Although some Republicans seem absolutely baffled why anyone would question what the problem would be in scrubbing non-citizens from Florida's voting rolls, there is precedent when it comes to supervisors of elections getting faulty lists from the state's Division of Elections.
Or have you forgotten all about the 2000 presidential election in Florida, when thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of legal, eligible voters were turned away from voting because of a faulty database?
Pam Iorio doesn't forget. The former Tampa mayor was Hillsborough County's Supervisor of Elections during that election, and was also head of the State Association of County Elections Supervisors, giving her a national platform during one of the most tumultuous times in Florida's political history.
"We have to learn from history or we're in trouble," Iorio told the monthly meeting of the Eastern Hillsborough County Democratic club, meeting at Barnacles in Brandon Tuesday night. Iorio related the details of what happened in 2000, when eligible voters who were incorrectly listed as ex-felons and thus had not had their voting rights restored were denied the opportunity to vote in that election, an election that was settled by 537 votes for George W. Bush.
This article appears in Jun 14-20, 2012.