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This is the kind of decision that shows how facts matter. Among other things, the judge spends page after page demonstrating that the state can't even say with any authority how much people owe, making it hard to justify requirement to pay before vote is restored. https://twitter.com/chiraagbains/status/1264672045742411781
It turns out to be an enormous administrative burden to figure out how much, if anything, each of 85,000 people convicted of felonies must pay to get vote restored. And Florida's not interested in doing the work.
One of the remedies the judge orders is that a prospective voter is entitled to get an advisory opinion within 21 days as to whether he or she is allowed to register to vote. If the state can't say no in 21 days, it can't prosecute someone later for registering and voting.
In order to bar someone from registering based on money owed, Florida has to set out the exact figure owed--no more, no less. No more making someone guess how much they must pay to get vote restored.
It's unconstitutional to make someone pay a debt they can't pay to vote. And while not necessarily unconstitutional, it's unjust to make anyone's vote contingent on debt payment. If Florida is going to insist on imposing that requirement, it must at least so do professionally.
Good thread from one of the plaintiffs' lawyers about this mess of a law. On this record, even if you think there's legitimate reason for requiring debt payment to vote--and I don't--it's hard to defend how Florida's law actually works in practice. https://twitter.com/JonathanTopaz/status/1264682412786831366
