TALLAHASSEE – On the heels of the 2020 election, Florida lawmakers are working to make changes to the state’s election laws.
Preventing ballot harvesting, increasing transparency and the security of vote-by-mail ballots are the focus of a bill approved by its first House committee Monday.
Recommended Videos
The sponsor of the House’s election reform legislation says Florida’s 2020 election was a success.
“And we should never pass up an opportunity to make a good thing even better,” said Rep. Blaise Ingoglia.
The bill would prevent election supervisors from taking private grants.
“Elections are a function of government and government should be paying for it,” said Ingoglia.
It would also require mail ballots be requested each election cycle instead of every other cycle, but requests made before July 1, 2021 would still be honored.
Mail ballot drop boxes would have to be monitored at all times and only family members or a roommate could drop off another person’s ballot.
Democrats worry those limitations don’t account for all situations.
“There’s no allowance for a guardian in here. There’s no allowance for a caregiver,” said Rep. Allison Tant.
The sponsor said the goal is to crack down on ballot harvesting.
“We just got to make sure that we’re not opening it up where anyone just signs a piece of paper saying that I’m the caregiver for this person and they can return the ballot. We don’t want to turn it into the fireworks where people sign saying they’re not going to do it and they do it anyway,” said Ingoglia.
One major concern from election supervisors is that the bill would require all mail ballot signatures to be posted online so they could be reviewed and potentially challenged by other voters.
“I think that opens up great opportunities, very bad opportunities, for identity theft,” said Leon County Election Supervisor Mark Earley.
The sponsor did say he’s willing and preparing to make changes to the bill to address concerns.
Democrats indicated that if enough changes are made, they could potentially support the legislation.
The Senate version of the legislation is far more restrictive. It would ban mail ballot drop boxes altogether. It also doesn’t grandfather in outstanding mail ballot requests.