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Change To Minor Party Voter Registrations
February 21, 2017
The Escambia County Supervisor of Elections Office recently received notice the registration status of the Independent Party of Florida (INT) has been canceled.
As a result, local elections officials were required to change the party affiliation of any voter registered in the Independent Party of Florida (INT) to No Party Affiliation (NPA). New voter information cards reflecting the change are being mailed to all impacted voters.
Voters can choose to remain registered as No Party Affiliation, or may choose to register with one of the ten political parties currently active and recognized by the Division of Elections, a list of which can be accessed at http://dos.myflorida.com/elections/candidates-committees/political-parties/ or at EscambiaVotes.com. A party change can be made using a Florida Voter Registration Application or by submitting a signed, written notice to a voter registration official.
Comments
3 Responses to “Change To Minor Party Voter Registrations”
Here are the REASONS.
This was a two year long battle against the State of Florida Division of Elections and Florida Election Commission on a number of issues which are too lengthy to put into detail on a short blog page. It hinged on (1) “an interpretation” of one word in the Florida Statutes which has NOT been verifiably been defined to this date; (2) a second portion of the Statutes from which the State was directed to waive the cause of all this action but the FEC opted not to take this “specific direction” into play; as well as a third issue which sided with the Independent Party but which the State and the FEC chose to ignore completely.
During this two year period the Independent Party offered and suggested early in the process to both the DOE and the FEC viable solutions to end this action without the final outcome, the hardship on Independent registered voters, the confusion of this action which many media are now calling an example of Florida voter suppresion, and what all affected and non-affected taxpayers are aware of, an expenditure of taxpayer monies which may well reach $750,000 to $1 Million dollars for this bureaucratic kerfluffle.
So what is the outcome? An amazing end result with over 262,000 registered voters removed from the voter roles from their party of choice to NPA (voter suppresion), a two year battle involving three agencies of the state government, a taxpayer expense of what may reach $1 Million and the end result a living breathing joke of the bureaucracy in that the Independent Party of Florida has refiled for its status as a minor party in Florida, and, it has been reviewed and signed off on by the Florida General Counsels office and forwarded to the Division of Elections for approval. In a simple terminology, through it all, they took our status away, and now they have to give it back.
THIS IS FLORIDA !
P.S. While we absolutely appreciate Mr. Larry McDonalds participation on behalf of his party, we must notify all who can re-register after you see the formal notice in the media that we have been re-instated which should be in place by early March, our party designation by the state may not be INT as it was in the past but could be IND as requested in our refiling papers as the proper designation of party.
Ernest Bach
State Chairman of the old and the new Independent Party of Florida.
The Independent Party of Florida (INT) (not to be confused with the Independence Party of Florida) is quite alive. Although stripped of its official status for the above reasons by the Florida Elections Commission (FLEC), it is already in the process of reforming. Once all supervisors of elections in Florida’s 67 counties notify all of the nearly quarter of a million disenfranchised members of the INT party members to No Party Affiliation (NPA) status, INT can immediately reform. And it will. Former INT members will need to fill in a new voter registration form and, once again, choose INT as their party after the “new” party reforms through the FLEC in about a month. The INT is a voice like no other in Florida, and will continue to grow, producing common sense candidates to challenge the stranglehold that the two major political parties statewide, and the single stranglehold on virtually all local politics by a single political party in this area. As a former and soon to be re-registering member of the INT, I can hope that other NPA’s and independent-minded voters will begin to bring about government that is responsive to all citizens, not just a third of them at a time. NPA’s need to consider the new Independent Party of Florida as an organized way to get Florida’s and local government back in line with sound policy for all people, not just major parties.
You could give the reason why this is happening. The Independent Party of Florida, founded in 1992, was stripped of its official status because it didn’t use a certified public accountant to audit its finances in 2014.