| Florida Senate Bill 90 | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Florida Legislature | |
| |
| Enacted by | 2020–2022 Florida Legislature |
| Enacted | 6 May 2021 |
| Signed by | Ron DeSantis |
| Introduced by | Dennis Baxley |
| Introduced | 3 February 2021 |
Florida Senate Bill 90 (SB 90) is a law in the state of Florida which amends the state's election law.
The coronavirus pandemic meant that the 2020 United States elections had seen high levels of mail-in voting, with up to 46% of voters saying they voted by mail. [1] In Florida, 4.8 million voters chose to vote by mail, with more Democrats voting absentee than Republicans for the first time in several election cycles. [2] [3]
After Joe Biden's victory in the 2020 presidential election. Trump supporters unsuccessfully attempted to overturn the election results. [4] SB 90 is seen to be part of Republican efforts to restrict voting rights following the election. [5] [6]
SB 90 restricts access to mail-in voting as well as limiting the ability of independent organisations to be involved with elections, [7] leading to the Brennan Center for Justice and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to describe it as a voter suppression measure. [8] [9]
Supporters argue that the law is a preventative measure in order to "restore faith and confidence in elections". [10]
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General provisions of the act include: [11]
Provisions include:
Provisions included:
No-solicitation zones are areas around polling stations where campaigning and political activities are restricted for the duration of an election. Under Florida law, anywhere within 150 feet (46 m) of a polling place, early voting site or election supervisor office is a no-solicitation zone. [31] SB 90 made provision for:
SB 90 was introduced by Republican Dennis Baxley, [32] reviving a similar bill introduced by Jeff Brandes in a past legislative session and building on recent proposals put forward by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. [33] [34]
Clauses requiring a handwritten signature for mail-in voters (rather than a digital one obtained from the Department of Motor Vehicles' databases) were scrapped after it became a focal point of debate around the bill. [32] [35]
The Florida Senate approved the bill 23-17 on 26 April with Republican Jeff Brandes voting with Democrats against it, [36] [37] before it was sent to the House of Representatives where it was amended and passed 77-40 two days later. [36] [38] The amended bill was passed by the Senate 23-17 and the House 77-40 on the 29 April, [39] [40] the day before the regular session of the legislature ended. [41]
The bill was signed by Governor DeSantis on 6 May in a bill-signing that aired exclusively on Fox News. DeSantis was criticised after other media outlets were neither told about the bill-signing nor allowed in. [42] [43] Fox News released a statement saying that they had not requested that the interview be exclusive, [44] and later said that they had not known that DeSantis would sign the bill on camera. [45] SB 90 came into effect immediately upon signing. [46]
Lake County Supervisor of Elections Alan Hays said that removing all existing requests for mail-in ballots would "cost the taxpayers of Florida somewhere between $12 and $16 million" and that the legislature should "rethink this". [47] Later, the president of the Florida Supervisors of Elections, Craig Latimer said that the bill "doesn't make any sense" when legislators hadn't cited any instances of fraud that it would prevent. [48]
The ACLU opposed SB 90 from its introduction, stating it would "make it harder for Floridians to cast a ballot by mail". [49]
DeSantis said at the bill-signing that the act would protect the "integrity and transparency" of elections in Florida. [50]
The Brennan Center for Justice called the act an "omnibus voter suppression bill" which was based on "unfounded and unspecified concerns about election integrity". [8] The Florida branch of the ACLU called SB 90 "undemocratic" and accused legislators of "suppressing the right to vote". [51] The President of the Florida branch of the League of Women Voters said that SB 90 shouldn't have "ever been filed as a bill" and that it would disenfranchise the elderly, disabled, students and people of colour. [52]
Michael S. Bennett, the election supervisor for Manatee County, said that while the bill would suppress votes, it is not a voter suppression bill, and that it would cause "additional costs" of between $200,000 and $300,000. [52]
In October 2021, it was reported that a survey of twelve of Florida's 67 election supervisors found an expected combined increase in costs of almost $165,000. [53]
Several groups sued the state nine minutes after the bill was signed into law. [54] The Florida branches of the League of Women Voters, Black Voters Matter, and the Alliance for Retired Americans along with three independent voters sued Laurel Lee, the Secretary of State of Florida and Ashley Moody, the Florida Attorney General, as well as the Election Supervisors of every county in the state, arguing that the act violated the First and Fourteenth Amendments. [55]
The NAACP, Disability Rights Florida, and Common Cause also filed a suit against Lee the same morning, claiming SB 90 "illegally and unconstitutionally burdens the right to vote". [56]
On May 18, another lawsuit was filed against Lee and Florida's election supervisors by several organisations including UnidosUS and the Hispanic Federation, alleging that SB 90 was racially discriminatory against Black and Latino voters, violating Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. [57] [58] [59]
On June 13, the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Fair Elections Center brought another suit against Lee and Moody on behalf of the Harriett Tubman Freedom Fighters and HeadCount to challenge the provision of SB 90 which mandates that third-party organisations conducting voter registration must give a disclaimer warning that they may not deliver applications on time. The suit argues that this "misleading warning" restricts the ability of third-party organisations to engage in advocacy or voter registration efforts, and that it violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments. [60] [61]
All four lawsuits were consolidated for the discovery phase, with League of Women Voters v. Lee named as the 'parent case'. [62] In four rulings in October 2021, Judge Mark Walker allowed the suits to move forward, but dismissed some of the challenges for lack of standing; Walker noted that state attorneys would have been a better target for litigation than the Florida's attorney general. [63] A motion to add Dave Aronberg, the state attorney for Florida's 15th judicial circuit, to League of Women Voters v. Lee as a new defendant was denied on November 4. [64]
In November 2021, Walker allowed the Governor's Office and seven Republican legislators to not testify on the grounds of legislative and executive privilege. [65] The University of Florida initially sought to bar three of its political science professors from testifying, saying that it may be "adverse to the university's interests as a state of Florida institution". [66] The decision was later reversed, [67] but the three professors sued the provost, president and board of trustees of the university for infringing their First Amendment rights. [68]
On March 31, 2022, Walker ruled that SB 90 violated the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Walker issued a permanent injunction against the law’s restrictions on absentee ballot drop boxes and required Florida to obtain preclearance from federal courts before enacting election laws. [69] [70] [71] Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Attorney General Ashley Moody vowed to appeal the ruling.
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