Texas | September 7, 2021
Gov. Greg Abbott signs election integrity bill, SB1, into law
Texas | September 7, 2021
B1 sets new ID requirements for voting by mail, enhances protections for poll watchers, prohibits drive-thru voting and more.
Today, after months of controversy, Gov. Greg Abbott has signed Senate Bill 1 into law, which changes voting laws in the state of Texas.
SB1 got national attention when state Democrats left Austin for Washington, D.C., trying to prevent the bill from moving forward by breaking quorum.
Ultimately, Abbott had to call two special sessions to get enough Democrats to reach a quorum so Republicans could pass the bill.
Despite Democrats’ efforts, SB1 became law in the state, but the fight is far from over. Abbott was joined by Sen. Bryan Hughes, who is the bill’s author, and Rep. Andrew Murr. Democrats say the law makes it more difficult to vote in the state and unfairly targets minority voters… (Excerpts from KTRKABC)
Texas | September 7, 2021
What’s Really in the Texas Voting Law
Texas | September 7, 2021
The Democrats who fled Texas in July to block their Legislature’s voting bill eventually had to go home. On Tuesday the bill passed, and Gov. Greg Abbott says he’ll sign it. Cue the shouts of “voter suppression,” as Democrats push H.R.4, Congress’s latest plan to federalize U.S. elections.
The Texas bill isn’t a blockade of the ballot box. The two most-cited provisions will ban 24-hour voting and drive-through voting, practices that weren’t even used until last year, when one county tried them in a pandemic. It isn’t crazy to think polling sites are likelier to attract trouble, or at least suspicion, at 3 a.m…. (Excerpts from the Wall Street Journal)
Texas | July 11, 2021
Texas Now Investigating 386 More Cases of Voter Fraud, Attorney General Tells CPAC
Texas | July 11, 2021
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton on Sunday told an audience at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) his office is investigating nearly 400 more cases of voter fraud and called on audience members that concern about election fraud is not overblown.
The 386 cases that are being investigated come in addition to more than 500 cases that his office has prosecuted, Paxton said, without elaborating on the details of some of the cases.
“Do not believe the narrative because in Texas we are going to fight election fraud,” Paxton said, adding that Republicans would have struggled during election day last year if his office didn’t stop local election officials from breaking rules around balloting.
Referring to claims that voter fraud doesn’t exist—made typically by Democrats—the Republican attorney general described it as a false narrative….
(Excerpts from the Epoch Times)
Texas | June 28, 2021
ALG in CQ Researcher: Voter integrity is the number one issue
Texas | June 28, 2021
Overview
Texas has long had some of the nation’s tightest voting restrictions — and lowest voter turnout.In the wake of the 2020 elections, the Republicans who control the Texas Legislature decided they needed to impose even more restrictions.
During an unusual Saturday session there in May — the second time voting legislation was considered during an overnight session this year — the Texas House appeared ready to pass a sweeping election bill that would impose restrictions on various forms of voting.
Republicans argued the rules are needed to combat fraud. But Democrats, who said the rules were aimed at hampering their own voters, temporarily blocked passage of the bill by walking out of the session, preventing a vote on the measure before the legislative session adjourned. Republican Gov. Greg Abbott said he will call lawmakers back for a special session on July 8 to act on the bill…
(Excerpts from Daily Torch)
Texas | June 1, 2021
Texas Democrats Walk Out on Voter Integrity
Texas | June 1, 2021
Gov. Greg Abbott counters with special session and a threat to veto funding for the state legislature.
As the Texas legislature neared the end of its session and was poised to pass a new voting integrity bill, SB 7, Democrat lawmakers snuck out of the building, preventing the quorum required for voting on legislation. It was a forgone conclusion that Texas’s Republican-controlled legislature would pass the bill, and Republican Governor Greg Abbott promised to sign it.
Democrats justified pulling the political stunt by falsely charging that the new voter integrity bill is an effort to suppress minority voting. However, as with the charges leveled against Georgia’s voter integrity law, the Texas bill is anything but suppressive. Instead, it works to close potential windows for fraud opened by accommodations during a once-in-a-century pandemic.
As the Wall Street Journal editorial board pointedly observes, “The 67-page bill would roll back Covid-19 innovations like Harris County’s drive-through voting and 24-hour voting. Those options were used disproportionately last year by black and Hispanic residents. But when did emergency procedures amid a 100-year pandemic suddenly become the new baseline? It’s hardly crazy to think polling-place shenanigans might be more likely at 3 a.m.”
Furthermore, the bill sets early voting at a generous two weeks, while creating a new ID number-based system for authenticating absentee ballots rather than the notoriously unreliable system of trying to match signatures.
While not going as far as to call the Texas voter integrity law “Jim Crow,” Joe Biden did ridiculously assert that “democracy itself is in peril.” What may be in peril is the Democrat Party’s scheme to prevent commonsense protections against voter fraud like voter ID laws while expanding their strategy of bulk-mail balloting…
(Excerpts from the Patriot Post)
Texas | May 6, 2021
Rep. Chip Roy Sends Letter to Texas House Speaker and Lt. Gov. Encouraging Passage of Election Integrity Bill
Texas | May 6, 2021
Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX-21) sent a letter on Wednesday to Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, and two influential state legislators encouraging them to pass election integrity legislation currently under consideration in the Texas State Legislature that includes several specific safeguards.
Breitbart News obtained an exclusive preview of the letter in which Roy states:
As you consider measures to protect the integrity of Texas elections, please know you have many friends in Congress who will support you, and please know how important it is for Texas to lead that fight as we watch states around the country taking steps to strengthen their election laws. As we have seen the momentum building for election security laws, it has been greeted by many “leaders,” woke corporations, and “voter suppression” mobs with efforts to stop these common-sense reforms. These efforts have spanned from misinformation campaigns, to corporate boycotts, and big business decisions to relocate sports games to new states.
Texas should not fall idle to any of these attempts aimed at mischaracterizing and attacking election security. Despite the spread of misinformation and self-indulging virtue-signaling by corporations, Texans know the truth: election reforms are a necessary, common-sense step to ensuring our elections are protected against potential fraud. Data clearly shows that voter fraud is an issue in elections, and any amount of fraud is too much fraud. As you know, since 2005, the Office of Attorney General (OAG) has successfully prosecuted 534 instances of fraud against 155 individuals. The OAG has 510 pending offenses against 43 individuals, and 234 active investigations. Additionally, at least 91 election fraud cases in Texas from 2005-2019 resulted in criminal convictions, sentencing to a diversion program, or judicial findings…
(Excerpts from BreitBart)