I did warn everyone that the Florida state constitutional amendment battle to restore voting rights to felons would end badly for Black Floridians, and Friday's 11th Circuit ruling has just restored the Poll Tax for felons.
In a significant reversal, the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in Atlanta ruled on Friday that a Florida law requiring people with serious criminal convictions to pay court fines and fees before they can register to vote is constitutional.
The decision overturned a ruling by a lower court in May that found the law discriminated against the majority of felons, many of whom are indigent, by imposing an unlawful “pay-to-vote system.”
The ruling, if upheld, will put new hurdles in place for people convicted of crimes who are seeking to vote, after Florida’s voters had amended the state’s Constitution in 2018 to end the disenfranchisement of those convicted of felonies, except for murder and sexual offenses. And with Florida a perennially close state in presidential elections, the decision could help shape the outcome this year.
The appeals court sided with the administration of Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, and found that the felons who sued had failed to prove the law violated the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. It reversed the prior ruling by the United States District Court in Tallahassee.
“If a State may decide that those who commit serious crimes are presumptively unfit for the franchise,” the 11th Circuit ruled, “it may also conclude that those who have completed their sentences are the best candidates for re-enfranchisement.”
At issue was a Florida law passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature and signed by Mr. DeSantis last year that required those convicted of felonies to settle their financial obligations to court before having their voting eligibility restored.
The law was passed after an overwhelming majority of Florida voters in 2018 approved Amendment 4, a landmark measure that automatically restored voting rights for people who have completed their sentences for felonies other than murder and sex crimes.
Lawyers for the DeSantis administration argued at trial that voters knew that felons would first have to pay their outstanding debts before becoming eligible to vote, a notion civil rights groups dismissed, countering that the state had no centralized system to let people know how much they might owe.
With Florida elections frequently decided by tiny margins, the restoration of felons’ voting rights was seen as a way to expand the electorate in the nation’s biggest presidential battleground state. An expert for the American Civil Liberties Union and the other civil rights groups testified at trial that more than 774,000 felons in the state owe legal financial obligations. Most criminal defendants are indigent when they are arrested.
“This ruling runs counter to the foundational principle that Americans do not have to pay to vote,” said Julie Ebenstein, a senior staff attorney with the A.C.L.U.’s Voting Rights Project. “The gravity of this decision cannot be overstated. It is an affront to the spirit of democracy.”
Again, the real issue here is that the vast majority of felons who are too poor to pay their court fines are Black or Latino, and Florida Republicans are completely okay with restoring voting rights to rich, white-collar felons who can pay while leaving non-white felons disenfranchised permanently.
The state doesn't even have a system to track exactly how much felons owe, but if they owe even a dollar, they can't vote. Effectively, the burden is placed on the felon to get their rights back even after serving their time. It's a poll tax, period.
But Trump of course packed the 11th Circuit over the last four years and now it's paying off. Republicans will continue to rule Florida for the foreseeable future.
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