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Voter groups sue state over tardiness law

They say the measure, passed last year, imposes "potentially ruinous fines" if voter registration forms are turned in late.

By STEVE BOUSQUET
Published May 19, 2006

TALLAHASSEE - The League of Women Voters and four other groups sued the state of Florida on Thursday, seeking to overturn a new law that imposes steep fines on organizations that miss deadlines for registering voters.

The lawsuit takes aim at an election law passed by the Legislature last year and signed by Gov. Jeb Bush that imposes regulations on third-party groups that sign up voters. Attorneys who filed the suit call it the toughest law of its kind in the country.

The law, which took effect in January, includes a minimum fine of $250 for each voter form turned in more than 10 days after it is collected. The maximum fine is $5,000 for each time a group fails to submit a completed voter registration form to an elections office.

With a shoestring annual budget of about $80,000, the League of Women Voters said it shut down its voter registration efforts in March because of concerns that a big fine could wipe out its operating funds.

The programs the league curtailed included those targeting newly eligible 18-year-old high school students.

"We were devastated," said Dianne Wheatley-Giliotti of Dunedin, president of the league. "We feel it constricts us in conducting our core mission, which is 86 years old, and that is to facilitate the registration of voters."

The law was sponsored by Rep. Ron Reagan, a Republican from Bradenton who is chairman of the House Ethics and Elections Committee.

Reagan recalled Thursday that as the bill was being debated a year ago, he heard testimony about third-party groups that did not submit voter forms on a timely basis and cases in which people who filled out forms were already registered to vote.

"The penalties were put in there to say if you didn't do the job right, you were going to pay the price," Reagan said. "We weren't targeting anybody in particular."

Reagan said he was confident the law would survive a constitutional challenge.

Besides the nonpartisan League of Women Voters, the other groups filing suit include the Florida AFL-CIO, the AFSCME public employees union, the SEIU service workers union and a Miami-based grass roots organization, People Acting for Community Together.

They say the law, with its "potentially ruinous fines," violates the U.S. Constitution's free speech provisions by deterring voter registration efforts, and that the law especially harms low-income, minority, disabled "and other marginalized citizens" who need help overcoming barriers to vote.

The groups are represented by the Fort Lauderdale law firm Becker & Poliakoff and the Democracy Program at New York University law school's Brennan Center for Justice.

Wendy Weiser, deputy director of the Brennan Center, said the law discriminates against third-party groups because political parties are exempt from the fines.

"There was nothing that would justify setting arbitrary time deadlines and strict fines," Weiser said. "The only effect is to shut down voter registration groups."

Reagan said political parties, which also engage in voter registration drives, were exempt from the fines and deadlines because "the parties do it right."

The bill passed the House, 82-36, with every Republican present voting in favor and all 36 Democrats voting against. The Senate vote was 29-9.

Susan Smith, a spokeswoman for the Department of State, said the agency had not seen the lawsuit. The department administers Florida's election laws.

The suit was filed in federal court in Miami and assigned to U.S. District Judge Adalberto Jordan, 45, who was nominated to the federal bench by President Clinton in 1999.

Steve Bousquet can be reached at bousquet@sptimes.com or 850 224-7263.

[Last modified May 19, 2006, 08:41:39]