Committee Substitute for Committee Substitute for House Bill 1355 (CS/CS/HB 1355) alters many of the procedures in place since the Florida Election Reform Act of 2001. In 158 pages of legislation, the Legislature has decreased the number of early voting days, altered the way voter registration drives can be done, including the potential of...
State Law and Opinions
Florida Election laws and procedures
Florida’s election laws are combined in one book, published by the State and online in PDF. Should any of the races require it, the State’s recount procedures are adopted by rule and also online in PDF. Want to look at the standard manual for pollworkers? It’s also online. Thank a pollworker today, it’s a long...
Where do I vote in Florida?
Confused about where to vote? – look it up online at http://registration.elections.myflorida.com/
Challenge to Florida’s campaign finance laws
The Federal 11th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a lower court’s ruling and entered a preliminary injunction barring the State of Florida from releasing funds to one of the candidates for Governor under the excess spending subsidy of section 106.355. This section of the campaign finance portion of the Florida Election Code provided for...
Florida election law bill vetoed
The Florida Governor vetoed HB1207, a recently passed election law bill. According to the bill analysis posted online, the bill would have reenacted and amended provisions related to electioneering communications and electioneering communication organizations (ECOs), revised provisions relating to use of local government funds for political advertising, and authorized the leader of each political...
New Division opinion on electioneering communications
The Division of Elections has issued a new opinion dealing with the result of a recent Northern District federal case (Broward Coalition v. Browning) prohibiting enforcement of the electioneering communications provisions of Chapter 106, Florida Statutes, which the State apparently decided not to appeal further.
Election bill dead for this session?
Numerous reports, including this one in the Miami Herald, indicate that leader of the Florida House of Representatives does not think there is enough time left in this session for the proposed elections bills. With the legislative session looking at either an extension or a special session this year, we’ll see what happens.
More on SB956
The latest summary of the changes proposed in Senate Bill 956 is: Expressly providing that the Florida Election Code preempts any local provision regarding elections unless otherwise specifically provided by law. A substantial revision to third party voter registration organization requirements. The removal of retirement center identification and neighborhood association identification from the list...
Senate Bill 956: Relating to Elections
As reported in the NY Times and St. Pete Times, the former “shell” bill SB956 has become the placeholder for a series of proposed elections changes. So far, the potential changes are listed in the committee amendments section – it’s schedule for a committee hearing Thursday afternoon.
America Votes! Supplement
I contributed a chapter to the American Bar Association to the America Votes! Supplement – just published today.