Safeguard the sanctity of Florida elections: DeSantis announcement

Earlier this week, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis proposed new measures to safeguard the sanctity of Florida elections– his commitment to the integrity of every vote and the importance of transparency.

“Last November, Florida held the smoothest, most successful election of any state in the country,” said Governor DeSantis. “While we should celebrate this feat, we should not rest on our laurels. Today, we are taking action to ensure that Florida remains a leader on key issues regarding our electoral process, such as ballot integrity, public access to election information, transparency of election reporting and more. By strengthening these election integrity protections, we will ensure that our elections remain secure and transparent, and that Florida’s electoral process remains a blueprint for other states to follow.”

The proposed legislation takes an important step in designing some of the nation’s strongest election integrity protections and providing unprecedented election transparency for Florida residents. The proposed legislation would include the following measures:

Ballot Integrity

• Address the use of ballot drop boxes.
• Address ballot harvesting so that no person may possess ballots other than their own and their immediate family.
• No mass mailing of vote-by-mail ballots—only voters who request a ballot should receive a ballot.
• Vote-by-mail requests must be made each election year.
• Vote by mail ballot signatures must match the most recent signature on file.

Transparency in the Elections Process

• Political parties and candidates cannot be shut out from observing the signature matching process.
• Supervisors of Elections must post over-vote ballots to be considered by the canvassing board on their website before the canvassing board meets.
• Prohibits counties from receiving grants from private third-party organizations for “get out the vote” initiatives.

Transparency in Elections Reporting

• Requires real-time reporting of voter turnout data at the precinct level.
• Supervisors of Elections must report how many ballots have been requested, how many have been received, and how many are left to be counted.