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Lawsuit Challenging Florida’s “Poll Tax” on Felon Voting Rights Expanded to Hundreds of Thousands

April 13, 2020 | FlaglerLive | 9 Comments

Desmond Meade of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, which led the fight to restore voting rights for felons who have served their sentence, after regaining his own right to vote in January 2019. Meade is now helping lead the fight against the new restrictions the Florida Legislature imposed on felons' rights. (Facebook)
Desmond Meade of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, which led the fight to restore voting rights for felons who have served their sentence, after regaining his own right to vote in January 2019. Meade is now helping lead the fight against the new restrictions the Florida Legislature imposed on felons’ rights. (Facebook)

A federal judge has agreed to add potentially hundreds of thousands of people to a lawsuit challenging a Florida statute requiring felons to pay outstanding “legal financial obligations” to vote.




U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle issued an order last week after saying he intended to grant class certification to plaintiffs, who allege that the 2019 law amounts to an unconstitutional “poll tax.”

The statute, passed by Republican lawmakers and signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis, was aimed at implementing a 2018 constitutional amendment granting voting rights to felons who have completed their sentences.

The law requires felons to pay court-ordered “legal financial obligations,” including fees, fines and restitution, to be eligible to vote.

In the order Tuesday on class certification, Hinkle rejected Secretary of State Laurel Lee’s arguments that a broad expansion of plaintiffs was unnecessary.

“The plaintiffs’ Twenty-fourth Amendment and inability-to-pay claims turn on issues that can be properly resolved in a single action, once and for all. Class treatment is proper,” Hinkle wrote in the 18-page order, referring to the U.S. Constitution’s 24th Amendment barring poll taxes.

In an October preliminary injunction, Hinkle ruled that it is unconstitutional to deny the right to vote to felons who are “genuinely unable to pay” court-ordered fees, fines and restitution. The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the injunction, which applied only to the 17 named plaintiffs in the case.

In a brief opposing the request for class certification, Lee’s lawyers wrote in October that identification of felons who can’t afford to pay financial obligations “is problematic, ill defined, and requires hundreds of thousands (up to as many as one million) of determinations regarding which former felons are ‘genuinely unable to pay’ their outstanding financial obligations.”

But Hinkle’s order Tuesday rejected the argument.

The relief likely to be granted, if the plaintiffs prevail in the case, “is not a felon-by-felon determination in this court of inability to pay but instead an injunction requiring the secretary to put in place a system under which felons are not precluded from voting based only on inability to pay,” Hinkle wrote.

The state lacks a uniform or consistent method of applying the 2019 law, with some records incomplete and others having discrepancies, according to court documents. Hinkle called the process “an administrative nightmare” during an October hearing.




The federal judge on Tuesday also disagreed with Lee’s contention that it is unknown who will be affected by the court’s decision. Hinkle said “the proposed class and subclass” — felons who owe financial obligations, and felons who cannot afford to pay outstanding financial obligations — are “sufficiently ascertainable.”

“The state’s records of financial obligations are a mess — that is one of the plaintiffs’ other complaints — but the secretary should hardly be heard to complain that it is impossible to figure out who has an unpaid financial obligation,” Hinkle wrote.

Also, the court will likely not decide which members of the “inability-to-pay subclass” are those who are genuinely unable to pay, but rather “those who assert genuine inability to pay,” the judge added.

Hinkle rejected Lee’s argument that class certification was unnecessary because the state would abide by a ruling about whether the law amounts to an unconstitutional poll tax.

Class treatment “adds a layer of complexity to any litigation,” the judge acknowledged.

“Here, though, the secretary’s promise to abide by any ruling is not enough,” he wrote.

Hinkle noted that, following his October preliminary injunction, Lee’s office advised county supervisors of elections that the judge’s ruling only applied to the 17 plaintiffs in the case.

“The March 2020 elections went forward on that basis — without any statewide effort to conform to the U.S. Constitution as interpreted by both this court and the 11th Circuit,” Hinkle scolded. “Class members can hardly be faulted for asserting that, if the ruling on the merits ultimately is that they have a constitutional right to vote, the right should be recognized in an enforceable decision.”

In reaching his decision about class certification, Hinkle pointed to an analysis by University of Florida political-science professor Daniel Smith, who found that, in the 58 counties for which he had data, more than 430,000 felons would be ineligible to vote solely because they had outstanding financial obligations.

Smith’s number “was conservative” because it did not include felons with federal or out-of-state convictions, Hinkle noted.

Hinkle also relied on a report by the Florida Court Clerks & Comptrollers showing that 22 percent of fines and fees assessed in the state were at risk of non-collection because of indigency.

The two reports “show that many thousands of felons are unable to pay their relevant financial obligations because of indigency,” Hinkle wrote Tuesday.

“Still others are unable to pay because the amount owed is out of reach even for a person who is not indigent,” he added.

Tuesday’s ruling is the latest blow to DeSantis, a Harvard Law School graduate who has fiercely defended the state law but has been thwarted repeatedly by Hinkle and the Atlanta-based appeals court.

For example, Hinkle recently chided the state for failing to come up with a process to determine whether felons have outstanding legal obligations, as he ordered the state to do in his October injunction. Hinkle told the state to come up with a plan before a two-week trial begins on April 27.

“If you don’t have a position in place by the time of trial, and I decide that it is a constitutional right — and if you read the 11th Circuit decision, you probably don’t want to bet against that — the answer’s not going to be, oh, start working on this. If the state is not going to fix it, I will,” the federal judge admonished on March 26.

During a hearing Wednesday, Hinkle and lawyers representing both sides tested the federal court system’s video-conferencing platform, which the judge intends to use for the trial because of the novel coronavirus.

Members of the public will be able to listen to the hearing by telephone. Hinkle said people who want to watch the trial may contact the federal court in Tallahassee, where they will be allowed to watch a video of the proceedings from one of the courtrooms.

–Dara Kam, News Service of Florida

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Mike Cocchiola says

    April 13, 2020 at 5:29 pm

    Yes! Florida Republicans will do anything underhanded, unethical, and unAmerican to keep people from voting. Poll taxes, voter fraud, voter suppression… you name it. They know if every American voted, they’d never win an election for anything so long as they subjugate themselves to Trump.

    We need every Democratic voter in Florida to Vote By Mail! And that includes all former felons.

  2. CB from PC says

    April 13, 2020 at 6:56 pm

    Well Judge Hinkle, your ruling has altered the terms of the Amendment as voted for by the Citizens of Florida. The current Amendment is now null and void. Therefore, the entire Amendment must now be rewritten, gather enough signatures to be placed on the ballot, and voted on by the CITIZENS of FLORIDA. Period.

  3. Frank Rizzo says

    April 15, 2020 at 1:11 pm

    @ CB from PC
    You sound like you voted against Amendment 4.

    Regardless. there is no legal basis for voiding the amendment because the Florida Supreme Court approved it and a amendment can only be voided if it is unconstitutional. None of these apply.

    Please try to understand that the State cannot say if you have the money to pay your legal obligations, then you can vote but if you don’t have the money , you cannot vote. That violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The district court and the circuit court have both agreed on this.

    People who don’t like it need to accept it, stop being crybabies an move on. There are a lot of laws I don’t like which I grudgingly accept because in this country, majority rules.

  4. Arl says

    April 16, 2020 at 12:45 pm

    “Hinkle ruled that it is unconstitutional to deny the right to vote to felons who are “genuinely unable to pay” court-ordered fees, fines and restitution. ” What about the perpetrator not genuinely committing crimes. I voted for this amendment because it DID HAVE full restitution, now they want to change it because it passed? Well, I will NEVER AGAIN vote “yes” for another amendment because someone will want to rewrite for their own efforts! My VOTING RIGHTS have been violated! The amendment that appeared on the ballot was a scam for those who voted for it!

  5. Arl says

    April 16, 2020 at 12:46 pm

    I agree, CB, and this time my vote will be NO!

  6. Pogo says

    April 18, 2020 at 12:14 pm

    @A country born by a revolution –

    started in no small part by cries (including a well known “tea party”) of no taxation without representation. No vote is no representation. Period. Obviously, the irony is lost on Republicans; They know better – and choose to do worse.

    Some basic truths:

    Fees, fines and ability to pay
    By Lauren-Brooke Eisen and Matthew Menendez, opinion contributors — 02/10/20 01:30 PM EST

    “In far too many criminal courts across the country, judges impose fees and fines on defendants without consideration for their ability to pay. The result: people struggling financially are saddled with debt that makes it nearly impossible for them to support themselves and their families. The devastating consequences of these practices are gaining national attention. In fact, five of the current Democratic presidential candidates have joined the growing outcry against this approach and are trying to address the problem through their criminal justice policy platforms.

    Despite promising momentum for change, some government officials hold on, partly under the belief that they need fines and fees to generate revenue. But a hard look at the numbers shows that collecting fees and fines is highly inefficient and costs much more than many policymakers ever realized…”

    “…After digging into the numbers, we can add fiscal irresponsibility and growing burdens to those most impacted by these debts to the reasons to dump these practices. Every jurisdiction using fines and fees must stop and do the math — all of it.”
    If you read nothing else – READ THIS:
    https://thehill.com/opinion/criminal-justice/482308-fees-fines-and-ability-to-pay

    In Florida, Fees, Fines From Felonies Means Disenfranchised
    By Claire Goforth | August 28, 2019

    “…The state has no idea how much restitution is owed cumulatively, by whom and to whom. There is no state agency tasked with tracking the data. Many defendants themselves don’t know how much they owe…”
    https://jjie.org/2019/08/28/in-florida-fees-fines-from-felonies-means-disenfranchised/

    Think, and then do the right thing:
    https://www.google.com/search?&ei=pRybXvvMFMe-ggeX0pq4Dw&q=how+does+florida+track+fines+fees+and+costs&oq=how+does+florida+track+fines+fees+and&gs_lcp=CgZwc3ktYWIQARgAMgUIIRCgATIFCCEQqwIyBQghEKsCOgQIABBHOgQIABBDOgIIADoGCAAQFhAeOggIABAWEAoQHjoFCAAQgwE6DggAEOoCELQCEJoBEOUCOgUIABCRAjoFCAAQzQI6CAghEBYQHRAeOgcIIRAKEKABUO6MAVilwQRgy48FaABwAngAgAGgAogByzGSAQYwLjQ0LjKYAQCgAQGqAQdnd3Mtd2l6sAEG&sclient=psy-ab

  7. Kjell Skaht says

    April 18, 2020 at 6:43 pm

    “What about the perpetrator not genuinely committing crimes[?]”

    My thought exactly. The sentence is time in jail AND fees/fines/restitution. Want your “right” to vote back? Do the time and pay up. Selah.

  8. Everyone should VOTE says

    April 21, 2020 at 1:25 am

    Why in the world would anyone in their right mind take a persons right to vote away because they committed a felony when those who committ lesser crimes loose nothing? What is the purpose of taking ones right to vote away when every person who is not jailed is a tax payer and subject to the rules and laws by those in public office and they should have a say so of who those office holders be other than to let politicians to manipulate and silence tax payers and citizens. Everyone should be permitted to vote that is a citizen here in the USA. What is wrong with the people of the USA anymore?

  9. CB from PC says

    April 24, 2020 at 11:33 am

    You and Cocciola ought want to read the text of what was passed by the voters.
    You have no idea as to how I voted. It was not for an altered after the fact piece of legislation rammed through in some back door deal to increase the voting bloc for a certain party.

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