It's a huge fight.
Even though Florida voters passed a Constitutional Amendment saying felons get to vote, there has been a lot of wrangling to stop this from happening. A district judge said that the State was putting up too many hurdles for voting. So all looked okay... but then the 11th Circuit stayed that order. Up to the Supreme Court it went. And, shocker, Justice Thomas, denied the motion to vacate the stay.
There were three dissenters (Sotomayor, Ginsburg, and Kagan; we need more women on the Court).
So the likelihood is that the 11th Circuit won't get to this one before the November election and 1.4 million people won't be allowed to vote, which is a tragedy. But there is still hope for the next election.
And there is still quite a bit of litigation to follow. The latest is this motion to recuse Judges Luck, Lagoa, and Brasher.
Reminds me of Omar Little:
The SDFLA Blog is dedicated to providing news and notes regarding federal practice in the Southern District of Florida. The New Times calls the blog "the definitive source on South Florida's federal court system." All tips on court happenings are welcome and will remain anonymous. Please email David Markus at dmarkus@markuslaw.com
No tragedy here. The Florida Supreme Court had pledges from the petitioners that restitution would not be excluded. Perhaps you and your blog do not believe that victims should be repaid and made whole by criminal defendants who rob cheat steal and commit fraud? If they truly care about the right to vote they should make their victims whole and then they will be allowed to vote.
ReplyDeleteThanks Ken.
ReplyDelete