Thread: Fla. purge of non-citizens from voter rolls appears dead

Jun 08, 2012

Fla. purge of non-citizens from voter rolls appears dead

By Michael Winter, USA TODAY Updated 49m ago

Florida's purge of non-citizens from voter rolls appears dead for now, after the 67 county election chiefs refused to continue the cull because they don't trust the accuracy of the state's list, the Miami Herald reports.

Secretary of State Ken Detzner has circulated to county election officials a list of nearly 2,700 potential non-citizens who may have registered to vote. But they found that more than 500 are citizens and lawful voters, and that only about 40 people statewide are not citizens. The status of the remaining 2,000 is not known.

"We're just not going to do this," said Leon County's elections supervisor, Ion Sancho, one of the most outspoken of the election chiefs. "I've talked to many of the other supervisors, and they agree. The list is bad. And this is illegal."

The state has asked to use the federal Department of Homeland Security's Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements Program (SAVE) to determine how many are registered illegally, but the Obama administration has balked. The Justice Department has ordered the state to stop the purge, saying it violates voter-protection laws.

BLOG: Report: Justice Dept. tells Fla. to stop purging voter rolls

Here's how U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services describes SAVE:

The SAVE Program is an inter-governmental initiative designed to aid benefit-granting agencies in determining an applicant's immigration status, thereby ensuring that only entitled applicants receive federal, state, or local public benefits and licenses. The program is an information service for benefit-granting agencies, institutions, licensing bureaus, and other governmental entities.

The SAVE Program will provide timely customer-focused immigration status information to authorized agencies to assist them in maintaining the integrity of their programs. SAVE will promote the use of automated systems to enhance efficiency, customer service and interagency collaboration, while protecting sensitive information.

Detzner argues in a letter to DHS that a 2011 DHS document sates that voter registration is a valid use of the system, even though it's not listed.

A senior DHS official told the Orlando Sentinel on Thursday that the agency was waiting for Florida and the Justice Department to settle their dispute before allowing access to the SAVE database.

"Obviously, removing folks from the voter rolls is something we take seriously," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The Sentinel also wrote that the DHS representative "cautioned that even if Florida could use SAVE, it would not paint a complete picture of who is a U.S. citizen — as the list deals largely with green-card holders and naturalized citizens, and is not a comprehensive list of all Americans who have the right to vote."

Today, Gov. Rick Scott said that he expects DHS to release data and that he expects the county supervisors to continue work on the purge, the Naples Daily News reports.

"This is not a partisan issue," Scott, a Republican, said this afternoon in Naples. "We want people to register to vote and we want people to vote. But the law of this land is only individuals who are eligible should register to vote."

Fla. purge of non-citizens from voter rolls appears dead

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http://www.alipac.us/f12/state-46-86...-voted-259006/