Yesterday, when we covered the Clinton campaign’s request for Florida to extend its voter registration deadline to accommodate for Hurricane Matthew set to make landfall Friday morning, we naively predicted that officials would likely grant the request due to the severity of the storm.
The request was made by Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook on Thursday afternoon, shortly after Scott himself told Florida residents “this storm will kill you.”
Before the day was over, Scott said that he would not be extending the deadline because he figured everyone had already had the chance to register.
“I’m not going to extend it. Everybody’s had a lot of time to register. On top of that, we have lots of opportunities to vote, early voting and absentee voting, so I don’t intend to make any changes.”
Scott’s decision falls in line with usual Republican stances on voting, mostly trying their best to suppress as much voting as they can. It’s a well-established fact that when turnout is high, Democrats win. When turnout is low? Only the most die-hard, white, ancient conservatives make it to the polls.
In this case, it is especially true that this refusal to extend the deadline will disproportionately affect Democrats due to the storm’s projected path.
Predictions from every meteorologist and hurricane expert say that this storm has the capability to be the worst we’ve seen in quite a while, due to its projected path, low pressure, and incredible strength. Under those conditions, it would make sense that all deadlines for things like voter registration might be put on hold or extended in order to give the thousands affected time to get their lives back in order.
Guess Scott just isn’t used to making sense.
