Florida elections division chief quits amid controvery on voter rolls
Ed Kast, who has worked for the state elections division for more than a decade, said only that he was resigning to “pursue other opportunities.”
But Kast has told a handful of associates that he was uncomfortable with growing pressure to trim felons from voter rolls in time for the fall election, friends say.
There should still be time to remove another 48000 black democratic voters before November, don’t you think?
Damn shame that he chose to tell close associates instead of going public with yet another attempt to manipulate a national election.
I posted this on a more conservative message board. Oh, my, the responses. “So.” “What’s controversial about removing felons from the voting list?”
Are people sheep or just such partisan zombies that they don’t care about the democratic process anymore?
Uh yeah, what’s wrong with removing felons exactly?
From what I’ve read, many of the people being removed are wrongfully removed due to false positives from another state’s list of felons or similar situations. The best part is that they don’t know they’re removed until they’re rejected on voting day, and then it takes them approximately 1 year to get reinstated.
Amazingly, the people identified (actual felons and false positives) are mostly minorities.
P.S. - this is all hearsay, I totally didn’t research this at all 
How does that work, by the way? You get convicted of a felony and then you can’t vote any more?
I hope that’s not it.
Yeah, that’s the way it works, unless you get a pardon. Why do you hope that’s not it?
It’s a state thing, not federal. So it varies by state laws – which is a problem itself when it deals with federal elections, IMHO.
That said, while I think this is a travesty because their system is extremely flawed and lots of innocent people are being improperly flagged as felons, I can’t feel sorry for the actaul felons. If you don’t want to lose rights or suffer hardships, don’t commit a freaking felony, you criminal scumbag.
Ever?
It’s a state thing, not federal. So it varies by state laws – which is a problem itself when it deals with federal elections, IMHO.
That said, while I think this is a travesty because their system is extremely flawed and lots of innocent people are being improperly flagged as felons, I can’t feel sorry for the actaul felons. If you don’t want to lose rights or suffer hardships, don’t commit a freaking felony, you criminal scumbag.[/quote]
Putting aside for one moment the fact that not every felon is a recidivist scumbag, I agree with you on some level; this is why I can’t stand drug dealers who go to jail and then complain about it. But there are some rights you should never lose.
I’m not opposed, necessarily, to not letting felons vote while they’re incarcerated, but at the very least, if they’ve done their time, they should have their rights back. When you’re sentenced for a crime, you’re sentenced for, say, three years, not “three years plus you can’t vote for the REST OF YOUR LIFE.”
Once you do your time, that should be it. You’ve paid your debt to society. You’re back out there, most likely paying taxes like everyone else, and you should be able to vote.
The issue isn’t removing felons. It’s subcontracting the felon-removal process to a shoddy third party with a history of getting the removal list wildly wrong, and in a suspiciously republican-friendly matter. There’s not really any oversight, either.
It’s a state thing, not federal. So it varies by state laws – which is a problem itself when it deals with federal elections, IMHO.[/quote]
To clarify further for Anders’ benefit, IIRC only seven or eight states in the U.S. have such laws preventing convicted felons from voting. So throughout most of the country folks with felony convictions can in fact vote.