Petition aims to stop arrests of those accused of voting illegally
TAMARAC - Videos of felons being arrested for illegally voting have been going viral and it's becoming more apparent that there's confusion over the existing voting rules. Now, there is a petition to stop further arrests and calls on the state to make adjustments.
"I was hurt, I was outraged, I was angry, because I led Amendment 4 something beautiful happened," Desmond Meade said.
When Meade saw the videos he was utterly disappointed. He had led the charge to pass the amendment that led to felons who had completed sentence, and had not been convicted of murder or a sexual offense getting their voting rights restored, but now the same amendment is getting felons in trouble with the law, many of whom thought they had the right when the state gave them their voting cards.
"Now what the state is doing which has never happened before, they're going around arresting people and dragging people from their homes, in some cases coming with SWAT as if their person was Pablo Escobar," he told CBS4.
Meade became a civil rights activist after serving time for a felony conviction and now heads the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, and he's launched a petition.
"The petition is there to raise awareness and to challenge our lawmakers, people who have been sent to Tallahassee to represent the will of the constituents, to challenge them to do their job."
The petition calls for a stop to arrests, and for the state to create a centralized database, but these arrests may have caused a chilling effect on the upcoming election.
"If you continue to target marginalized voters, then yes you will discourage them and thus you can be victorious in your election process," Ruban Roberts, Miami Dade NAACP said.
Going over the arrests, the majority who were arrested were Black. Roberts says this is a fight against voter suppression, and likens this move to the poll tax, another hurdle voters have to clear simply to vote.
"One example is being questioned about how many bubbles in a bar of soap. There is no way for you to actually answer that question, but those were tactics that were used historically to discourage people from voting," he explained.
This time it may be the threat of arrests, but Meade doesn't want potential voters to be intimidated.
"We're responding to try and mitigate some of those damages, we're responding organizing attorneys across the state who have courageously agreed to represent individuals pro bono." He wants to reassure voters, this effort to challenge the state is not just for felons but for everyone's voice to be heard.
CBS4 reached out to the governor's office and the state division of elections about potential changes to the voting registration system to prevent further arrests, however as of the publication of this story have yet to get a response.