807 told voting status in doubt

Galey says names won't be removed from purge list

BY PAIGE ST. JOHN - FLORIDA TODAY - July 13, 2004

TALLAHASSEE -- With the U.S. Justice Department and national civil rights groups keeping watch, some counties that used Florida's voter-purge list are now unsure what to tell those threatened with removal.

Florida elections supervisors initially were told state law required them to immediately send such letters to 47,112 voters, giving them 30 days to appeal.

Brevard County mailed notices to 807 people. Elections Supervisor Fred Galey said those voters now won't be removed from the rolls. He is undecided, however, whether to send notices telling them that.

Secretary of State Glenda Hood abandoned the statewide matching list on Saturday after repeated attacks on the accuracy of the suspected-felons list and the threat of litigation. Her office has yet to give county supervisors instructions on what to do with the voters already threatened with removal -- something the Brennan Center for Justice insists needs to be done.

[...] Republican advisers discredited the notion that could seriously hurt President Bush's re-[S]election chances in a state that gave him the presidency four years ago by 537 votes.

Records show 8,500 of the 47,112 voters on this year's now-inoperative purge list voted in the 2000 presidential election. Those included 5,549 Democrats and 1,835 Republicans.

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