Voter checks to restart before Nov. election

FROM THE NEWS SERVICE OF FLORIDA

State elections officials will re-start an effort to have supervisors of elections check voter rolls against lists of possible non-citizens before Election Day in November, the state’s top elections official said Tuesday.

Orlando voters stood in line at the polls in 2008. (FLORIDA COURIER FILES)

The state will have a new list of possible non-felons that will be better than a previous one, because the state is expecting to use a federal Homeland Security database, said Secretary of State Ken Detzner.

“We’re going to restart the program in the very near future, and we’ll be working deliberately, very cautiously and making sure that all due process is in place,” Detzner said. Asked if the checks would start before the November election, Detzner said they will.

The state earlier sent lists of potential non-citizens to local supervisors of elections for further checking and possible purging from the voter rolls, but Detzner said those earlier lists were now outdated and are no longer of any use.

The effort to remove non-citizens who aren’t eligible to vote came under criticism when the first lists were sent out because of fears that the effort was casting a wide net that could result in eligible voters having to prove they are citizens to remain on the voter rolls.

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