A while ago, Florida submitted a law to the DOJ that would amend early voting days (but keep the same aggregate amount of early voting time) and require third party voter registration groups to turn in applications in a timely fashion.  They submitted this law to the DOJ for preclearance under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act. 

Then a funny thing happened.  Florida starting hearing from DOJ Voting Section Attorney Elise Shore.  In my book Injustice (<—— Link to purchase book over there), I go into detail about Shore’s background with the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund.  Before coming to DOJ, Shore was an opponent of voter integrity efforts in Georgia that included verification that only citizens are registering to vote.  DOJ initially objected to Georgia’s law before caving after a lawsuit was filed challenging Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act.  The civil rights groups were outraged, though their grumbles were largely kept “in the family,” shall we say.  

DOJ made odd inquiries that led to the more level headed folks in Tallahassee begining to wonder if the fix was in.  Good faith inquiries, they seemed not to be.   DOJ could have precleared the law when it had the chance to.  Instead, Florida yanked the submission and filed in District Court for approval.  They knew the federal court would not be as biased in reviewing the law.  Smart move.

Now in an amended complaint, Florida has rolled out the artillery – a constitutional challenge to Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act.  This lawsuit threatens to unravel the whole Section 5 enforcement scheme.  And there seems little doubt that a Federal court would preclear the pretty small election changes.  These are not the facts DOJ wants in front of the high court.  Had odd lines of inquiry not been made by DOJ, this untidy mess could have been avoided.  Even a stealth objection, one without the obvious warning signs, might have avoided this mess, cost and risky lawsuit.

DOJ could, of course, moot out this risky and costly lawsuit by making it clear to the court (or at least to Florida) that they will speedily preclear the change in early voting dates and time requirements for voter registration forms.  And it all started with an inquiry that made it seem that DOJ was about to go a bit too far.