The Department of Justice (DOJ) will monitor elections in six Florida counties on Election Day, the federal agency said in a statement Monday.
CBS Miami notes:
The effort — which includes Broward, Duval, Hillsborough, Miami-Dade, Orange, and Palm Beach counties — will be similar to previous election monitoring actions by the department’s Civil Rights Division, the announcement said. The agency will also take complaints through its call center about possible violations of federal voting-rights laws.
“Our federal laws protect the right of all American citizens to vote without suffering discrimination, intimidation, and harassment. The work of the Civil Rights Division around each federal general election is a continuation of its historical mission to ensure that all of our citizens can freely exercise this most fundamental American right,” said Eric Dreiband, who serves as assistant attorney general for the Civil Rights Division.
A May 2020 audit found that Broward County’s handling of the 2018 election was plagued by extra votes and unnecessary delays.
The issues included (via SunSentinel):
- Half of Broward County’s election precincts reported more ballots cast than the number of voters. Backlogs in processing mail ballots snarled reporting of results.
- Confusing ballot design may have led thousands of voters to inadvertently skip an important contest.
- Money was wasted on unneeded blank ballots, which weren’t adequately tracked and were eventually destroyed.
“We conclude that the November 2018 election was not efficiently and effectively conducted,” the audit read. “Based on the totality of these issues, we are unable to provide assurance over the accuracy of the November 2018 election results as reported.”
Brenda Snipes ultimately resigned as Broward County’s supervisor of elections due to her handling of the election.
The DOJ’s announcement comes days after a report that South Florida investigators uncovered a plot to register the deceased as Democrat voters.
Officials in Broward County, a Democratic stronghold and Florida’s second most populous county, uncovered the scheme over the summer.
Someone in Columbia, South Carolina, mailed 51 new voter applications — each bearing the same neat handwriting — to the Broward County elections office in July, officials said. The story was first reported Friday by the South Florida SunSentinel.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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