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With the official primary date for Florida’s midterm elections just days away, Governor Ron DeSantis made an important announcement related to election integrity on Thursday, August 18, in Fort Lauderdale at the Broward County Courthouse.
DeSantis announced that, following investigations by the Florida Office of Election Crime and Security and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE), 20 individuals have been arrested for committing election crimes in the state.
BREAKING: Florida Governor Ron DeSantis says they are charging and arresting 20 people in the state of FL, for illegally casting votes in the counties of Palm Beach, Broward and Miami Dade.
These people were not allowed to legally vote due to criminal records. pic.twitter.com/VUeFhKQsjr
— Anthony Cabassa (@AnthonyCabassa_) August 18, 2022
According to DeSantis, most of those arrested were in Palm Beach, Broward, and Miami-Dade counties. “These folks voted illegally, in this case, and there’s going to be other grounds for other prosecutions in the future, and they are disqualified for voting because they’d been convicted of either murder or sexual assault, and they do not have the right to vote,” DeSantis said.
These individuals now face charges of voter fraud, “a third-degree felony punishable by up to a $5,000 fine and up to 5 years in prison,” the governor’s office said.
During his address, Governor DeSantis said that Florida was one of the best performing states during the 2020 elections in terms of election integrity, especially when compared to other states that had multiple issues and faced various changes to their election laws. However, DeSantis noted that his state still has a lot of work ahead to continue to defend its electoral system.
“In 2020, Florida ran an efficient, transparent election that avoided the major problems we saw in other states. At the same time, the election was not perfect, which is why we continue our efforts to ensure the integrity of our elections,” DeSantis said. “Our new election crimes office has sprung into action to hold individuals accountable for voter fraud. Today’s actions send a clear signal to those who are thinking about ballot harvesting or fraudulently voting. If you commit an elections crime, you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
DeSantis emphasized that no state has worked as hard as Florida to defend electoral integrity, explaining that his office made substantial changes to voting processes and voting by mail, but that there was no point in creating new laws if they were not enforced.
Therefore, he highlighted the work done by the Florida Office of Election Crime and Security, a new agency that is focused on investigating and prosecuting election crimes or irregularities. Florida is the first state in the country to have such an office.
The governor also said that they are closely investigating cases of people who voted in several jurisdictions in the state, and also of illegal immigrants who would have voted in Florida.
Emmanuel Alejandro Rondón is a journalist at El American specializing in the areas of American politics and media analysis // Emmanuel Alejandro Rondón es periodista de El American especializado en las áreas de política americana y análisis de medios de comunicación.
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