New election laws cause St. Johns Elections Supervisor to tighten scrutiny on VBM ballots

Image via AP.

St. Johns County Supervisor of Elections Vicky Oakes says that when it comes to verifying a voter’s signature on their vote-by-mail ballot, her philosophy has always been to “err” on the side of the voter. But no more.

“We used to err on the side of the voter, but with the scrutiny that we are under these days, those days are over,” Oakes told the Florida Phoenix. “We can no longer do that.”

Oakes explained that recent election laws passed in Florida governing verification of voter signatures on mail-in ballots with versions on file with her office is probably a factor in why her office has so far rejected 6.9% of those ballots (cast as of Thursday morning) because of concerns about mismatches — much higher than the statewide average of 0.63% (the Phoenix was able to review a list of all statewide vote-by-mail rejections).

The vote-by-mail ballots are being cast for Tuesday’s Primary.

Oakes objects to any suggestion those ballots have been “rejected,” because her office is in the process of contacting those voters so they can come back to “cure” their ballots. Supervisors are required to reach out to voters whose signatures have been questioned and ask them to sign a “signature cure affidavit” with the required identification no later than 5 p.m. next Thursday, two days after the Primary.

“They’re not rejected, they’re referred,” Oakes said. “Because we want our voters to update their signatures and have current signatures on file with our office, so this doesn’t happen again in the November election.”

‘Strained financially’

But some voting rights advocates are concerned that it won’t necessarily be easy for some of those voters to return to their local elections offices to cure their ballots.

“Folks who are already strained financially, they don’t have the resources to follow up and appear in person to cure a ballot,” said Genesis Robinson, Executive Director of Equal Ground, a Black-led voting rights organization. “That’s part of the reason why they chose to vote by mail in the first place.”

Brad Ashwell, Florida state director with All Voting is Local Florida, said most Supervisors will allow voters to email signed forms but “that often requires printing out the form and then signing it and making a photocopy or scanning it, and not everybody has access to that capability.”

Oakes, a Republican, joined the St Johns County Elections Office in 1988 as Assistant Supervisor of Elections. In 2011, she was appointed Supervisor by then-Gov. Rick Scott and won election to the office for the first time in 2012. She was re-elected in 2016 and 2020 and has already won re-election this year because no opponent challenged her.

Following the 2020 election, when Donald Trump defeated Joe Biden in Florida by more than 3 percentage points and state officials labeled the election a success, the GOP-controlled Legislature came back in 2021, 2022 and 2023 with election reform packages that in two of those years included tighter restrictions when it comes to the verification of signatures on vote-by-mail ballots.

Legislative Republicans cited concerns about election integrity generated by Trump’s false claims the Presidential Election had been stolen from him in swing states.

In the 2021 Session, lawmakers passed SB 90, which allows a political candidate, a political party official, or a political committee official or designee to be granted “reasonable access” to review or inspect ballot materials before canvassing or tabulating vote-by-mail envelopes, cure affidavits, and comparison signatures.

Oakes said her office had “a number of signatures challenged by the parties and candidates” in the 2022 election cycle. This year, she says, none of those signatures were challenged in advance.

In the 2023 Session, lawmakers passed SB 750, which requires the Florida Secretary of State to provide mandatory formal signature matching training to Supervisors of Elections and county canvassing board members and anyone whose duties require verifying of signatures.

“My take on (that law) and the direction to my staff is if a signature does not match and is questionable, that voter gets a referral, which gives them the opportunity — the referral allows them to cure their vote-by-mail-ballot, by providing an affidavit and required identification, and that cure affidavit allows them to update their signature with our office,” Oakes said.

‘Really hard place’

Ashwell concedes that Supervisors have been put in an exceedingly tough spot post-2020.

“They are on the frontlines of defending democracy, to make sure that voters can vote, but at the same time they’re getting this increased pressure in the public and now officials, and there’s also the looming threat with the Office of Election Crimes and Security that could be directed at them if they’re perceived as doing something wrong, so they’re in a really hard place now,” he said, referring to the state agency created by Gov. Ron DeSantis and included in 2022’s SB 524 to investigate election law violations.

“We need to be sounding the alarm because obviously 7% is an outlier and signals that this SOE is obviously erring on the side of caution, but at the expense of having people having their votes cast, and that’s not something that we can take lightly,” Robinson said. “Democracy relies on people being able to cast their vote and have it counted.”

“In times past we would err on the side of the voter,” Oakes said. “We can no longer due that with the new state laws.”

___

Mitch Perry reporting. Florida Phoenix is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Florida Phoenix maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Diane Rado for questions: [email protected]. Follow Florida Phoenix on Facebook and Twitter.