TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida’s attor­ney gen­er­al asked state and fed­er­al law enforce­ment on Wednes­day to inves­ti­gate pos­si­ble elec­tion law vio­la­tions after bil­lion­aire and for­mer Demo­c­ra­t­ic pres­i­den­tial can­di­date Mike Bloomberg helped raise more than $16 mil­lion for Flori­da felons to pay their debts so they can vote in the pres­i­den­tial election.

Attor­ney Gen­er­al Ash­ley Moody sent let­ters to the Flori­da Depart­ment of Law Enforce­ment and the FBI say­ing that fur­ther inves­ti­ga­tion is war­rant­ed. Gov. Ron DeSan­tis had asked Moody to review alle­ga­tions that Bloomberg and the Flori­da Rights Restora­tion Coali­tion had vio­lat­ed the law by offer­ing incen­tives for vot­ing. DeSan­tis and Moody are both Republicans.

“I have instruct­ed the Statewide Pros­e­cu­tor to work with law enforce­ment and any Statewide Grand Jury that the Gov­er­nor may call,” Moody said in a writ­ten statement.

In 2018, vot­ers approved a con­sti­tu­tion­al amend­ment to restore most felons’ vot­ing rights once they’ve com­plet­ed their sen­tences. The excep­tion was for mur­der­ers and sex offend­ers. But when craft­ing the law to imple­ment the amend­ment, the Repub­li­can-dom­i­nat­ed Leg­is­la­ture said that rights wouldn’t be restored until all fines, court fees and resti­tu­tion were paid.

Bloomberg announced this week that he raised more than $16 mil­lion to help pay off the finan­cial oblig­a­tions for felons so they can vote. While the coali­tion says it doesn’t tar­get peo­ple based on their polit­i­cal affil­i­a­tion, Moody is ques­tion­ing whether the dona­tion vio­lates laws that pro­hib­it giv­ing peo­ple incen­tives to vote.

Spokes­peo­ple for Bloomberg and DeSan­tis didn’t imme­di­ate­ly reply to phone calls seek­ing comment.

A fed­er­al appel­late court ruled on Sept. 11 that in addi­tion to serv­ing their sen­tences, Flori­da felons must pay all fines, resti­tu­tion and legal fees before they can regain their right to vote. The case could have broad impli­ca­tions for the Novem­ber elec­tions. Flori­da has 29 elec­toral col­lege votes that are cru­cial to Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump’s hopes of stay­ing in the White House.

Moody’s let­ter was sent on the same day DeSan­tis and the inde­pen­dent­ly elect­ed Cab­i­net, act­ing as the state clemen­cy board, decid­ed not to act on a par­don peti­tion sought by Flori­da Rights Restora­tion Coali­tion Pres­i­dent Desmond Meade. Moody is a Cab­i­net mem­ber, but declined to vote on Meade’s request for a par­don. DeSan­tis said he want­ed more time to review his case.

The mon­ey Bloomberg raised is tar­get­ed for felons who reg­is­tered to vote while the law was in ques­tion and who owe $1,500 or less. That accounts for about 31,100 peo­ple, his staffers said. In a state that decid­ed the 2000 pres­i­den­tial elec­tion by 537 votes, that could be crit­i­cal in a year when polls show Trump and for­mer Vice Pres­i­dent Joe Biden in a dead heat.

The Flori­da Rights Resti­tu­tion Coali­tion had raised about $5 mil­lion before Bloomberg made calls to raise almost $17 mil­lion more, accord­ing to Bloomberg staffers.

Agri­cul­ture Com­mis­sion­er Nik­ki Fried, Florida’s only statewide elect­ed Demo­c­rat and a mem­ber of the Cab­i­net, crit­i­cized the deci­sion to inves­ti­gate Bloomberg.

“Flori­da Repub­li­cans will stop at noth­ing to pre­vent peo­ple from vot­ing, and this is anoth­er ploy to sup­press the voic­es of those try­ing to regain their right to vote,” Fried said in a state­ment. Whether Mike Bloomberg, John Leg­end or Lebron James, these are are con­tri­bu­tions made legally.”

After not being par­doned Wednes­day, Meade said the clemen­cy process is sup­posed to be about rec­og­niz­ing that peo­ple have turned their lives around and con­tributed to soci­ety, and he feels he’s done that.

“They said they weren’t going to go into retry­ing the past, but it feels like there was a slight attempt to do so,” Meade said. “In spite of what­ev­er I’ve done in the past, I’ve clear­ly demon­strat­ed over the last 20 years that my life has been com­mit­ted and ded­i­cat­ed to giv­ing back to soci­ety, to make my com­mu­ni­ty a bet­ter place, to bring peo­ple together.”

Meade has his vot­ing rights, but he is hop­ing to have all his civ­il rights restored. He served prison time for drug charges and oth­er offens­es, but began turn­ing his life around when he was released in 2005. He earned a law degree, but can’t work as a lawyer because of felony con­vic­tions. That’s one of the rea­sons he wants his rights restored.

Neil Volz, the group’s exec­u­tive direc­tor, has also had his vot­ing rights restored and the clemen­cy board restored his oth­er civ­il rights Wednes­day. But he lament­ed that Meade wasn’t giv­en the same priv­i­lege. He not­ed that Meade was select­ed on Time magazine’s 2019 list of most influ­en­tial peo­ple in the world and cho­sen as the Uni­ver­si­ty of Florida’s Bob Gra­ham Cen­ter for Pub­lic Service’s “Florid­i­an of the Year.” Gra­ham is a for­mer gov­er­nor and U.S. Senator.

“Here’s a guy who got his law degree and is unable to prac­tice law,” Volz said. “It just seems like, then what is enough?”

The ques­tion of sat­is­fy­ing finan­cial oblig­a­tions before vot­ing rights are restored con­tin­ues to be bat­tled in court. On Sept. 11, a fed­er­al appeals court reversed a low­er court rul­ing that gave Flori­da felons the right to vote regard­less of out­stand­ing resti­tu­tion, court fees and fines.