As the Miami Herald reports:



A House council hurriedly passed a sweeping rewrite of Florida election laws Friday after shutting down debate and public comment, prompting an uproar and cries of "travesty" from opponents.



Like a similar Senate version, the House bill would ban two forms of voter ID at the polls now used mainly by older voters and require paid initiative-petition circulators to register with the state. It also would require people whose address changed in the month before an election to cast provisional ballots, prohibit anyone from interacting with voters in a floating 100-foot zone outside polling places and make it more difficult for third-party groups to register new voters.

While the bill places severe restrictions on voters and voter registration, it simultaneously loosens rules on out of state political action committees:

The bill allows political committees registered in other states to be active in Florida without complying with the Sunshine State's campaign reporting requirements, which are stricter than other states. Legislators would be allowed to create leadership funds to solicit large donations from special interests and lobbyists.

The House and Senate bills are also notable for what they don't include: For example, there are no provisions to expand early voting centers and hours, something Gov. Charlie Crist had to do by executive order last year after swamped voting sites had waits of up to six hours.



A St. Petersburg Times editorial labeled the massive package a "GOP power grab":

Republican legislative leaders have lost all sense of shame with their 11th-hour bill to roll back voting rights in Florida. The legislation is so disgraceful it is no wonder a Republican-led House committee debated the bill for all of 6 minutes Friday before silencing public comment and approving the bill along party lines. This fast-moving train needs to be stopped cold.

Yesterday, the ACLU, NAACP and other civil rights groups held a press conference with Democrats to blast the bill:

"There is a chilling similarity between the way this bill was railroaded through committee and the provisions of the bill itself," said Sen. Nan Rich, D-Weston. "Both are unabashed attempts to limit the ability of ordinary citizens to have a say in their government." She also singled out the bill's sponsor for criticism, saying that Sen. Alex Diaz de la Portilla, R-Miami, was unable to cite a single instance of voter fraud in the 2008 cycle that would justify the ban on two forms of ID used mainly by retirees.

Voting advocates have cause to be concerned. With Republicans boasting strong majorities in both the Florida Senate (a 26-14 advantage) and House (76-44), there's no doubt they could pass the bill.



The wild card may be Gov. Charlie Crist (R) -- a self-described moderate with larger political ambitions, who may be reluctant to earn bad publicity with voters. Yesterday, Crist hinted that he may veto the bill:

"It always seems to me that when there may be legislation that attempts to sort of make it harder for people to do something - the people that we work for -- generally that's not good. I don't look on that in a favorable light and that is true of this particular part of this legislation."

Crist's statement about a "particular part" of the bill hints at one possible outcome: Republicans in the legislature will strip out some of the most controversial provisions to make it more palatable for Crist to sign, but still succeed in re-writing parts of the election code.





UPDATE: CREDO put out an action alert about this yesterday -- here's the link. (h/t evora)



Here's what the leader of Fla PIRG says:

The normally mild-mannered Brad Ashwell with Florida Public Interest Research Group made the most out of his 15 seconds: "This is probably one of the worst pieces of elections legislation I’ve ever seen."

In a press release yesterday, the ACLU and PIRG itemized some of what the Senate bill would do:

The proposed changes to Florida’s voting and elections laws would:



* Expand the "no-solicitation zone," creating a constantly shifting zone that would be impossible to enforce and further restricts voters’ ability to receive important nonpartisan voting rights information at the polling place;



* Further limits acceptable IDs, without proposing acceptable alternatives, preventing eligible citizens from registering to vote, and properly registered voters from exercising their right to vote;



* Force more voters to vote by provisional ballots, which have a higher rate of rejection;



* Increase the frequency of "list maintenance programs" causing more validly registered voters to be removed from the voter rolls;



* Extend the deadline for making accessible paper (marksense) ballots available for disabled Floridians, relegating voters with disabilities to four additional years of voting on second class touch screen voting systems;



* Impose unnecessary and onerous restrictions on third-party voter registration groups. This would have the direct effect of decreasing electoral participation by Floridians who are significantly more likely to register through these drives, especially eligible Black and Latino voters;



* Impose unnecessary and onerous restrictions on groups that collect citizen petitions for ballot measures, making it harder for regular citizens – as compared to well-financed corporate interests – to get measures on the ballot.



* Pre-empt some powers granted to county supervisors of elections in favor of concentrating greater power in the hands of the Secretary of State.

UPDATE 2: An important note: Four counties in Florida are covered under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act: Collier, Hardee, Hendry and Hillsborough. Insofar as these bills affect every county in Florida, they seem to fall under Section 5, which requires that any voting change be "pre-cleared" by the DOJ. See the DOJ's website. This would argue that the DOJ has clear grounds for getting involved before these bills could be implemented.

UPDATE 3: For those interested in contacting Gov. Crist about this issue (from the comments):