Inquiry Finds No Intent to Turn Away Fla. Voters

WASHINGTON —  The Justice Department said Tuesday that it found no credible evidence that any Florida residents were intentionally denied their right to vote in the state that handed George W. Bush his margin of victory in the 2000 election.

The Justice Department, in a letter to Congress, detailed findings in its ongoing investigation of possible voting irregularities in three Florida counties: Orange, Miami-Dade and Osceola. The department is considering lawsuits in those counties, saying that, even though polling problems were unintentional, they may have deprived some voters of their rights.

In the letter, the department acknowledged that polling problems may have led to small numbers of voters leaving the polls without casting ballots.

Assistant Atty. Gen. Ralph Boyd said the small number of people who were unable to vote “doesn’t reasonably cast any doubt on President Bush’s several hundred vote margin of victory in Florida.”