Republican legislators pushing new restrictions on groups that register voters and on voters trying to change their addresses at the polls have said the changes are intended to bring integrity to the voting process. They have yet to find much evidence of widespread fraud, much less fraud that would be addressed by their election bill, which has already passed the House.
Longtime Tallahassee reporter Gary Fineout takes a closer look at the examples cited by state Rep. Eric Eisnaugle, R-Orlando, during last week’s House debate on the measure in a post titled “Does Florida have a voter fraud problem?” which finds the answer is: not really, though there may be some vulnerabilities with absentee ballots, which would not be addressed by the bill’s most controversial provisions. The post is worth reading in full, as lawmakers try to justify legislation that will make it more difficult for people to vote or register new voters.
PolitiFact also takes a look at Eisnaugle’s claims and finds that in each case, they were dealt with by the existing current system (though someone apparently signed up some college students as Republicans).
The Senate budget committee is taking up the election bill today. How will supporters justify the changes now?
