PBS and NPR for Southwest Florida
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Florida Supreme Court Approves Voting Restoration Initiative

Florida Supreme Court
Florida Supreme Court
Florida Supreme Court

The Florida Supreme Court has approved language for a voting restoration ballot initiative. It could give felons back the right to vote after completing their sentences.

Florida Supreme Court
Credit Florida Supreme Court

Desmond Meade with the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition said he and other activists will collect nearly 700,000 thousand signatures to get it before voters next year.

“This issue has impacted so many Floridians from all walks of life and it seems to me that the momentum is growing and more and more people are finding out about it and wanting to be engaged,” he said.

Signatures have to be collected and verified by February to get on November’s ballot in 2018. Currently more than a million and a half Floridians can’t vote.

Copyright 2020 WFSU. To see more, visit .

Sarah Mueller is the first recipient of the WFSU Media Capitol Reporting Fellowship. She’ll be covering the 2017 Florida legislative session and recently earned her master’s degree in Public Affairs Reporting at the University of Illinois Springfield. Sarah was part of the Illinois Statehouse press corps as an intern for NPR Illinois in 2016. When not working, she enjoys playing her yellow lab, watching documentaries and reading memoirs.