A new Tennessee law has eased up on two longstanding financial hurdles for people with felony sentences who want their voting rights back, including a unique requirement among states that they must have fully paid their child support costs, reported The Associated Press.
The
Republican-supermajority Legislature approved the Democratic-sponsored change,
which now lets people prove they have complied for the last year with child
support orders, such as payment plans. The legislation also unties the payment
of all court costs from voting rights restoration.
Advocates
for years have sought various changes to Tennessee’s voting rights restoration
system at the statehouse and in court. They say loosening these two rules marks
the biggest rollback of restrictions to voting rights restoration in decades.
“This is
huge and this is history,” said Keeda Haynes, senior attorney for the advocacy
group Free Hearts led by formerly incarcerated women like her.
To read more CLICK HERE
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment