There's no word from the governor yet on how much time and money the checks will require, or whether the SAVE database is up-to-date on resident aliens who may have gained citizenship through naturalization. But given that SAVE aims to catch people who overstay their visas, rather than undocumented immigrants, there has been a marked shift in Florida Republicans' rhetoric, focusing on "noncitizen" voters rather than "illegal" voters. "Access to the SAVE database will ensure that noncitizens do not vote in future Florida elections," Scott said in a statement following the DHS decision. "We've already confirmed that noncitizens have voted in past elections here in Florida."

Scott was referring to an attempt Florida made earlier this year to hack down its state voter rolls: Using info from the driver's license bureau, state officials compiled a list of 182,000 suspicious voters, which was whittled down to 2,600. Of that number, 107—or about 0.001 percent of Florida's 11.2 million voters—shouldn't have been registered to vote. It turned out those 107 voters included more registered Republicans than Democrats. That state list was also riddled with errors—full of longtime and recently naturalized citizens who were fully eligible to vote.

"I hate having these new citizens' first experience with our process be one that frustrates," one country elections supervisor complained to a state official about the sweep.

Scott's moves could make a tight presidential contest in Florida even tighter. According to Nate Silver, keeper of the New York Times' Five Thirty Eight blog, strict voter ID laws can reduce turnout in an election by about 2 percent. Fishing for noncitizen voters isn't exactly the same as requiring a state ID at the poll, but it's in the same ballpark—particularly in a minority- and immigrant-heavy state like Florida. Florida has a new voter ID law, has used sketchy legal tactics to slow the pace of new voter registration drives, and has taken pains to keep convicted felons from registering to vote. Add in the fact that President Obama and Mitt Romney are polling neck-and-neck in the Sunshine State, and you have a recipe for another litigious November in Tallahassee.

Scott's voter purge strategy has turned out to be popular among voters, even as he has not. But even if it helps tilt Florida in Romney's favor, it may not be enough to help Scott get reelected. He is saddled with low approval numbers, a high-profile loss in the Florida-led challenge to Obamacare at the Supreme Court, and a lieutenant governor fighting allegations that she had a lesbian affair with a staffer. "He doesn't turn even Republican voters on the same way that [former Gov.] Jeb Bush did," one pollster said of the uncharismatic governor. "There's just something not there."