Florida's voter purge can go forward -- but they need a new list.
A US district judge ruled Wednesday that Florida's efforts to remove ineligible voters from the rolls was in line with federal law.
The Department of Justice demanded the state stop the voter purge earlier this month because the purge was happening too close to the August 14 primary election.
State officials asked local election supervisors to check out the citizenship status of more than 2,600 voters. While more than 100 non-U.S. citizens have been removed supervisors have also discovered more than 500 people on the list were U.S. citizens.
State officials already asked local election supervisors to check out the citizenship status of more than 2,600 voters but the state has also drawn up a list of 180,000 voters.
A spokesman for Gov. Rick Scott said the state will not distribute that list unless the state first can check the names against a federal immigration database.
Most counties in Florida have stopped removing voters due to differing opinions over whether it is legal.
Governor Rick Scott issued the following statement regarding the ruling:
“The court made a common-sense decision consistent with what I’ve been saying all along: that irreparable harm will result if non-citizens are allowed to vote. Today’s ruling puts the burden on the federal government to provide Florida with access to the Department of Homeland Security’s citizenship database. We know from just a small sample that an alarming number of non-citizens are on the voter rolls and many of them have illegally voted in past elections. The federal government has the power to prevent such irreparable harm from continuing, and Florida once again implores them to grant access to the SAVE database.”
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The Associated Press contributed to this report.