Under one requirement of the partnership, the state would have to commit to reaching out to an estimated 4.2 million people who are eligible to vote but have not registered. | Getty Election fraud? Florida won’t pledge to look for voters registered in multiple states

DAYTONA BEACH — An effort to clamp down on potential voter fraud in Florida has been bogged down by an unlikely source: the state’s Republican-controlled administration.

More than a year ago, Florida legislators gave permission to the nation’s third-largest state to join a multistate partnership to flag people registered to vote in more than one state.


Florida, a haven for semi-residents who trek yearly from the North and Midwest, has long been hit with reports of people possibly voting in more than one state. Republicans — including President Donald Trump — have complained about voter fraud despite a lack of evidence.

A top state election official who works for Gov. Ron DeSantis told local election supervisors on Wednesday that it wasn’t clear when — or if — the state would become a member of the Electronic Registration Information Center, or ERIC. Member states exchange voting information and look for duplicate registrations.

On Wednesday, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, said his state had joined the partnership, bringing total participants to 26 states and Washington, D.C.

“In addition to enhancing the accuracy of our voter rolls, ERIC will help our office better identify, contact, and offer eligible but unregistered citizens the opportunity to register to vote,” Georgia Elections Director Chris Harvey said in a written statement. “We are continuing to expand our efforts to increase voter registration and participation — bringing more Georgians to the voter lists and out to the polls.”

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Florida's reluctance to act, which began under former Gov. Rick Scott and has continued under DeSantis, has angered local election supervisors who say they regularly are accosted by residents.

“Voter fraud being on the minds of many, it’s very frustrating to us to not have access to that tool,” Pinellas County Supervisor of Elections Deborah Clark said. “I’m really sorry to see the state take a pass on this year after year.”

Wendy Link, the newly-installed elections supervisor for Palm Beach County, called joining the partnership the “best thing to protect ourselves heading into 2020.”

Maria Matthews, the director of Florida’s Division of Elections, said a package of election laws passed by the Legislature this spring and the partnership‘s requirements made it difficult to say when the state would join the group.

“There’s a lot of moving parts and pieces to this,” Matthews said today a meeting of Florida elections supervisors.

Under one requirement of the partnership, the state would have to commit to reaching out to an estimated 4.2 million people who are eligible to vote but have not registered. Florida would have to promise to educate residents on the “most efficient means to register to vote.”

Responding to a wave of questions, Matthews said there was a “carrot and stick” to participating in the partnership. That remarks drew disapproval from supervisors, who bristled at the idea that reaching out to unregistered voters should be viewed as some sort of punishment.

Matthews would not answer questions from reporters after his remarks.

Sarah Revell, a spokesperson for Secretary of State Laurel Lee, gave no indication of whether the nation’s biggest battleground state would join the partnership.

“The Legislature passed a bill last year that permits the Department to join ERIC,” Revell said in an email. “The department is in the process of reviewing the requirements to join ERIC and there are a variety of factors that must be considered before a decision is made.”

Lori Edwards, the supervisor of elections for Polk County who criticized Matthews’ carrot-and-stick comment, was perplexed by the state’s position.

“It’s probably our best opportunity to have accurate voter rolls in Florida,” Edwards said. “I’m really disappointed that the Secretary of State’s office says they are too busy and it’s too much work to try to have accurate voter rolls.”