WASHINGTON, July 16 (UPI) -- The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights said it wants an investigation into whether errors in Florida's felon voter rights process were intentional.
The commission asked the Department of Justice to take on the investigation, The Miami Herald reported Friday.
"If it was intentional, it may well have been a criminal violation of the Civil Rights Act," said Commissioner Christopher Edley Jr.
"It's not just about a sloppy database, it's not just about bureaucracy strapped for resources. It's about the deprivation of a fundamental civil right," Edley said.
Florida is one of six states that requires convicted felons who have served their sentence to apply for restoration of voting rights. The state had put out a list of 47,000 names it said were possibly ineligible to vote.
The state scrapped the list after reports that a flaw in the database failed to include most Hispanics.
Many Democrats, black Democrats in particular, said the list discriminated against them.
