House update: Felon voting rights bill clears House, goes to Senate
STAFF REPORT
REP. DAVID FLOYD
Thursday, Jan. 16, 2014, 4:45 p.m. — A bipartisan bill that would allow Kentucky voters to restore voting rights to more than 180,000 nonviolent felons across the Commonwealth has passed its first hurdle this legislative session.
House Bill 70, sponsored by Rep. Jesse Crenshaw, D-Lexington, and House Minority Leader Jeff Hoover, R-Jamestown, cleared the Kentucky House today by a vote of 82-12. If it is approved by the state Senate, the law would allow Kentucky voters to decide if they approved of a constitutional amendment to automatically restore the voting rights for nonviolent felons.
HB 70 received vocal support from Rep. David Floyd, who has supported similar legislation in past sessions. Floyd told the House there “is no political consideration that can push aside my sense that a debt paid is a debt satisfied.”
The amendment would apply only to nonviolent felons who have served their sentences or completed the requirements of probation or parole, and exclude felons convicted of rape, sodomy, intentional murder, or sexual contact with a minor.
Crenshaw said it’s a matter of fairness that those who have paid their debt “be able to take part in their own governance. And, ladies and gentlemen, that is what House Bill 70 does.”
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