House Republicans dealt their governor a setback on his quest to replace Florida's touch-screen voting machines with paper-trail producing versions.
The House Policy and Budget Committee voted along party lines against amendments to put money in the budget to pay to replace the ATM-style machines. Fifteen of Florida's 67 counties use the paperless, touch-screen systems, mostly South Florida counties including Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, Lee and Sarasota where the congressional saga between Vern Buchanan and Christine Jennings has played out.
The Florida Senate has agreed in principle with a request from Republican Gov. Charlie Crist to end the years of headaches and voting embarrassments by spending about $35 million to replace them with optical-scan machines.
But House Republicans refused Friday morning to pass a budget amendment offered by Democratic Rep. Ari Porth, D-Coral Springs.
"Our voters are crying out for this and we need to listen to them," Porth said at the hearing.
Instead, the issue looks like its headed to conference where it could be trade-bait.
"This is an issue that's about perception," said Rep. Dennis Baxley, an Ocala Republican and House speaker pro tem who suggested support for replacing the machines was spurred partially because "some people just don't like the outcome of elections."
"We're going to have a lot of close elections in Florida because we're a diverse state," he said.