NYT: Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo announced on Wednesday that he intends to restore voting rights to felons on parole, a move that could open the ballot box to more than 35,000 people. The mechanism through which Mr. Cuomo plans to … Continue reading
Category Archives: felon voting
Kira Lerner for Think Progress. … Continue reading
Will at WaPo: What compelling government interest is served by felon disenfranchisement? Enhanced public safety? How? Is it to fine-tune the quality of the electorate? This is not a legitimate government objective for elected officials to pursue. A felony conviction … Continue reading
Tampa Bay Times: Gov. Rick Scott is appealing a federal judge’s ruling that he must come up with a new way to restore voting rights to felons. “People elected by Floridians should determine Florida’s clemency rules for convicted criminals, not … Continue reading
FELN: U.S. District Court Judge Mark Walker issued a permanent injunction today that requires Florida’s Executive Clemency Board to establish a new voting rights restoration process for former felons by April 26. While the Court did not order the automatic … Continue reading
David Cottrell, Michael C. Herron, Javier M. Rodriguez, and Daniel A. Smith have written this article for American Politics Research. Here is the abstract: On account of poor living conditions, African Americans in the United States experience disproportionately high rates of … Continue reading
Miles Rapoport for TAP. … Continue reading
Release via email: United States District Court Judge Mark E. Walker ruled Florida’s voting rights restoration scheme violates the First Amendment rights of free association and free expression, and the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. The decision, issued … Continue reading
Washington Post editorial: NO STATE comes close to disenfranchising its citizens at the rate Florida does. By doing so, the state extends the iniquities of Jim Crow into the modern era to the detriment of minority and, for the most … Continue reading
I have posted this draft on SSRN, which is forthcoming in a special symposium issue of the University of Memphis Law Review commemorating the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King. (More about that symposium here.) Here is … Continue reading
Think Progress: Florida voters will have a chance to restore voting rights to more than 1 million former felons through a ballot initiative this November. The proposed constitutional amendment on Tuesday reached the 766,200 petition signatures required to go on the ballot. … Continue reading
WTOP: A Virginia commonwealth’s attorney has warned prosecutors statewide Wednesday against prosecuting certain voter registration fraud cases, due to concerns raised by Virginia registrars. In an email obtained by WTOP through a Freedom of Information Act request, Chuck Slemp, commonwealth’s … Continue reading
Release: Ysterday, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF), The Sentencing Project, and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), filed an amicus brief in a Louisiana appellate court in support of plaintiffs-appellants, who are challenging Louisiana’s felony disenfranchisement policy. More … Continue reading
Hadar Aviram, Allyson Bragg, and Chelsea Lewis have posted this draft on SSRN (forthcoming Annual Review of Law and Social Science). Here is the abstract: Crime control and prisons have featured prominently in electoral campaigns, yet currently and formerly incarcerated people … Continue reading
AL.com: A number of election officials across Alabama remain confused about the impacts of a sweeping new felon disenfranchisement law, according to interviews this week with registrars representing 12 counties. The new law, which took effect in August, clarified which … Continue reading
BAN reports on this ruling. … Continue reading
Nancy Leong for Take Care. … Continue reading
CLC press release from last week: Campaign Legal Center today asked a federal court to immediately order the state of Alabama to implement the Felony Voter Disqualification Act (HB 282) (signed May 25, 2017) by educating and advising voters of the law, … Continue reading
Orlando Sentinel intro. Charlie Crist in favor of state constitutional amendment. Michael Morley opposed. … Continue reading
Kira Lerner for Think Progress: The law still imposes what can be considered a poll tax because former felons have to be able to afford to pay their fines and fees to restore their right to vote. “Wealth should not … Continue reading
Good news from Alabama. … Continue reading
WaPo: Gov. Terry McAuliffe announced Thursday that he had broken the record for restoring voting rights to convicted felons, calling it his “proudest achievement” as governor. McAuliffe (D) said he had individually restored rights to 156,221 Virginians, surpassing the previous … Continue reading
Frank Askin Miami-Herald oped: Can Florida claim to be a democracy when one out of every 10 of adult citizens in the state are denied the right to vote because some time in their lives they were convicted of a … Continue reading
Tilman Klumpp, Hugo Mialon, and Michael Williams have posted this draft on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Approximately one in forty adult U.S. citizens has lost their right to vote, either temporarily or permanently, as a result of a felony … Continue reading
Release: On Monday, March 13 the Fair Elections Legal Network and Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC filed a class action lawsuit that seeks to automatically restore former felons’ voting rights and eliminate Florida’s arbitrary process for re-enfranchisement. The plaintiffs … Continue reading
Miami Herald: Attorney General Pam Bondi had nothing to say to the Florida Supreme Court Monday, and for people working to restore the right to vote to convicted felons, that was welcome news. The court must decide whether a ballot … Continue reading
If the Florida Supreme Court allows this measure to go on the ballot, it would be a huge deal in Florida. WSJ: Mr. Meade plans to be in the courtroom Monday when the Florida Supreme Court reviews a proposed constitutional … Continue reading
New ACS Issue Brief by Avner Shapiro. … Continue reading
The case is Thompson v. Alabama and the brief is here. Keep your eye on this suit. … Continue reading
Release: Florida’s lifetime ban on voting for people with past felony convictions is one of the harshest laws in the nation and its severe moral, racial, and economic consequences demand it be replaced, according to a new report released today … Continue reading
News and Observer: Larry Smith got an odd phone call last week: Someone had filed to throw out his vote, claiming he was a felon serving an active sentence. Smith, who lives in Stokes County, is no felon. But he … Continue reading
Murat Mungan has posted this draft on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Disenfranchisement laws in many states prohibit convicted felons from voting. The removal of ex-convicts from the pool of eligible voters reduces the pressure politicians may otherwise face to … Continue reading
Must-read on Florida’s long path to restoration of voting rights for felons who have turned their lives around. More than 10,000 applications wait to be heard by the Florida Board of Executive Clemency. The backlog seems by design. The board, … Continue reading
NYT reports. … Continue reading
Release: The Campaign Legal Center, the Voting Rights Institute, and the law firm of Jenner & Block, alongside a star-studded team of civil rights lawyers, today filed a lawsuit in Alabama district court on behalf of U.S. citizens with past … Continue reading
You can find the unanimous 1st Circuit opinion at this link. Here is a statement from Demos. From the opinion: It is true that Evenwel did not decide the precise question before us. Nevertheless, we hold that its methodology and logic compel us … Continue reading
Think Progress: The Virginia Supreme Court rejected a petition from Republican leaders on Thursday that sought to hold Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) in contemptfor restoring the voting rights of tens of thousands of ex-offenders ahead of the 2016 election. … Continue reading
Washington Post editorial: In just four states are felons permanently barred from voting absent action by the governor. And in one of them, Virginia, lawmakers are considering an even more restrictive regime that would forever foreclose the possibility of redemption … Continue reading
WaPo: A Republican state senator who sued Gov. Terry McAuliffe over the governor’s efforts to restore voting rights to felons filed legislation Thursday to automatically grant political rights to certain nonviolent criminals. Senate Majority Leader Thomas K. Norment Jr. (R-James … Continue reading
Richmond Times-Dispatch: GOP leaders announced Wednesday that they want the Supreme Court of Virginia to consider holding McAuliffe in contempt for his efforts to restore felons’ political rights en masse despite the court’s July 22 opinion that struck down the … Continue reading
Zack Roth for NBC News. … Continue reading
AP: At noon Monday, it said, he will appear at the Civil Rights Memorial on Capitol Square “to make major restoration of rights announcement.” A McAuliffe spokeswoman, Christina Nuckols, declined to provide more information. McAuliffe will announce that he has … Continue reading
WaPo: Armed with an autopen, Gov. Terry McAuliffe said two weeks ago that he had all he needed to swiftly but individually restore voting rights to more than 200,000 felons. But McAuliffe (D) has since decided that he needs something … Continue reading
Richmond Times-Disptach: In response, McAuliffe said he will “expeditiously” sign roughly 13,000 individual rights restoration orders for people who have already registered to vote. He said he’ll continue until rights are restored for all 200,000 people affected by the original … Continue reading
You can find the 63 pages of opinions here. This is a big blow both politically to Democrats (who would have gotten a boost from the restoration of voting rights to felons who had secured their sentences) as well as … Continue reading
Dale Ho NYT oped: THE Virginia Supreme Court will hear arguments on Tuesday in a lawsuit that aims to strip the right to vote from more than 206,000 people, including one in five African-American adults in the state. If state … Continue reading
WaPo: It was not clear which way the seven justices would rule. Much of the arguments were spent focused on whether the GOP legislative leaders and voters could even challenge the restoration of voter rights in court. … Continue reading
Think Progress: But Virginia Republicans are taking the state to court on July 19 to try to roll back these changes, and restore the Reformation-era felon disenfranchisement law. The conservative officials are arguing not only that the governor’s order violates … Continue reading
NYT editorial: Voting rights advocates have been pressing the Census Bureau for more than a decade to stop counting prison inmates as “residents” of prisons — where they typically remain for only a short time — instead of the communities … Continue reading
Nola.com and Buzzfeed report on the state constitutional class action, which allegedly affects 70,000 people … Continue reading