GOP Bills target Harris County voters

By ReShonda Tate

Harris County Elections system has been under fre since the 2020 Midterm Elections and now, the Texas Legislature is pushing sweeping changes that could permanently alter voting in the state’s largest county.

Republicans have targeted Harris County with voting-related bills in the last two legislative sessions. In 2021, lawmakers implemented Senate Bill 1 to get rid of 24-hour voting sites, drive-thru polling places and eforts to proactively send mail ballot applications to voters — all strategies implemented by then-County Clerk Chris Hollins in 2020 to help Harris County voters access the polls during the early days of the COVID pandemic.

Now, GOP lawmakers are using their majority to target Harris County voters in a number of areas.

“Let me be clear, the MAGA Republicans in charge in Texas have unfortunately been driving the Trump kool-aid of election fraud based on the big lie,” said State Rep. Ron Reynolds. “Tey are pissed that they spent millions of dollars in Harris County to defeat Judge Lina Hidalgo and lost. Now they want to take away local control and win elections not by receiving the most votes but by placing their thumb on the scales when they don’t agree with the results of the majority of citizens that vote to elect Democrats.”

Two of the biggest bills take aim at the Elections Administrator and gives Texas Gov. Greg Abbott precedent-setting power to reverse elections.

Removal of Elections Administrator Senate Bill 1750 was recently approved by the Texas House.

It seeks to abolish the county elections adminis trator position (currently held by Cliford Tatum) in Harris County and transfer election duties to the county clerk and tax assessor-collector. Te Senate passed the bill, written by state Sen. Paul Bettencourt, a Republican, on April 18. It will now go up for debate on the House foor.

Te bill was originally written to afect all counties with populations of more than 1 million residents, but it was changed afer Bettencourt’s ofce found that only Harris County had continuous problems, said Rep. Briscoe Cain, who presented the House version of the bill — House Bill 3876 — in committee.

“Each election seems to bring a new and bigger election disaster than the last,” said Cain, a Republican. “Harris County leadership has done nothing to remedy this embarrassingly poor quality of operation of the elections department.”

Te Texas Election Code allows counties’ election commissions, based on their individual needs, to assign election duties to the county clerk and tax assessor-collector — which are elected positions — or to create an elections department and appoint a nonpartisan elections administrator. More than half of Texas’ 254 counties currently appoint an elections administrator to run their elections.

In last November’s general election, Harris County had to extend voting for an hour afer various polling places had malfunctioning voting machines, paper ballot shortages and long waiting periods. More than 20 lawsuits from losing Republican candidates have been fled against the county, citing those problems and seeking a redo of the election. Elections Administrator Cliford Tatum, the county’s second elections administrator, hired only two months before November’s election, could not say early on how many polling locations ran out of paper on Election Day or whether anyone was prevented from voting.

Tatum lacked a sophisticated tracking system that many elections administrators use to manage polling place problems across the county in real time. He has since said the county will be equipped with such a tracking system for the upcoming May 6 municipal election.

Changing the rules for elections

Senate Bill 1993 gives Gov. Abbott “precedent-setting” power to undo election results. Te measure would give Abbott’s appointed Secretary of State the authority to order a new election under certain circumstances in counties with at least 2.7 million people. Te state would be able to call a new election if 2% or more of the total precincts run out of usable ballots during voting hours, something that happened at several polling places in the last midterm elections. Only Harris County, a Democratic stronghold and the country’s third most populous county, would be afected by this bill as it has 4.7 mil people. S.B. 1993 now goes to the state House for consideration.

• SB 1933 authored by Bettencourt, would give the Texas secretary of state the authority to appoint a state conservator to take over county elections for two federal election cycles. Five of the bills have been passed by the full Senate. To move forward, they also need approval from a House committee and the House as a whole.

Tat triggered allegations of voter suppression from Senate Democrats who saw the move as simply handing the governor a way to reverse results as Republicans like former President Donald Trump and losing Arizona governor candidate Kari Lake tried to do.

“You want to vest in a political appointee the ability to make a decision as to whether or not an election should be overturned and reheld?” state Sen. Royce West (D-Dallas) said. Harris County, which once skewed Republican, voted nearly 56% Democratic in the last presidential election.

Abbott and U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz lost the county in recent re-election races.

Under the terms of the law, the secretary of state wouldn’t actually have to prove that any polling places did run out of ballots; they would merely need to have “good cause to believe” that there was a shortage. Additionally, they wouldn’t have to prove that election administration issues afected the outcome of the election.

“Tis bill provides a remedy for systemic ballot paper denial in Harris County and simply insures there is enough ballot paper for voters,” said State Senator Mayes Middleton.

Senate Democrats in the minority ofered pushback, suggesting Middleton’s measure is hyper-partisan and overkill.

“Instead of making it statewide right now, we are just going to pick on my county, little old Harris County, right? Kind of like all the other election bills that come through here,” said State Senator Borris Miles, a Houston Democrat.

SB 1993 will now move to the Texas House for consideration and Harris County Attorney Christian Menefee says they will take the matter to court.

“Tis bill is about targeting the largest county in the state, which is led by people of color,” Menefee said.

Te Texas Tribune contributed to this report.