The Texas House passed a radical election law on Friday after months of Democratic opposition that included a nearly six-week break quorum.
The House passed Bill 80-41 about a week after the Democrats they finished their 38-day outing. Lawmakers debated the controversial bill for more than 12 hours on Thursday before giving it the final passage on Friday.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott tweeted Thursday he was waiting “eager to sign this bill.”
House Democrats left the state in July in an effort to deny the quorum to the Republican majority and defeat the bill during the first special session. Many Democratic lawmakers did not return to the Capitol at the start of the second session earlier this month, continuing the quorum rupture, but in recent days enough Democrats have returned to end the stalemate.
The Texas Senate passed his version of the bill earlier this month after Democratic state Sen. Carol Alvardo filibustered the bill for 15 hours. The House made some changes, so the bill will go to the conference committee, where both houses could work on a new version of the bill, or the Senate could approve what the House passed and send it to Abbott’s counter.
As it stands, the bill would eliminate 24-hour and two-hour early voting, which was widely used in the Houston area last year during the pandemic. It would also extend early voting hours in some smaller and medium-sized counties; add identification requirements for voting by mail; prohibit officials from sending unsolicited leave requests; giving more powers to observers in favor of the polls; and create new rules, with possible criminal sanctions, for election workers and people attending voters.
Eric Gay / AP
Democrats have fought Republican-led efforts to change Texas election laws since the laws were introduced in March. They say the bill is a solution to a problem, arguing that there is no evidence of widespread fraud in the Texas election, and say some provisions may make it difficult for some people to vote.
“The likelihood of fraud in the Texas election is a rounding error of a rounding error,” Democratic Rep. Rafael Anchia said. “There’s no reason for this bill and no reason why we’ve had to come back and no reason why we’ve had to be here. It’s all about promoting the big lie.”
But Republicans backtracked, saying the bill strengthens Texas ’electoral system against possible fraud and has nothing to do with the 2020 election.
“Texas has constantly revised its electoral legislative policy over time, making changes and updates as needed,” said Republican State Representative Andrew Murr. “The intention of the legislature is that the application of this code and the conduct of elections be uniform and consistent throughout the state to reduce the likelihood of fraud in the conduct of elections, protect the secrecy of the vote, promote voter access and ensure that all legally issued ballots are counted. “
Many Democratic amendments were defeated during Thursday’s session, but lawmakers passed some changes to the bill during the lengthy debate.
One of the main amendments removed provisions forcing election judges to warn observers of polling violations of a law before an observer could be removed from the polls and forced officials to notify voters to request a vote. by mail if your request does not contain the correct information. This amendment also toughened the penalty for election workers who refused to allow poll observers to enter a polling station.
An overnight amendment with Republican support requires the Texas secretary of state to conduct monthly citizenship tests on voter lists, add a form for people who drive seven or more voters to the polls, and have counties with at least 100,000 people adding video surveillance systems to record areas with voted votes. The changes brought the bill closer in line with the Senate’s version of the bill.
Texas ’fight for its election laws has been one of the most contested battles in a state House this year. Democrats left the Capitol in the closing hours of the May regular session to defeat a broader and different electoral bill. In July, more than 50 lawmakers left the state to break the quorum during the first special session. The outing continued until last week.
On Thursday, in the first part of the floor, Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan urged members not to use the term “racism” during the debate on the bill. It came after Republican Rep. Matt Shaheen, whose grandparents were immigrants, said he “will obviously never suppress my own vote.”
“This chair would appreciate members not using the word racism this afternoon,” Phelan said.
Shortly afterwards, Democratic state Rep. Gina Hinojosa tested the limits of the rule when she asked Anchia, “Intentional discrimination against people of another race. Is that racism?”
“Mrs. Hinojosa,” Phelan interjected. “We can talk about the racial impacts of this legislation without accusing members of this body of being racist.”
“Respectfully, I am not accusing the members of this body,” Hinojosa replied.
Later in the evening, Democratic State Representative Erin Zwiener introduced a bill to amend an oath for people helping voters to include that the person providing assistance has never “participated in or encouraged any act of insurrection “. Republican Kyle Biedermann challenged Zwiener over the provision, prompting an intense exchange over the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
“Do you think the events of January 6 were an insurrection?” Zwiener asked Biedermann, who was in Washington, DC, on January 6th.
“Of course not,” Biedermann replied.
Abbott praised the legislation on Twitter and said it will make the “Texas election process fair and uniform.”
The bill passed by the House has it many similarities with SB1, the election bill that Democrats defeated during the regular session. This decision eventually led Abbott to convene lawmakers for a special session.
But the current bill does not include the two most controversial provisions of this bill. One of the proposals would have prompted the start of early voting on Sundays at 1 p.m., which critics said would harm Souls to the Polls, a tradition of mobilizing voters in black churches. The other provision omitted in the old bill would have lowered the rule to overturn election results based on fraud claims.
There was no evidence of widespread fraud in Texas during the 2020 election. The Houston Chronicle reported in December that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton spent 22,000 hours investigating election fraud in 2020 and resolved only 16 cases. minors.
Several other states, included Florida, Georgia i Iowa, have also passed major laws to revise their electoral systems. Democrats, civil rights groups and voting rights have challenged many of the new judicial voting laws and lawsuits are expected in Texas. The Justice Department is suing Georgia on an election bill signed by Gov. Brian Kemp earlier this year.