While it should come as NO SURPRISE (for those who know the Florida Governor) that Rick Scott recently attempted to toss out tens of THOUSANDS of mail-in ballots, it was a welcomed surprise when a federal judge blocked his attempt and then publicly reprimanded him (U.S. District Judge Mark Walker seriously cautioned Scott’s top election official about the vote-by-mail ballots).

From the article:

“According to ABC News, the judge accused Governor Scott appointed Secretary of State Ken Detzner of “delaying a hearing on the lawsuit, so that he could use every second available to run out the clock,” . That means, there would not be enough time to address the lawsuit. Then, Judge Walker said the governor’s man, Detzner, was in effect committing an “undeclared war’ on Florida voters’ rights.”

At issue was the lawsuit filed by Florida’s Democratic Party asserting that thousands of vote-by-mail ballots should be rejected because the voter’s ballot envelope and the registration file signatures didn’t match (Florida law says that vote-by-mail ballots cannot be counted if signatures don’t match). Apparently, county canvassing boards rejected more than 23,000 ballots. Interestingly enough, voters who forget to sign their ballots are given an opportunity to fix them so it only seems right that voters whose signatures don’t match should be given the same opportunity.

More from the article:

“The Tallahassee, Florida judge said he will skip the hearing that was scheduled for Monday and make a decision on the lawsuit. In his order, the judge said:

“This court will not allow the Florida Secretary of State — a high-level officer of the State of Florida — to take a knee and deprive Florida citizens of their most precious right.”

“If one were skeptical, it would appear that the Florida Secretary of State requested as much time as he felt he could possibly justify so that he could use every second available to run out the clock. And by wasting a week on his scintillating response, he quite nearly succeeded,” the judge wrote.

Really Governor Scott? Are we ever going to be able to trust this guy?

Source: PoliticalDig