Today, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (“LDF”) and the NAACP Florida State Conference (“FSC”) sent a letter to Florida senators expressing opposition to S.B. 90 and urging senators to vote no on the restrictive voting bill. S.B. 90 would impose unnecessary barriers and burdens that will disproportionately impact and other voters of color, voters with disabilities, the elderly, and low-income voters—and may violate federal laws, including the First, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Americans with Disabilities Act. S.B. 90 includes severe new restrictions on Vote-by-Mail ballots and would ban providing food, water, or “any item” to voters waiting in line. These restrictions would make voting by mail more difficult at every stage in the process, and exclude many Floridians from casting a Vote-by-Mail ballot. S.B. 90’s restrictive measures include unnecessary identification requirements to request a Vote-by-Mail ballot; require voters to renew their their request every year, eliminating current laws allowing voters to place requests for two years at once; significant limitations on the availability of ballot drop boxes; and restrict who is able to return completed Vote-by-Mail ballots on behalf of others.
Read the full letter here.
###
Founded in 1940, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF) is the nation’s first civil and human rights law organization. LDF has been completely separate from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) since 1957—although LDF was originally founded by the NAACP and shares its commitment to equal rights. LDF’s Thurgood Marshall Institute is a multi-disciplinary and collaborative hub within LDF that launches targeted campaigns and undertakes innovative research to shape the civil rights narrative. In media attributions, please refer to us as the NAACP Legal Defense Fund or LDF. Follow LDF on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
