Lawsuit and emails show Duval County elections supervisor wouldn't provide Spanish ballots

A federal judge ruled Monday that Duval County Supervisor of Elections Mike Hogan "inexplicably ignored" a court ruling by refusing to provide Spanish-language sample ballots at early voting sites.

In September, a Tallahassee federal judge ordered Duval County Supervisor of Elections Mike Hogan and other supervisors to "provide signage, sample facsimile ballots, and notice in Spanish on their websites.

Jason Teal, a city attorney, argued that the order didn't actually require Hogan to provide the sample ballots at early voting sites, according to emails between him and Hispanic voting rights groups. Federal Judge Mark E. Walker said Teal was mistaken.

"[Hogan's] reading, which inexplicably ignored this Court’s unambiguous language to 'make available a facsimile sample ballot in Spanish to voters who fall within the ambit of Section 4(e) of the Voting Rights Act” apparently, and unfortunately, resulted in no Spanish-language sample ballots being provided during the early-voting period in Duval County."

Teal had said the order only required that the office make Spanish-language sample ballots available (which he said it did by mailing them out to some voters) and that at polling locations the office only had to tell voters that Spanish sample ballots were available (even though the office didn't provide those ballots at early voting).

In Walker's first order, he said that "it is remarkable that it takes a coalition of voting rights organizations and individuals to sue in federal court to seek minimal compliance with the plain language of a venerable 53-year-old law."

While Walker's two orders against Hogan were mostly blistering, he did praise Hogan for providing official ballots in Spanish, which wasn't something Walker had explicitly required.

Nonprofit organizations Mi Familia Vote Education Fund, Hispanic Federation, Faith in Florida, UnidosUS, and Vamos4PR filed the lawsuit.

According to an emergency motion filed Sunday, "plaintiffs learned earlier today (Sunday, November 4, 2018) that Duval County Supervisor of Elections Mike Hogan (“Duval Supervisor Hogan”) is not providing any Spanish-language facsimile ballots at early voting sites."

Early voting ended Sunday, and voting will resume at 7 a.m. Tuesday.

Hogan described in a statement late Monday what he called "our significant efforts to provided [sic] Spanish voters with a Spanish-language sample ballot." He said the office mailed out sample ballots in English and Spanish to "every one of the 494,696 registered voters in Duval County." (There are actually 607,386 registered voters.)

He also said the office published sample ballots in The Times-Union and in Hola Noticias, a Spanish-language newspaper. The office has 10 Spanish translators for Election Day placed "at precincts where we expect a large concentration of Spanish-speaking voters." The supervisor's website also has a digital copy of the Spanish sample ballot, and he said each early voting site had a system that would read the ballot out loud in Spanish.

According to the court filing, though, a Spanish-speaking voter in Duval asked for a Spanish sample ballot when voting Sunday. "Despite her request, a polling official at the early voting site did not provide her a Spanish-language facsimile ballot."

When an attorney emailed Hogan, Jason Teal, assistant general counsel for the city, wrote that "our read of Judge Walker’s order never mandated that Spanish-language sample ballots appear in early voting sites."

Hogan added that there were 271 versions of sample ballots and it wasn't feasible to keep all 271 versions available at every early voting site.

Andrew Pantazi: (904) 359-4310