November 16, 2021 – Former felon (Returning Citizen) turned civil rights activist Desmond Meade has been battling for his civil rights for a long time. Recently, Meade got these rights restored.

November 5, 2021 – Desmond Meade was visiting his hometown on St. Croix in 2014, several bottles of rum he had collected for friends in Florida on the table beside him, when he got the news. 

November 1, 2021 – The man who ran the constitutional amendment campaign that restored voting rights of convicted felons (Returning Citizens) treated a Tallahassee audience Monday to an inspirational tale of his personal journey from homeless drug addict to nationally recognized leader of a campaign to help others like himself.

October 25, 2021 – After being the face and the driving voice behind Florida voters passing Amendment 4 in 2018, Desmond Meade has emerged as one of the most prominent civil rights leaders in the nation.

October 20, 2021 – As another election cycle draws closer, conversations are emerging around how to make democracy work for everyone — from voting rights to political parties. The McCourtney Institute for Democracy will address these topics head-on at two events taking place in mid-November.

October 19, 2021 – The Miami Dolphins Social Impact Committee announced it will continue to positively impact civic engagement, education, and economic empowerment in South Florida.

October 10, 2021 – The civil rights of Florida voting icon Desmond Meade were restored this week, allowing him to run for office, serve on a jury and take the bar exam.

October 10, 2021 – The Florida activist who led a movement to allow most former felons (Returning Citizens) to vote got more civil rights restored under a new state clemency program.

October 9, 2021 – The civil rights of Florida voting icon Desmond Meade were restored this week, allowing him to run for office, serve on a jury and take the bar exam.

October 4, 2021 – The 2021 MacArthur Fellows were recently announced and the list of recipients of the so-called “Genius Grant” include Desmond Meade, President and Executive Director of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition which spearheaded the 2018 Amendment 4 ballot initiative.

September 29, 2021 – This year’s MacArthur fellows were announced on Tuesday. The list highlights 25 exceptional individuals that span across fields, ranging from studying the mechanisms of how landforms are created on Earth, to exploring racial disparities through film. Each fellow receives $625,000 to spend however they like, as an investment in their potential.

September 29, 2021 – Desmond Meade, the face of a movement to restore voting rights to Florida felons, has won a so-called genius grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

September 28, 2021 – Desmond Meade, a civil rights activist who spearheaded an effort to restore the vote to formerly incarcerated people in Florida, has been awarded a MacArthur Fellowship. 

September 28, 2021 – The Florida Rights Restoration Coalition says there’s financial barriers stopping returning citizens in the state from participating in this National Voter Registration Day.

September 28, 2021 – Writers, artists, poets, a virologist, activists and filmmakers are among the luminaries named as this year’s MacArthur fellows. The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation on Tuesday announced 25 people will each receive $625,000 over five years to use as they please.

September 28, 2021 – Desmond Meade, the Orlando man who overcame homelessness and drug addiction to earn a law degree and lead a sweeping movement to restore the voting rights of former felons (Returning Citizens), has won a prestigious MacArthur Fellowship “genius” grant, one of the highest honors recognizing an individual’s contribution to society, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation announced Tuesday.

September 17, 2021 – A lawsuit seeking to restore voting rights to North Carolinians with felony convictions faced a setback on Sept. 3 when the state Court of Appeals stayed a lower court’s August ruling that would have allowed people on probation or parole to register while the case moved forward.

September 10, 2021 – Orange County says it will remove a question about criminal history from its initial job application form. Orange County Human Resources Director Ricardo Daye said there are a lot of vacancies right now, including positions at the convention center, and in the public works and utilities departments, and the question about criminal history is a deterrent for some job-seekers. 

August 24, 2021 – Southwest Florida is mourning the loss of a community activist. Monday, Anthony Thomas Jr. died of cancer in the hospital. He had been receiving treatment there for the past few months and even worked in his hospital bed until his death.

August 24, 2021 – Covid-19 concerns, while incarcerated. That’s a reality many people are facing. And Michael Shawn Brown is in one of them.

August 2, 2021 – Kevin Scott was incarcerated in the Florida state prison system for around three and a half years, or, as he sees it: four birthdays, four Christmases and four of his daughter’s birthdays, too.

July 24, 2021 – In addition to raising money for the Equal Justice Initiative, Rolling Loud will host organizations like Headcount and the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition on-site to educate festival goers about the importance of voting.

June 20, 2021 – Some Republican-led states have increased the number of votes required to pass ballot initiatives, while others expanded the spread of required petitioner signatures across the state to even bring it to the ballot.

June 10, 2021 – It’s often described as a second chance. Former convicts being released from their prison sentence and stepping back into society. 

June 2, 2021 – Sean Shaw says it’s not easy enough to vote in Florida. He’s about to put lots of time, effort and money where his mouth is. The former state representative and 2018 Democratic candidate for attorney general is embarking on a gargantuan effort to increase access to the ballot:

June 2, 2021 – Last Sunday, a big red bus arrived at a church in Gainesville, Florida, offering a different kind of revival. The church parking lot turned into a social event and mini Covid-19 vaccination center, but the event’s real purpose was summed up by the images of voting rights activists emblazoned across the side of the bus.

May 26, 2021 – People returning to society from incarceration with the inability to pay fines and fees that keep them from exercising their right to vote had an opportunity to discuss their situation and connect with members of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition (FRRC) Saturday at the Second Chance #The FreeTheVote Bus Tour held at Greater Bethel AME Church is southeast Gainesville.  

May 25, 2021 – The “Free the Vote” bus tour is making a stop in Lake County. The Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, in partnership with several local organizations, is hosting an event focused on community reintegration from 2 to 6 p.m. Saturday at Carver Park in Eustis. 

May 19, 2021 – Do you have a past criminal conviction in Florida keeping you from registering to vote and you owe fines and fees as part of your sentence you just can’t afford. Don’t despair because the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition is working to remove financial barriers to voting and increase public safety.

May 19, 2021 – Last fall, Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody and Congressman Matt Gaetz floated a conspiracy theory that former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg was trying to illegally buy Democratic votes in Florida.

May 8, 2021 – On April 27, Florida Memorial University (FMU) hosted a book signing event with the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition (FRRC), in partnership with the Miami Dolphins and Lennar Foundation.

May 2, 2021 – John Legend addresses the Class of 2021: To love your neighbors “means being curious about their lives. Genuinely wanting the best for them. Investing in their success.”

April 30, 2021 – The Free the Vote tour bus will be in Southwest Florida on Saturday to help former felons restore their rights to vote.

April 29, 2021 – Following the 2020 presidential election, Florida is considering changing how voters obtain and drop off mail ballots, who can collect ballots and ID requirements for voter registration changes.

April 25, 2021 – The Florida Rights Restoration Coalition’s “Free The Vote” bus tour stopped in Kissimmee on Sunday, where it offered voter registration information, free COVID-19 testing, food, bounce houses, and more.

April 20, 2021 – For Desmond Meade, the right to vote is not simply a bedrock of American democracy. It is a personal struggle. He knows what it’s like to lose that right and he has spent the past 15 years working to help formerly incarcerated people in Florida fight to regain it.

April 18, 2021 – Members of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition spent their Sunday sending several messages to the people in the Orlando Community. They encouraged people to protected themselves with PPE during the pandemic, while also encouraging felons to register to vote.

April 17, 2021 – A bus tour to promote voter registration made a stop in Riviera Beach on Saturday. The “Free the Vote” bus tour is traveling across the state to get new voters signed up.

April 17, 2021 – Activists across Florida are condemning the Florida Legislature’s approval of House Bill 1, the so-called anti-riot bill that Gov. Ron DeSantis put forward last year. The bill won the final approval of the Florida Senate on Thursday and has become one of the most controversial items of the 2021 Florida legislative session.

April 16, 2021 – Last November, Neil Volz was one of the more than 11 million Floridians to cast a vote in the presidential election. It was a significant moment for Volz. He’s a returning citizen: he served time in prison for a felony and was able to vote thanks to the passage of Amendment 4 two years earlier.

April 9, 2021 – Policing and the push to improve it, is heavy on the minds of many, especially now. One major criticism is that law enforcement is heavy-handed and over-policing communities and people for non-violent crimes over and over.

April 9, 2021 – The Florida Rights Restoration Coalition is partnering with the Orlando Magic to help returning citizens register to vote. Staff from the bus tour will help people who’ve served prison sentences through the process of paying off fines and fees and registering to vote. 

April 6, 2021 – Activists in Manatee County gathered at the intersection of Moccasin Wallow Road and US 41 to demand the evacuation of Manatee County Jail during the Piney Point environmental disaster.

April 6, 2021 – Florida Department of Corrections facilities will receive 33,000 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, a spokeswoman for the Florida Division of Emergency Management said Tuesday evening. 

April 3, 2021 – The Florida Rights Restoration Coalition kicked off Second Chance Month with its latest statewide bus tour, starting in Jacksonville Saturday. 

April 3, 2021 – On Saturday, April 3rd, the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition (FRRC) is kicking off Second Chance Month in Jacksonville with its latest statewide bus tour. The first stop is the Charles Clark Community Center where FRRC will provide a fun, family-friendly opportunity for returning citizens to celebrate Easter. 

March 31, 2021 – Activist and Florida Rights Restoration Coalition president is doing the work to make sure his state’s disenfranchised due to felony convictions, regain their power.

March 30, 2021 – In 2018 almost 65% of Florida voters cast ballots in support of Amendment 4 to the state constitution, the ballot initiative to restore voting rights to citizens who’d been convicted of certain felonies after they had completed their sentences. Its successful passage restored voting rights to more than 1.4 million Floridians — at least that’s what its authors intended.

March 20, 2021 – The Florida Cabinet recently revamped how people with felony convictions can get their civil rights restored. That’s not just for voting but for things like serving in elected office and sitting on a jury.

March 18, 2021 – After the election, I found myself reflecting on some of the final words from the civil rights icon and congressman John Lewis. “The vote is the most powerful nonviolent change agent you have in a democratic society,” he wrote in an essay he asked The New York Times to publish the day of his funeral last July. “You must use it because it is not guaranteed. You can lose it.”

March 16, 2021 – We spoke to voting rights activist, Desmond Meade.  He is Executive Director of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition and has been a leading advocate to restore voting rights for more than a million Florida residents with a prior felony conviction.  He spoke to us about his new book, Let My People Vote.  

March 16, 2021 – Florida’s Board of Executive Clemency seemed to advance major reforms last week regarding how most people who have served felony sentences can regain their civil rights. But what really happened? The news, it appears, is less than it seemed.

March 11, 2021 – On Wednesday, Florida’s Executive Clemency Board enacted substantive changes to the state’s clemency process for the first time in more than a decade. These bipartisan reforms will impact hundreds of thousands of lives and represent a win-win-win for the government, taxpayers and individuals and communities throughout Florida.

March 11, 2021 – The Florida clemency board approved changes proposed by Gov. Ron DeSantis to previous rules that also removed the five-to-seven-year period felons (returning citizens) are required to wait after applying to have these rights restored.

March 10, 2021 – There were sweeping changes to the state’s clemency process approved Wednesday. Floridians with past felony convictions will now have an easier time getting their rights back. It reverses a decade-long policy of delay.

March 10, 2021 – In Florida, hundreds of thousands of felons (returning citizens) who have completed their sentences will now be able to serve on juries and even run for public office. New rules adopted today by Florida’s governor and Cabinet follow an amendment adopted in 2018 – an amendment that allows felons (returning citizens) to vote. NPR’s Greg Allen has more.

March 9, 2021 – Gov. Ron DeSantis blocked a pardon on Wednesday for Desmond Meade, who led the campaign behind Florida’s voting-rights restoration ballot initiative in 2018, citing Meade’s dishonorable discharge from the military.

March 9, 2021 – Governor Ron DeSantis and the Clemency Board removed the minimum five-year waiting period for felons to apply to have civil rights restored, including the right to vote.

March 9, 2021 – President Joe Biden signed an executive order Sunday directing federal agencies to develop a plan to increase voter registration and participation across the United States.

March 8, 2021 – A Republican senator has proposed a bill to reinstate gun rights to nonviolent felons (returning citizens) who have completed their sentences.

March 5, 2021 – “No matter what you face in life, what position you’re in, we all have some type of obstacle and adversity we go through,” Meade said. “We all make mistakes but never say it’s impossible. Impossible really means I’m possible. There’s nothing you can’t overcome.”

March 5, 2021 – Today I want to talk about a wildly unpopular idea — vaccinating inmates. I know this proposal will trigger a lot of people. So let’s go ahead and get the screaming out of the way. 

March 3, 2021 – President of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, Desmond Meade has spent the last 20 years working his way from homelessness in Miami to the forefront of a human rights movement that pushed Amendment 4 into succession. Photo courtesy of Desmond Meade.

March 2, 2021 – Of all the moments of the 2019–20 NBA season — the one with Rudy Gobert touching all the mics and the pandemic and the bubble and another Lakers championship — the most lasting one, the most important one, came when the Milwaukee Bucks, in the wake of the shooting of Jacob Blake by police in Kenosha, Wisconsin, elected unanimously not to play their playoff game against the Orlando Magic in order to call for justice for Blake and for the officers to “be held accountable.”

February 27, 2021 – Desmond Meade received the Wm. Reece Smith, Jr. Public Service Award during the annual Inns of Court event held virtually on Feb. 22, 2021. The prestigious Wm. Reece Smith, Jr. Public Service Award recognizes individuals who have provided outstanding contributions to public service, the justice system, and the community.

February 26, 2021 – Amendment two gives everyone making minimum wage in Florida the right to earn $15 an hour by 2026. The voter-approved constitutional amendment to raise the minimum wage in Florida is being crafted into law, in the form of a bill working through the state legislature. But some lawmakers are pushing efforts to exclude some from that pay raise.

February 18, 2021 – More Americans voted last year — both as a share of the eligible population and in raw numbers — than in any presidential election since 1900, when the “eligible population” looked quite different.

February 18, 2021 – As part of its ongoing mission to invest $100 million in organizations focused on achieving social justice, the Warner Music Group / Blavatnik Family Foundation Social Justice Fund (WMG/BFF SJF) today announced its initial six grant recipients: Black Cultural Archives, Black Futures Lab, Florida Rights Restoration Coalition (FRRC), Howard University, REFORM Alliance and Rhythm & Blues Foundation.

February 17, 2021 – The president of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition will be honored with an award during the Feb. 22 virtual event.

February 13, 2021 – Last September, Desmond Meade — the President of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, a nonpartisan organization dedicated to humanizing our reentry system — had his petition for a pardon and full rights restoration denied by the Office of Executive Clemency.

February 8, 2021 – Democrats are pushing an important set of voting reforms, from expanding dropboxes to helping ex-felons (returning citizens) vote. They’re convinced it will help them at the polls. That’s hardly certain.

February 8, 2021 – Nearly 160 million people in the United States voted in the 2020 presidential election, the most ever in our nation’s history. One individual in particular who helped increase voter turnout, not just in 2020 but the last couple years as well, was Desmond Meade, a voting rights activist and the executive director of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition (FRRC).

February 2, 2021 – Orange County mayor Jerry Demings said once more coronavirus vaccines become available it will be distributed more widely, including to at-risk inmates in the county jail.

January 30, 2021 – Marcus Bullock, the founder and CEO of Flikshop, wants to be the poster child for second chances.

January 28, 2021 – Florida governor Ron DeSantis has made it a priority to vaccinate the state’s elderly population. Along with frontline healthcare workers, they’ve been first in line for COVID-19 vaccines. But there’s another population that’s uniquely vulnerable to COVID-19: people who are behind bars.

January 28, 2021 – Last November, 61% of Florida voters approved an amendment to raise the minimum wage to $10 an hour beginning this September, with a one dollar per year raise to $15 in 2026. Republican state senator Jeff Brandes has filed a measure to put a new Amendment on the ballot next year that would allow employers to pay some workers less than minimum wage.

January 18, 2020 – In recognition of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried released a special episode of the FDACS Podcast featuring Desmond Meade.

January 15, 2021 – In 2005, Desmond Meade was homeless, addicted to drugs, and feeling suicidal. Then he turned his life around. He checked himself into rehab. He pursued his education, ultimately graduating from Florida International University College of Law.

January 5, 2021 – The Miami Dolphins Social Impact Committee is this year’s winner of the Nat Moore Community Service Award. The group donated $100,000 to the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition Fines and Fees program, which assists returning citizens who have outstanding fees to complete their sentences and become eligible to vote.

January 5, 2021 – “An interesting book I just finished reading and recommend is ‘Let My People Vote’ by Desmond Meade. He is a former felon (current returning citizen) who experienced homelessness, but he had this dream to make sure he and other people who served time could vote once they paid their debt to society.”

December 27, 2020 – Mountainous court fines looming over two dozen Alachua County residents were recently cleared — freeing the way for them to vote, hold onto their driver’s licenses and as an added bonus, propping up judicial system services. 

December 22, 2020 – Ahead of the holidays, a Florida nonprofit has paid $327,000 to clear the fines and fees of 181 ex-felons (returning citizens) in 17 counties throughout the state.

December 11, 2020 – The effects of mass incarceration in this U.S. are felt by many more people than those convicted of crimes. Student Reporting Labs, our journalism training program, explores how the criminal justice system can also create far-reaching obstacles for kids and families.

November 30, 2020 – Perhaps no documentary is more timely — purposefully — this year than “All In: The Fight for Democracy.”

November 13, 2020 – Florida received high marks in dealing with the 2020 election but the state’s system for tracking ex-felons (returning citizens) and their eligibility to vote is still being criticized by some.

November 13, 2020 – In Florida, tens of thousands of newly eligible voters who were previously disenfranchised due to their criminal records turned out to the polls for the 2020 election.

November 11, 2020 – Green Thumb Industries Inc., a leading national cannabis consumer packaged goods company and owner of Rise™ retail stores, today announced it will open Rise Kendall, its 50^th retail location, on November 18. Profits from the first day of sales will be donated to Florida Rights Restoration Coalition (FRRC)

November 11, 2020 – Voter suppression has tarnished election processes in the United States for decades. Many were concerned that the 2020 election would be no different. In recent years, the most notorious cases of voter suppression centered around the southern states of Florida and the 2020 election superstar, Georgia.

November 9, 2020 – In November of 2018, approximately 64% of Floridians voted in favor of Florida Amendment 4, a constitutional amendment meant to ensure voting rights for former felons (returning citizens).

November 9, 2020 – Shams Charania of The Athletic reported Monday that Miami Heat managing general partner Micky Arison will join the fledging NBA Social Justice Coalition Board. The group also includes representatives from the league’s players and coaches.