Florida: Voter-rights activists pan Florida election measure | TBO.com

For more than a decade, lawmakers have been tweaking election rules to improve on Florida’s ham-fisted history of counting ballots. This year, an election law rewrite is moving through the state House that voter-rights activists have assailed as “good old-fashioned voter suppression” and “Jim Crow tactics.”

The legislation was described as a cleanup bill in advance of the 2012 elections that is “important to ensure the integrity of the political process and our elections in Florida,” said sponsor Dennis Baxley, a Republican from Ocala.

Florida: Critics lash Florida elections bill as ‘voter suppression’ | St. Petersburg Times

The latest House makeover of Florida election laws stirred intense controversy Thursday as unions and grass roots political groups complained that it would suppress 2012 voting in a state Barack Obama won in 2008.

By a 12-6 party-line vote, the House State Affairs Committee approved the new bill, setting up a vote by the full House. Similar legislation will be taken up Friday by the Senate Rules Committee.

South Carolina: South Carolina House rejects early voting, pushes ID bill | thestate.com

House Republicans squashed a Senate plan Wednesday to let voters cast ballots early and sent back to the Senate a bill requiring voters to present a photo ID at the polls.

Under the bill approved by the Republican-controlled House, voters must bring a driver’s license, passport, military ID or other photo ID to the polls in order to cast a ballot. Under current law, voters only have to present a voter registration card that does not include a photo. About 178,000 voters in South Carolina don’t have driver’s licenses or DMV-issued photo IDs, according to the State Election Commission.

Florida: Supervisor of Elections Ion Sancho: Florida Elections Bill is a Travesty

The House Republican Leadership has introduced a bill that the Leon County Supervisor of Elections calls a travesty. Proposed House Bill 1355 passed through a subcommittee Friday morning. Leon County Supervisor of Elections Ion Sancho says proposed House Bill 1355 destroys the election process as it currently exists in Florida and he went to legislators to let them know that he strongly opposes it.

Sancho shook his head at the 128-page document before heading inside the House Office Building to let the Governmental Operations Subcommittee know how he feels. But, to no avail. The subcommittee members voted in favor of proposed House Bill 1355. Sancho says he disagrees with a change that would allow the partisan appointee of the governor to control all supervisors of elections and give them orders, or remove them from office. Sancho said, “This is ridiculous. It would be as if an appointed water district commissioner could order an elected legislator around. There’s only one reason for this and that is partisan control over the process. It serves no interest of the citizens.”

Florida: Sweeping Florida elections-law overhaul clears committee | Miami Herald

Over the objections of county elections supervisors and public-interest groups, a bill that would make numerous changes to Florida’s elections law cleared a House subcommittee on Friday. The Government Operations Subcommittee voted up the bill on Friday by a party-line tally of 9-4.

Its sponsor, state Rep. Dennis Baxley, R-Ocala, said the changes will get the state’s Elections Code in “ship-shape” for the next election cycle and the redrawing of congressional and legislative district lines. “This bill preserves and protects the political process,” Baxley told the subcommittee.