Federal judge orders bilingual ballots for Florida counties, including Lake and Brevard
A federal judge on Friday ordered 32 Florida counties, including Lake and Brevard, to provide Spanish-language ballots beginning with the 2020 presidential primaries.
The order by U.S. District Judge Mark Walker comes in response to a lawsuit by LatinoJustice and other organizations that claimed as many as 30,000 Puerto Ricans were having their rights violated by counties not providing bilingual ballot access.
The order grants a preliminary injunction that requires Florida Secretary of State Laurel Lee and the 32 county elections supervisors to not only provide bilingual ballots by the March 17 primary but to provide Spanish-language election assistance and bilingual voting materials by August.
“In today’s decision, the court recognized that Spanish-speaking voters are not second-class citizens and should not have to wait for their voting rights to be fully protected,” said Stuart Naifeh of Demos, one of the organizations that filed the lawsuit. “For democratic participation to have any meaning, voters must be able to exercise their right to vote in a language they understand.”
Read more: https://www.orlandosentinel.com/politics/os-ne-bilingual-ballot-ruling-20190510-fuj2enp2ajfj5fuenzv6obu77u-story.html
