My husband is in Palm Beach working with the Election Protection Coalition. He reports:
Broward and Palm Beach counties sent out thousands of absentee ballots on Saturday, which by Florida law, to be counted, must be returned not to a polling place but to the office of the supervisor of elections by Tuesday. It will be difficult and in many cases impossible for voters to comply with this law. See http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-1101votelonglines,0,5894117.story?coll=sfla-
home-headlines for more information.
In addition: Florida law provides that there is no solicitation within 50 feet of the entrance to a polling place. The People for the American Way Foundation and two Palm Beach voters filed a lawsuit today (Monday) suing Theresa LePore on the basis that she is barring communication with voters not only within the 50-foot buffer zone but also far beyond it.
In fact, she has taken the position at some polling places that there can be no communication with voters because the polling place is on county property. It appears that she has also taken the position that the entrance to a polling place is where the last person in line is standing, which for early voting, with waits of 3 to 5 hours, has placed the so-called entry to the polling place 50 or more yards beyond the real entrance to the building. This interpretation also means that the zone keeps changing depending on where the last person in line is standing. This has had an especially harmful effect on members of the Election Protection Coalition, who are a nonpartisan group, merely attempting to distribute a voters bill of rights to voters explaining to them things such as their right to take children with them into the polling booth, their right under Florida law to ask for a demonstration of teh touch-screen voting machine before they have to vote with it, that if they do not have their voter registration card or photo ID with them, they can still vote, that if their name is not on the voter rolls and they are sure they are in the right precinct, they have the right to use a provisional ballot. Currently, many voters have no source of information about their rights.
In addition: sheriffs' deputies are telling the nonpartisan EPC volunteers at some polling places that they cannot speak to voters at all, and that they cannot stand on county property.