Assault on the Ballot: Florida law makes it harder for grassroots
organizations to assist historically disenfranchised voters

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Esther Schrader | Read the full piece here

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Friend,

Trust is hard to build. Especially in Jacksonville, Florida, where
Sheila Singleton and Rosemary McCoy live. You have to walk a lot of
staircases, get past a lot of fear.

But that does not deter McCoy, 63, Singleton, 59, or the handful of
volunteers they have recruited to their small voting outreach and
advocacy organization. They ply the corridors of bus terminals, stand
outside grocery stores and knock on doors to convince people to
register to vote. Every day, they make progress against skepticism and
people who are too mistrustful, too scared or too busy just trying to
get by to believe that their voice can make a difference.

That's why, when Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed Senate Bill 90
(SB 90) in May, in a "Fox News exclusive," live-streamed
event that excluded all other media, McCoy and Singleton decided that
they had endured enough. SB 90 is modeled off the broad, restrictive
and unnecessary voting legislation cropping up in 2021 state
legislatures from Texas to Georgia in the wake of historic voter
turnout in 2020. 

Among other things, SB 90 requires civic organizations engaged in
voter registration activities to provide misleading information to
voters that the organizations "might not" submit their
registration application on time. This disclaimer will make the
trusted voter relationship work McCoy and Singleton have long done to
advance voting rights in Florida even harder.

That is why their organization, Harriet Tubman Freedom Fighters Corp.,
filed a lawsuit challenging SB 90. The complaint, filed in June on
behalf of the organization by Fair Elections Center and the Southern
Poverty Law Center, challenges the law's misleading disclaimer
and disclosure requirements. It alleges that the law is void because
of its vagueness under the due process clause of the 14th Amendment,
that the disclaimer is government-compelled speech in violation of the
First Amendment, and that it prevents organizations from exercising
their expressive and associational rights guaranteed by the First
Amendment.

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"We are working so hard to earn trust," McCoy said of
their voter registration efforts. "And when we are out in the
field, we see that often people don't believe the system works
for them. We are out there encouraging them, talking about issues,
educating them on civic engagement, and this right here, it just
throws a wrench in everything we are trying to do. ... Now the
individual is looking at the canvasser and saying, 'Wait a
minute, you are telling me that you might just throw my registration
away? So why should I give you this? Why should I bother at
all?'"

READ MORE

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