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In a landmark decision yesterday, a federal court affirmed the voting rights of hundreds of thousands of Floridians and ruled that a pay-to-vote system is unconstitutional.

This victory with our partners means that Floridians with past felony convictions cannot be banned from voting if they are unable to pay fines, fees or restitution.

In 2018, Floridians overwhelmingly voted that people with past felony convictions shouldn’t be locked out of the democratic process if they are unable to pay. Amendment 4’s passing granted residents who had completed their sentences the right to cast their vote in the largest single expansion of voting rights since the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

However, some Florida lawmakers and Gov. Ron DeSantis weren’t on board.

They passed a law known as SB 7066 that required people with past felony convictions to pay fines, fees and restitution before they could vote. The voices of millions of Florida voters had just been undermined, and their sweeping support of the voting rights expansion was overridden.

So we sued.

In July 2019, we filed a lawsuit on behalf of our clients Rosemary McCoy and Sheila Singleton that describes how SB 7066 acts as a pay-to-vote system that bars people from casting a ballot simply because they are poor.

Yesterday’s ruling sent a crystal-clear message that returning a citizen’s right to vote cannot be conditioned on their wealth.

“This ruling is not only a victory for our clients and voting rights activists in Florida, but is an important step toward dismantling financial barriers to the ballot box across the country,” said Nancy Abudu, deputy legal director for the SPLC’s voting rights project. “The court’s decision also deals a serious blow to the Florida Legislature’s attempt to undermine the spirit and purpose behind Amendment 4. We hope the state will swiftly implement the court’s directives and stop dragging its feet.”

The case, Jones v. DeSantis, was consolidated with the SPLC’s McCoy v. DeSantis as well as Gruver v. Barton, brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of Florida, Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law, and NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., and Raysor v. Lee brought by the Campaign Legal Center.

Major victories like this one are only possible because we have you on our side. Thank you for upholding our shared mission of protecting voting rights.

You can read the full decision here.

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