JACKSONVILLE, Fla — It is becoming an election cycle replete with allegations of voter suppression, fraud, even conspiracy, and it is all before the votes are cast.
"I have never seen anything like this," Sharonda Scott said.
Scott, a state fraud investigator, received a notice over the weekend from the Division of Elections stating "she may not be eligible to vote."
"We went online and, sure enough, it said we were not registered to vote," she said.
Scott, her spouse, brother, son and niece all received the same notice. Scott is a registered Clay County voter and was surprised to learn that she is being considered as an unregistered voter.
"We recently voted in August and this is my voter registration card here in my hand," she said. "Nothing has changed."
Now she is suspicious and wants to know how she was kicked off the system — if she was kicked off.
"It upsets me because it seems like you are trying to take away my right to vote, my voice," Scott said.
Chris Chambless is the Clay County Supervisor of Elections and is responsible for the 162,000 registered voters.
"There is no reason to be suspicious. Absolutely not," Chambless said.
His office has received similar complaints from others, and the common thread is these are voters whose information is a protected record; not part of a public database.
"You can think of it as a false positive," he said.
Florida became part of the Electronic Registration Information Center or ERIC. Chambless said the system searches public databases for unregistered voters and voters with protected status may appear unregistered in other public databases.
So we checked Scott's status and confirmed she is registered.
"She is registered," Chambless said. "Yes, she is."
He said it is possible that the state fraud investigator's information is not private in another database and that's why she was sent a notice — not just her but her family members.
"There are no shenanigans here at all," he said.
Perhaps not, but there are confusion and growing doubt in the system in place to ensure your vote counts.
Duval County Supervisor of Elections Mike Hogan said his office has had similar complaints from voters with protected records.
Scott said even if this turns out to be a glitch of sort by ERIC, it should be considered a wake-up call to all voters to check their statuses now.
"Everyone needs to be informed of their status before Nov. 3," said Scott.
We reached out to the Division of Elections and waiting on a response.