Florida Gov. Says Voter Registration Deadline Won't Be Extended Despite Hurricane Matthew

The Clinton campaign asked for an extension.

ByABC News
October 6, 2016, 10:58 PM

— -- Florida Gov. Rick Scott said that he will not extend the deadline for voter registration in the state despite the potential impact from Hurricane Matthew.

"I’m not going to extend it, if you, whether it’s the registration date, you’ve had, everybody has had a lot of time to register," Scott told reporters. "So on top of that we got lots of opportunities to vote, early voting, absentee voting and election day so I don’t intend to make any changes."

Scott has issued dire warnings about the storm and ordered evacuations of 1.5 million people in the state. Forecasters warn that if the storm makes landfall, its impact could be historic.

Earlier the Clinton campaign had called for an extension of the Oct. 11 deadline in light of the storm.

"The voter registration deadline in Florida is October 11th and our hope would be that a little bit more time will be given for people who were expecting to be able to get registered before the election and we certainly expect that the governor and local officials will make that possible," said Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook.

Mook also said that the campaign was focused on the safety of Floridians.

"Our first priority on Hurricane Matthew is that people are safe," he said. "We have been doing everything we can on social media and email list to make sure that all Floridians heed the warnings of public officials that are saying this could be a very deadly storm."