when out of state tracks are running on the wrong easter dunday not yet indicted catholic andrew cuomo closes nassau otb. on the other easter sunday nassau otb is open. when you are as yet uninficred and convicted you do not eorry sbout rights secured by ny const art 1 sec 3?
Sunday, April 1, 2018
| Track Code | Track Name | Entry | Scratch | 1st Post ET | 1st Post Local | Time Zone | Stakes Race(s) | Stakes Grade | T.V. Indicator |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| EQ | EQUIBASE | 48 | 0 | 9:05 PM | 9:05 PM | EDT | |||
| GG | GOLDEN GATE FIELDS | 72 | 0 | 3:15 PM | 12:15 PM | PDT | |||
| GP | GULFSTREAM PARK | 72 | 0 | 12:00 PM | 12:00 PM | EDT | |||
| SA | SANTA ANITA PARK | 72 | 0 | 2:30 PM | 11:30 AM | PDT | |||
| SUN | SUNLAND PARK | 168 | 24 | 2:30 PM |
Florida Officials Appeal Court Order on Felon Voting Rights
Sunday, April 1, 2018
| Track Code | Track Name | Entry | Scratch | 1st Post ET | 1st Post Local | Time Zone | Stakes Race(s) | Stakes Grade | T.V. Indicator |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| EQ | EQUIBASE | 48 | 0 | 9:05 PM | 9:05 PM | EDT | |||
| GG | GOLDEN GATE FIELDS | 72 | 0 | 3:15 PM | 12:15 PM | PDT | |||
| GP | GULFSTREAM PARK | 72 | 0 | 12:00 PM | 12:00 PM | EDT | |||
| SA | SANTA ANITA PARK | 72 | 0 | 2:30 PM | 11:30 AM | PDT | |||
| SUN | SUNLAND PARK | 168 | 24 | 2:30 PM |
The state has nearly 1.7 million people who have lost their voting rights because of felony convictions
Florida Gov. Rick Scott, shown at Florida’s Capitol in Tallahassee, Fla., on March 9, and other Republican state officials are strongly defending the state's current system for restoring voting rights to ex-prisoners. A federal judge found the process flawed. PHOTO: MARK WALLHEISER/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Florida officials on Wednesday appealed a federal judge’s order that the state revamp its process for restoring voting rights to people with felony records.
U.S. District Judge Mark Walker ruled in February that the state’s rights-restoration system is unconstitutionally arbitrary because it grants unfettered discretion to a clemency board that opens the way to discriminatory actions. Last week, the judge issued a permanent injunction requiring the state to create a new process by April 26 with “specific and neutral criteria to direct vote-restoration decisions.”
Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi filed the notice of appeal to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of the four state cabinet members who make up the state clemency board, including herself and Gov. Rick Scott. Ms. Bondi requested a stay of Judge Walker’s order, or at least an extension of the April 26 deadline.
“People elected by Floridians should determine Florida’s clemency rules for convicted criminals,” said John Tupps, Mr. Scott’s communications director. “This process has been in place for decades and is outlined in both the U.S. and Florida Constitutions.”
Later Wednesday, Judge Walker denied the state’s request to stay his order or extend the April 26 deadline. It is now up to the 11th Circuit whether to grant a stay.
Plaintiffs’ attorneys who filed the lawsuit—Fair Elections Legal Network and Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC—criticized the state’s appeal and its opposition to creating a new rights-restoration process. “Their continued resistance,” the legal team said in a news release, “betrays a brazen disregard, if not disdain, for basic principles that go to the heart of our democracy.”
The case is one of several factors focusing attention on the clemency process in Florida. The state has nearly 1.7 million people who have lost their voting rights because of felony convictions, more than in any other state, according to the Sentencing Project, which advocates for criminal justice policy changes.
Separately, voting-rights groups collected enough signatures to get a measure added to the November ballot in Florida that would restore voting rights for many people with felony records.
The moves could have significant repercussions in Florida, a crucial swing state where elections often are decided by razor-thin margins.
Under current rules in Florida, felons must wait five to seven years after completing their sentences to reapply for their civil rights. It then takes an average of nine years more for petitioners to have their cases heard by the clemency board, according to the state office that oversees the process.
In his February ruling, Judge Walker—who was nominated by President Barack Obama —said the current system was prone to bias. He cited cases in which former felons appeared to curry favor with clemency board members by expressing conservative political views, and one instance in which Mr. Scott restored the rights of a man who said he had voted illegally for the governor.
In the state’s appeal, Ms. Bondi said the clemency panel has well-established authority under the law to exercise discretion in deciding whether to restore voting rights to people with felony convictions. And she said the judge’s order to devise a new rights-restoration system in 30 days provided too little time “to revamp a 150-year-old vote-restoration scheme.”
Write to Arian Campo-Flores at arian.campo-flores@wsj.com
