LWVTX Blog

Voting Rights Update

Before we go into the details about which bills advanced out of the House Elections Committee last week, we wanted to take a moment to discuss our deep concerns at the wholly inadequate public process being used by various legislative committees this session. There have been multiple instances where testimony has been cut off, hearing notices have posted with shorter notice than is required, and bills have been completely changed through committee substitutes after public testimony has been heard. 

A case in point is SB 1933. Originally, this bill would have simply allowed the Secretary of State (SOS) to add more counties to their audit list in a 2 year period if the Audit Division were to finish their work early. Public testimony was taken on that version of the bill on the Senate side, and then after that hearing, the bill author substituted in a significant portion of an unrelated bill, SB 823, without giving the public a chance to provide input on the new version of the bill. SB 823 grants the SOS the ability to take administrative control over an entire county's election process. After the substituted version of SB 1933 passed out of the Senate, the House Elections Committee voted the bill out of committee without taking any public testimony. That means the new version of the bill has not been subject to any public scrutiny.

This shameful attempt to prevent public input in the legislative process is unacceptable. Lawmakers are waiving legislative norms because they know their proposals are unpopular with many Texas voters. The public has the right to be a part of the legislative process and to provide input on how these bills will impact their communities.

Bills that are Closer to Becoming Law

Here are the bills that were voted out of the House Elections Committee yesterday and are making their way through the legislature and onto the House floor for a vote:

• HB 1933 - would give the Secretary of State, an appointed official, the authority to oversee a county's elections and appoint a conservator. The bill provides little to no guidance or legal standards to define when and for how long the SOS could step in.
• SB 1039 - would allow for the Secretary of State to perform an audit in a given county upon receiving notice of an irregularity. The SOS would also have the ability to administer a civil penalty against election officials and could also appoint a conservator to oversee a county's elections. You can read our testimony on this bill here. 
• SB 924 - would allow the consolidation of election precincts in counties with less than 1.2 million people. 
• SB 1089 - penalizes and prohibits election reforms on the local level if they aren't "expressly authorized" in the election code. (There are numerous practices that election administrators use to help people access the polls. A wait time tracker is a good example of this.)
• SB 477 - (A good one, finally!). This omnibus bill would allow people with disabilities to skip the line at a polling place, requires a parking spot be reserved for curbside voters, and would partially digitize the process of applying for a mail ballot.

We have just a few more weeks in the legislative session, so please be on the lookout for important Action Alerts and other ways to take action in the upcoming days.