The GOP-controlled Texas Senate on Tuesday passed a proposal allowing the state to overturn elections in Harris County, home to the state’s most populous city Houston.
The legislation penalizes county officials for running out of ballot paper at some voting sites in the 2022 election, the Houston Chronicle reported. Still, more importantly, it gives Republican Gov. Greg Abbott “precedent-setting” power to undo election results.
The measure would give Abbott’s appointed secretary of state the authority to hold a new election in the county if it runs out of paper at 2% or more of its polling sites for more than an hour, the newspaper noted.
The bill’s Republican co-author, state Sen. Mayes Middleton, said, “There is no excuse why we can’t competently run our elections and have adequate ballot paper.”
But Senate Democrats 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.
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.
“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 Attorney Christian Menefee told the Chron that the bill was “about targeting the largest county in the state, which is led by people of color.”
County Commissioner Adrian Garcia said it was a form of “election denial.”
The bill now goes to the Republican-controlled Texas House.
Middleton said the shortage “stopped countless people from voting on election day,” Fox 26 reported.
But a Houston Chronicle study concluded that the paper shortage did not alter the outcome of the elections in Harris County, defying Republican claims of voter suppression in GOP-leaning areas. There was “no evidence voters were systematically disenfranchised,” according to the study.
Abbott had previously said the paper shortage would “necessitate new laws” directed at Harris County, Newsweek reported.
At least a dozen Harris County Republican candidates contested the 2022 results, Houston Public Media reported.