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florida politics and they debated the impact of such laws at the local level. this is part after political campaign ethics conference held at st. thomas law school in miami gardens. it is close to an hour. >> so again as was stated, our intention is to open up our conversation for questions from the floor. we invite to you participate by asking questions. first we're going to try to work our way through a preset agenda of sourts. sorts on the voter panel vie. this is a distinguished panel this morning and i'm excited to be the moderator. the people on this panel, i

think, have thought long and hardspr both in the trenching a in the academy about voter access to the ballot. ? roberto martinez we have someone who has served on the transition teams of two statewide elected official. charles zelden, we have a scholar who has written at least two books on hugely important supreme court cases. one on bush v gore. another on sweat versus painter. as we thought and teachesi thes issues in the history department. in robert hernandez we have someone who has worked in the

executive department of state government and who perhaps more than anyone on the panel has thought about these issues in service on with respect to ethics and elections here in the state of florida. and dan gelber who has been both a federal prosecutor, state elected official, has again sort of thought about these issues and on lots of levels most recently at least in my knowledge, as a member of the voting rights commission, which held an important hearing here in south florida, earlier this year. and so i think we have a wonderful mix of viewpoint and perspectives both institutionally situated and to have, i think, a very fruitful

conversation. so i will start with a sketch of what we would like to talk about with respect to issues around voting rights, fraud and access. the first is what comes to us reseptemberly out of the 11th circuit. that is the 11th circuit recent decision in garcia versus secretary of state with respect to the legality of the 2012 perthing of the voter roles for purposes of purging noncitizens from the roles. and the decision was divided under the national voter registration act and it was decided that the that the

actions violated the national voter registration act. and i would like to invite our panelists to speak about efforts to maintain the legit ma sift electoral roles with respect to citizen participation and issues of access particularly in light of recent supreme court decisions around the voting rights act. so i will start with mr. martinez on my left and invite other panelists to speak about the tension between again access and protection of the integrity of the voting process. in the voter purge debate and controversy. mr. martinez? thank you, by wait. good morning, everyone. i'm not sure i'm the right person to begin the topic. but obviously we all have an

interest in making sure that those that have the right to vote, vote. we also have the interest in making sure that vote is cast by people who are in fact entitled to vote. it protect the integrity of the process. in regard to purging of the roles, as i understand that's been stopped here if florida. and for good reason. the roles being used, there was question of their accuracy. so i don't know how much more i can tell you about this poent in time. i thought you were going to talk about the photo id requirement in wisconsin. >> we'll get there. >> and i guess i would like to add, the secretary of state has simply delayed the institution of the voter purge until the homeland security data base is more accurate, i guess, as according to the secretary of state's memorandum.

if anyone want to address that question, then again, tension that rise -- >> thank you. and bob was brought here to class the place up. >> i was brought here go the other way. i think the purge id, a lot indicates theish issue that is not unique to florida but pronounced in florida. florida is a state that's always in play. so when you have a -- when you have like nobody wonders who what is going to happen in new york on november 5th. but they wonder what happens in florida. when you have the apparatus of elections tends to be much more important. fault lines are displayed more proudly to the world. when you have a close election and we saw that in 2000. it happens with all of the issues which i think is the issue you're getting at is the question is whether quote ef

reports from mote integrity are simply being used as a stocking horse to try to change the outcome of an election. and i'm not worried about appearing too partisan because frankly, florida is a state where the apparatuses of elections are run by the legislature which is republican legislature. it may be different in states where democrats run the legislature but here in florida, really most of the efforts to deliver quote integrity to the process, whether a purge, whether voter id in other states that are close, most of those generally are intended more to suppress a vote than to assure integrity because things like early voting constraint and purging and things like that, really rpt allot of people running to the polls with fake ids to vote. there aren't really a lot of felons really desperately trying to vote. there are people out of status, you know, horde of them running to vote.

if that happens it happens infrequently and by accident. you don't hear about other cases really. so i would tell you that the purge was a very -- was an idea whose only purpose was to suppress the vote of the population that they believed that the governor believed might noting necessarily favorable and i think most of the election that had come out of legislature have an ulterior and mischievous purpose. >> this is in vard to voter iid. there are clearly documented cases and even in the 2012 purge, there are documented cases of noncitizens on voting roles. at least 85 people were ultimately removed.

whittled down from a rather large number of 180,000. i guess the question i have for the panel is, does it matter and if i take mr. gelber's comments to heart, he suggests it doesn't, but does it matter that secretary of state is putting a hold on moving forward for a better data base. to the extent that there were problems with the 2012 effort to protect the integrity of the vote. was it based upon the mechanism used so that, you know, the use of dmv records simply was a bit noisy and allowed for the inclusion of too many legal voters. or does it go back to your point about what you take to be the intent behind the intent to

clean up the voting world? >> if i could speak on that. i think it is somewhat equivalent to -- [ inaudible ] we've known for a long time that the state of our voter role has been filled with flaws. and to suddenly discover rb oh, my god, there's flaws here, we need to hold back, which is probably the right decision, is also coming a little late. we knew this in 2000, in 2004. in 2006. this is a problem not only in florida, but across the nation. of voters role data bases that simply we don't know -- we don't have good data. we have problems in which there are errors and mistakes in the data bases we are using to check voters. and the end result is similar to here. there is big news and everybody hears about it. in the end you come down to 85 people. and in the end you come down to 8 5 people out of a hundred thousand, out of, what, 7

million potential voters in florida. the problem isn't new. and so while i think the decision to hold back was the right one, why were we in the decision in 2014? why weren't we fixing this or holding off earlier? >> let me just say something, i'm not an expert in this o area, but obviously the way in which this whole thing was implemented was clumsy. or certainly gave that appearance. it didn't look well. but it is in our best interest to make sure we don't have people on the roles that are not entitled to vote. so if there is someone on the roles here and in two different states, we don't want that. if the person is not qualified in the first place, we don't want that puerson voting.

we have a legitimate interest in making sure that people voting have the right to be voting. but it being clumsy throws the whole process into question. but i don't think we need to throw out the baby with the bath water kind of thing. it stopped. didn't look good for the republican party and the governor. the way in which it was implemented may have been clumsy but that doesn't mean we don't have a legitimate interest to make sure there is integrity in the voting roles. >> to go further, there's a question about whether or not the state ought to have access to its own data base. to the extend that state is relying on a data base of homeland security in reading and preparing for this panel i thought, isn't it interesting, and this is not to cast dispersions on the add menstruation, but isn't it interesting that homeland security would say, hey, the data base isn't quite ready.

so you -- to the extent that partisanship might be influenced -- might influence both homeland security effort to get a data base of the state's that can in fact be used doesn't make the argument that the states ought to have data base or be aebl to make recourse to a data base that is perhaps not vulnerable to perhaps the opposite parties. >> sound like a great idea except florida has been trying to put together its own data base in this area for about the last 20 years. it has been flawed. dmv data base is flawed. various other data bases, as comparison for voter roles, has been flawed. sometimes by choice. in 2000, the decision was make connections with same first

name, last name, middle name and they knew there would be false positives. they said okay we will go with false positives. then said sent the whole list out and said, purge that. this has been an ongoing problem. the data bases that we ourselves have in florida aren't very good. so one reason to turn to homeland security is to have a new data base. surprise surprise, it is hard for them to get a good data base. it undermines the process as a whole. and voter registration, until we have a national registration process, we're going to republican into these problems and it will be difficult to purge the list. even as mentioned, it is legitimate to clean out the voting list on a regular bases. but if you doing it in a way that legitimate voters are purged when they shouldn't be, that questions the electoral

process. >> very briefly, i agree with bob that you shouldn't have people who can't go -- who can't authorize to vote voting. but i think you confused who is dethe baby and who is the bath water. in the sense when you have, you know, when have you 80 people who shouldn't be on the list obviously and may or may not be voting but you're prepared to purge tens of thousands of others that aren't on the list and that are legal citizens and should be voting, that's what happened in 2000. we put out a list and realize, because i think they are smart enough to realize, that whole lots of citizens of our state we're gok purged to get a couple people who probably shouldn't have been on the list. that's what happens. and i believe and i this i this is clear as day that those lists tend to implicate certain types of voters who vote a certain way. an problem doing it.

and that the problem with the voter purge. is that it takes citizens who should be voting some -- a story of broward county veteran. the sort of of face that said, i've been voting here. i served in world war ii and i can't vote because somebody with my name is also on that list. i think that's the problem. you shouldn't do a purge unless can you really protect actual voters. >> let me just climb in here for a second. he is right there is serious issues in 2000. but we're in 2014. although we are still talking about a purge list, in 2014, i mean, i challenge anybody in here to tell me that there is massive purging going on for people voting because of a bad list. yes, there are lists. yes, still problems with it and they have voluntarily decided we are not fwoing to go ahead and

do this until we have confidence in the list that we have that in fact people who are not voting in fact won't be voting. we can talk all day we want about what happened in 2000. but in 2014 that's not happening. that's what we need to focus on is where we are in 2014 and going forward and how are we going to make sure that if there is a legitimate public interest in making sure that people who should not be voting do not vote. because it dilutes everybody else's vote that is entitled to vote. having said that, we want to make sure that nobody, like the veteran that dan is talking about, is put in that situation. i can tell you, that's not happening in 2014. >> let me just follow up. i think part of the topic of the panel panel is common ground. can we all agree, we need a list that is accurate? it needs to be carefully reviewed. is that basically what we are saying? can the democrats and republicans agree that we need to have a list that is accurate?

it seems to me that's a basic -- >> i this i that goes back to my question. if i take mr. gelber seriously, he seems to suggest that a list that's accurate is irrelevant in light of the intent behind the -- the attempt to clean up voter lists. so i think that's the crux of the problem. >> why would the governor purge the list when he knows there are tens of thousands of people that shouldn't be on there? the governor is a smart guy. he has smart people working around him. he realizes what you and everybody else here realize that that list isn't capable of really purging people who shouldn't be voting. it is going to include loads of others. >> but does that still taint the attempt in integrity that every

subsequent attempt becomes suspect? >> i suppose we have an enlightened democratic governor, governor gelber -- >> an endorsement -- >> suppose he wants to enlighten the republican chief of staff, sew hires me. so we go about and clean the list in the right way. i think we all agree we want a list that is accurate. that is honest. >> we all agree that people shoo shouldn't be voting, shouldn't be voting. the hard part is, if you don't have a list that works, what do you do? and just like in the court system, you say, we will attend guilty go free instead of convicting one insent. are we prepared to kick out of voting polls a thousand citizens so we can find that one guy that isn't a citizen? and until have you a good list, it is an academic debate.

and he didn't have a good list. i use 2000 because there is a history of it in this state. and i'm sure we will talk about it at some point in this discussion. but i think that's the point. >> i certainly want to pivot to that. in light of the supreme court's decision during the last term in shelby county, in which the supreme court invalidated the formula, the coverage formula, that triggered free clearance under the voting rights act, the courts seem to suggest that history would not forever be a taint on certain political jurisdiction. and certain coverage

jurisdictions immediately began to move to implement or move forward with the implementation of voter id laws. the supreme court in 2008 protects the legitimacy of the ballot by voter id law. so we stand here, after crawford, after shelby, with the doj in litigation in texas and north carolina and in other places, with respect to voter id laws, the conversation that we just had on wednesday, a district court in wisconsin is thrown out. the wisconsin voter id law. and again, it goes back to the question of the evidence that justifies the state's interest in protecting the integrity of the ballot.

of the ballot. and the effectiveness of voter ids in protecting against the harm identified by the state. and again, a project that was affirmed, a constitutional in crawford and in which now post shelby we've got some work to do in lots of places. and so, in light of the wisconsin decision, which seems to minimize crawford, that is to say, saying look, we will take seriously the impact that voter id laws have on sub groups within the state to make the assessment of whether or not these laws violate the voting rights act. and again, there probably is lots of common ground on this panel with respect to what

counts as evidence. what counts as sufficient evidence. so again, i will cover you this time again. >> okay. well again, i'm not an expert. this is veriesotery esoteric. so they invite congress to come back with a different formula. i don't know if the obama administration proposed one. putting shelby aside. the wisconsin decision, and that friend of mine brought to my attention, he is in the audience, a decision repderred recently, in case some of you don't know, it held in wisconsin passed a law requiring photo identification. in toward vote, you have to obtain and present a photo id. if you don't have one, the state will give you one for free. and what court in a very long opinion held was that getting that tree photo id, if you didn't have one, impose an

unjustified burden on the people who didn't have the photo id. therefore found it unconstituti unconstitutional. the court felt that the class of people impacted would be mostly poor people. included in those categories would african-americans and pla te latinos. it had an impact. i find the scope of that rather expansive. the court went out of its way on crawford that the state did not protect the integrity of the role sufficient to establish that requirement. and to legislate its own standard. it surprised me to learn of that opinion, because we've had that in florida for quite a long time. i don't believe it to be an impediment to anyone's right to vote. nor i do believe to have been discriminatory on any particular

sub group, including hispanics. which i'm in that category. so i think that effort in wisconsin, maybe it is unique to wisconsin. so if this is part after of a movement to stir up groups, perhaps that's the intent behind it. but as far as being a law that is unconstitutional, i think that's a reach by the district court judge. >> let's put it in context why people have different conclusions on the same topic. republicans have the general view of the election which is certainty. the purpose of holding election is that we know who won. and that we are clear as twho won and confident as to who won and there's no question as to who won. so anything that cleanse up the electoral process, is a burden

worth paying because that's the purpose of an election. democrats generally believe that legitimacy involves participation. that anything that limits par p participation that undermines the legit ma simac ma si /* /- legitimacy of the outcome. this is a perspective towards the purpose of the election of voting. but each perspective focuses on a different answer to the question of what is a legitimate burden for the state to impose upon voters in the voting process. and of course, underneath this is that not so secret dirty little secret that of course each side takes a position that is very comfortable with outcomes that will help them. generally more better it is for democrats. that is not saying necessarily

they are doing it for that reason. it is just always easy do the right thing if the end result is the one you want. and so, part of the reason why we have this difficulty is we have a, i suspect, a district judge in wisconsin whose perspective is on the legitimacy in election is access and have you a majority on the supreme court currently that believes the purpose of election is certainty. and i know we are trying to cut middle ground here. that is a difficult thing to break because of differing perspectives. while we can say yes, we agree that we should keep people who shouldn't be voting, what that entails on a practical level are perspective on the purpose of voting, provides what is a legitimate answer and that often leads to a different direction. is there some possibility for common ground if we understand

crawford and in both asking a question about the reasonableness of the fear that the process will lack certainty or reasonableness that the process will lack broad participation? and so in some sense with the court suggesting that there is simply no evidence that the voter id law is going to cause the burden that was complained of by the plaintiff. where in the wisconsin decision, the court suggestions there is no data to support the fear of the -- >> well in fact he argues, and part of it is so long, it is a 90-page opinion. he goes into great detail explaining why there is this burden. the court said, you want e evidence, here is evidence.

at least in milwaukee. this is in part how you perceive the election. >> i have a little bit after of a disagreement. the wisconsin case is a good example to look at. i will dispute also what my friend bob said, as i do this. the judge pointed out in eight years in wisconsin you can count on one finger how many instances of someone trying to use a fake id or showing up at the poll with somebody else it happened. and that 9% of the population, 200,000 people, didn't have an id. so those two point that tell you, whether you, on the certainty side or the participation side, those aren't the sides in election. when the certainty side is using sort of phony justifications, to create obstructions to vote, you ask anyone in this audience who sat in the line for eight hours in 2012 or six hours in 2008,

they won't say this is to make sure there is certainty in early voting. they will tell that you someone stopped the process of accepting voters, to obstruct that process be to cloud that process. because they did not want robust participation. that's what is going on. it is a wonderful thing to say one group likes certainty and the other likes participation. but if the one group that likes certainty is saying we like certainty and the way we do it is by stopping lot of people from voting, that is not a democracy. and that's what has been happening in florida and anyone, down the street, they are in line for ten hours. ten hours because of artificial obstructions to voting that had nothing to do with certainty of an election. [ applause ] >> please-db. >> professor, i became a citizen

in 1974 because i wanted to vote. i was paying taxes. i could work. but i wanted to vote. so i believe strongly. i'm a republican. i registered as republican in 1987 after i left the prosecutor's office. i believe very strongly as a republican. but as an american citizen first, that people should be entitled to vote. that's my primary priority. without uncertainty, that people entitled to vote, vote. in wisconsin, the judge there, the judge in wisconsin found that the burden was that you had to take time to go to the department of motor vehicles and get a photo id. that was hassle, to use his word. that was the burden. by the way, the photo id was free. you didn't have to pay for it. but he found that to be an unjustified burden. i was curious as to why this judge went to such great lengths

to find this law unconstituti unconstitution unconstitutional. the judge served for 20 years on the wisconsin legislature as a senator, democratic senator. maybe he also brought a certain experience and partisan view to that particular law that he wanted to find unconstitutional. but to hold that, take time, we all do, we all have to take some effort, to take time to go to the motor vehicle, get a photo id for free, that that is a burden and unconstitutional hassle. to raise that to the 14th amendment violation, i find that to be an extraordinary reach. >> and again, this goes back and your statement goes back to the wisconsin decision and to crawford. should it matter which groups

bear the burden of a voter id law? should that matter to the extent that the voter id law is generally applicable law. just right in crawford. scalia writing for justices thomas and alito and himself, that it doesn't matter. differential burden is born. and go back to your point about the wisconsin judge, wisconsin judge saying i'm free to decide this question and it does, that is a sub group burden does in fact matter. does it matter? should we take into account that there are groups that will be differentially effected by this? and that those are groups that are connected to the voting rights act. or if we go back to sort of some payment about history, should that matter? >> i think that in a long

opinion, i think he found that to be relevant with regard to the stat statutory violation of the voting rights act. and he found that it had a discriminatory act on people that were poor and they were more of the african-americans and latinos. but i'm not quite sure what the significance of that rational was. i'm sure that african-americans and latinos are able go to the department of motor vehicles, take time from their day, and figure out thousand get a free photo id. it is not that difficult to do. i find that the comment by the judge frankly to be perhaps a little patronizing with his views of certain sub groups. i'm not sure i understand the reasoning for that rational. >> i disagree. surprise. 9% of wisconsinians voting didn't have id. marketplace tell us that 200,000 people didn't have it already.

i've been to the dmv. i dispute that factually that it is an enjoyable experience. not to disparage anybody who works there, thank you. i think the point is though, that it does go to the intent of the action. in a sense that if you employment a voter id law, knowing that 200,000 voters don't have ids, and those those 2 00,000 are minority and there is no justification for it in that there is. a documented case other than one person who accidentally voted for their spouse who passed away, over eight years, then it goes to the intent of the action and also disproves the idea there is any legitimate state justification. there are a lot of people that don't have vehicles.

who can't afford public transportation sometimes, who live remotely. who live on sort of the fringes of the economy and frankly those people have the right to vote also without an added obstruction. >> professor, maybe you know the answer. maybe somebody knows the answer. we've had photo id laws in florida for quite sometime. is there any evidence that that was had a burden on any particular sub group of voters from voting?