Yesterday, the
director of the ACLU Florida Voting Rights Project gave testimony to
the US Commission on Civil Rights, outlining a number of policies that
could potentially lead to serious voting problems in that state. "The
November 2000 election taught us that even the seemingly smallest
voting policy, practice, procedure, or problem must be scrutinized in
order to prevent widespread disfranchisement," Courtenay Strickland
told the Commission. "Florida elections officials must devote time and
energy to changing these policies and practices that together threaten
to suppress the vote of large segments of the population, and
particularly those within minority communities. Our democracy depends
upon it." Among the policies identified by Strickland was Florida's
provisional balloting program, in which voters whose eligibility is
unknown by poll workers on election day are given an opportunity to
vote using a provisional ballot. The ballot is then counted if it is
confirmed that the voter was indeed registered to vote. Strickland said
that a problem with the policy as it is currently written is that
provisional ballots can be disqualified even if the voter was legally
registered to vote, but did not vote in the correct precinct. [more ]
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