SENATE DEMOCRATS TO STRENGTHEN ELECTION SECURITY, WORKER PROTECTIONS AND RECYCLING

Connecticut Senate Democrats today will vote to protect voter data, warehouse workers and the state’s bottle redemption program. Key provisions that were thoroughly reviewed by lawmakers in 2025 and 2026 will take steps to prevent federal interference with state voter data, place restrictions on quotas for warehouse workers and prevent exploitation of the state’s recycling programs, among other actions.

“We will not apologize for passing legislation that has had a public hearing and has the support of a majority of the General Assembly,” said Senate President Martin M. Looney (D-New Haven). “Connecticut will benefit from today’s legislation strengthening our election security, empowering workers and ensuring our bottle redemption system continues to support sustainability. Republicans will look for any excuse to vote against legislation that supports workers and makes our elections safer.”

“When we have the opportunity to deliver needed change for Connecticut residents, we need to take it. In the current landscape, that means protecting voter data, supporting warehouse workers and keeping recycling viable,” said Senate Majority Leader Bob Duff (D-Norwalk). “The White House is bringing out AI-written executive orders and handing them to Donald Trump. That’s a mockery of the governmental process. In contrast, the Senate is committed to passing legislation that has been thoroughly vetted, thoroughly reviewed and will make life better for its constituents.”

The bill utilizes aspects of important bills that passed the committee process in the 2025 legislative session and received strong support from lawmakers but did not become law. Several reflect statewide, national and global issues impacting Connecticut, including:

Election Security Enhancements

In response to escalating actions of the Trump administration’s efforts to perpetuate The Big Lie, stoke baseless claims about non-citizen voting and potentially meddle in future elections, Connecticut is taking action to protect its voters’ privacy and election integrity.

The United States Department of Justice (U.S. DOJ) seeks to acquire voter files and sensitive information such as driver’s license numbers and partial Social Security numbers from all states. Connecticut’s Secretary of the State provided information regarding the state’s election protections and security. In response, the U.S. DOJ sued Connecticut, and several other states, for their refusal to provide the Department with this information.

In order to further protect voter privacy, the legislation passed today restricts the release of the birth month and day from voter file data shared with the federal government or the public. However, a voter’s birth year will still be shared. It also prohibits the voter file from being used for anything other than election-related, scholarly, journalistic, political or governmental purposes, and thus bans its use for commercial or private purposes, such as harassment.

The DOJ alleges its actions are in pursuit of “election integrity” as it seeks to “clean-up” voter rolls from ineligible voters – particularly undocumented people. Despite widespread evidence to the contrary, President Trump and his allies claim that non-citizen voting is rampant in democratic-leaning and swing states, may have cost him the 2020 election, and may falsely affect the 2026 midterms.

In Connecticut, the state constitution and statute limits voting to only U.S. citizens. It is a class A misdemeanor for a non-citizen to register to vote, and it is a class D felony to vote when ineligible.

The legislation passed today also expands the FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) exemption of ballots. Ballots are currently exempt from FOIA except for stand-alone referendums like one for a town budget. The bill will extend the exemption from FOIA to referendums.

In addition to voter privacy measures, the legislation strengthens our elections through several provisions from HB 7228 from the 2025 legislative session. This bill received a public hearing on March 21, 2025, was voted out of the Government Administration and Elections Committee on March 27, 2025 and the Appropriations Committee on May 5, 2025. These provisions include:

• Allowing Early Voting ballots to be placed directly into tabulators instead of envelopes to be counted on election day, streamlining the vote counting process.
• Requiring party registration changes 18 days before primary.
• Prohibits individuals convicted of an election crime, or felony involving fraud, forgery, larceny, or other deceit, from serving as a moderator.
• Allowing candidates to cure problems with their endorsement certifications after filing by making corrections with the SOTS within 19 days.

Supporting Warehouse Workers

As more and more companies move into or expand and grow right here in Connecticut, today’s bill seeks to create protections for workers in Connecticut warehouses, fulfillment centers, distribution centers and other such large-scale operations against unreasonable quotas imposed by their employer.

The bill applies to companies with at least 100 employees at a single warehouse in the state, or 1,000 employees in total at multiple warehouses across the state, and it requires employers to give employees a written description of each quota that they’re subject to and any consequences that could result from failing to meet those quotas.

The quotas cannot interfere with meal periods or bathroom breaks, and they cannot set a performance standard that measures an employee’s total output over a time period that’s shorter than the employee’s workday or based solely on ranking the performance of one employee in relation to others.

Violations allow an employee or the state attorney general to file a civil action in Superior Court seeking damages and penalties of up to $1,000 for a first violation, $2,000 for a second violation, and $3,000 for a third or subsequent violation.

Bottle Bill Updates

Connecticut’s Bottle Bill has long served as a cornerstone of the state’s recycling infrastructure, but the current system has faced mounting pressure from out-of-state container fraud, abuse at redemption centers, and inadequate enforcement tools.

Today’s legislation will strengthen and modernize Connecticut’s Bottle Bill, cracking down on fraud and ensuring the redemption system works as intended for Connecticut consumers, retailers, and the environment.

Under the bill, redemption centers would be required to obtain a state license beginning July 1, at a cost of $2,500. The bill also tightens the rules around which containers may be accepted for redemption, prohibiting the acceptance of containers that are known or suspected to have originated out of state, that have been previously redeemed, that are too damaged for their barcode to be scanned, or that are not included on a distributor’s product list.

The bill also lowers the thresholds at which redemption centers must collect identification from customers, from 2,500 containers to 2,000. It will reduce the maximum daily collection amount from a person from 5,000 to 4,000 containers, except for nonprofit organizations or verified fundraising activities. All containers returned from a single vehicle would be attributed to one individual.

The bill both increases penalties for violators of the bottle bill and increases the legal pathways to punish wrongdoers.

In addition to these key changes, the legislation will also make minor educational changes, including increased focus on multi-language learners, improvements to crisis response plan development and earlier potential access to vision screenings for young children.

It will further support development of police training to better respond to individuals with mental and physical disabilities, better support the Fire Fighter Cancer Relief Fund and ensure continued compliance with federal child support standards.

With this passage in the Senate, the bill now heads to the House floor, where it’s expected to be taken up February 26.