For second time, federal judge finds Texas is violating voter registration law

Safiel · 2020-08-29T03:16:11.631Z

For second time, federal judge finds Texas is violating voter registration law

A U.S. district judge found Texas is “legally obligated” to allow voters to simultaneously register to vote with every driver's license renewal or change-of-address application, and ordered the state to set up a “fully operable” online system by...

static.texastribune.org

GarciaRulingStringerII.pdf

Above link is the second order granting preliminary judgement in JARROD STRINGER, NAYELI GOMEZ, JOHN HARMS, MOVE TEXAS CIVIC FUND, and LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS OF TEXAS Plaintiffs and TEXAS DEMOCRATIC PARTY, DCCC, and DSCC Intervenor-Plaintiffs v. RUTH HUGHS, in her official capacity as Texas Secretary of State and STEVEN C. McCRAW, in his official capacity as Director of the Texas Department of Public Safety Defendants.

The absolute petty bull ■■■■ that Texas will engage in to make voter registration as difficult as possible absolutely defies the bounds of imagination.

Texas allows in person and mailed applications for voter registration combined with driver’s license registration and updates as per Federal law. BUT. They DENY online registration. You can do your driver’s license online, but must print a form and mail it in to do the bundled voter registration.

Truly moronic and petty behavior by Texas to make voter registration as difficult as possible. There is absolutely ZERO valid reason for such behavior by Texas.

If Texas doesn’t comply this time, it is time to begin talking bail-in under the Voting Rights Act. And maybe contempt sanctions for those involved.

DougBH · 2020-08-29T03:28:30.273Z

Yeah, its so hard to register to vote in Texas:
“You can register by mail to vote in Texas by printing a voter registration form, filling it out, and mailing it to your local election office. You can also register to vote in person if you prefer.” Much easier to bring multiple lawsuits in federal court.

And what was that “technicality” that had the first lawsuit overturned? The article fails to tell us that.

BTW, appealing a case and having the higher court overturn the ruling is not “contempt of court”.

So the voter suppression in this case would consist of having to get an envelope and a stamp and putting the paper form in the envelope and leaving it at the mailbox. Maybe an extra 2 minutes involved over doing it online.
Some terrible suppression.

GrandWazoo · 2020-08-29T03:30:17.709Z

Ken Paxton is a dangerous person. And right behind him is Dan Patrick. And Greg Abbott is scared of both of them. Between the two of them they convinced Abbott to open up way too early. Abbott finally grew a pair and shoved it in their faces by shutting down a large percentage of businesses before the virus got out of hand. I think that Abbott was smart enough to know that this voter deal didn’t have a chance in the courts.
However he has been so scared of Paxton and Patrick ganging up on him to get his job that he went along with it. Fools all of them.

DougBH · 2020-08-29T04:02:17.408Z

The appeal of the prior case that was overturned for lack of standing of the parties:

storage.courtlistener.com

jarrod_stringer_v._david_whitley.pdf

Safiel · 2020-08-29T04:06:59.839Z

DougBH:

Yeah, its so hard to register to vote in Texas:
“You can register by mail to vote in Texas by printing a voter registration form, filling it out, and mailing it to your local election office. You can also register to vote in person if you prefer.” Much easier to bring multiple lawsuits in federal court.

And what was that “technicality” that had the first lawsuit overturned? The article fails to tell us that.

BTW, appealing a case and having the higher court overturn the ruling is not “contempt of court”.

So the voter suppression in this case would consist of having to get an envelope and a stamp and putting the paper form in the envelope and leaving it at the mailbox. Maybe an extra 2 minutes involved over doing it online.
Some terrible suppression.

Just follow the Federal Motor Voter Law and there will be be NO problems at all. If Texas can do driver’s license registration online (without putting a paper form in the envelope and leaving it at the mailbox) then they can easily do voter registration in the same bundled process online.

They shouldn’t need a Federal Judge’s iron boot in their ass to adhere to the rule of law.

And since you mentioned the first lawsuit, let’s here what Judge Ho had to say in regards to the case overturned because of mootness.

Although the appellate court tossed the case, Judge James Ho of the 5th U.S. Circuit of Appeals wrote in the decision that Stringer’s lost vote was a right he "will never be able to recover.”

“As citizens, we can hope it is a deprivation they will not experience again," Ho said.

Judge Ho is a Trump appointee and about as conservative as you can get. And he gets that the rule of law must prevail and recognizes that the right to vote was denied.

WuWei · 2020-08-29T04:57:18.584Z

You don’t have to print it. They mailed mine to me and I filled it out and sent it back.

NickN · 2020-08-30T12:33:40.592Z

DougBH:

The appeal of the prior case that was overturned for lack of standing of the parties:

My questions for especially Safiel and anyone else here to chime in are two fold:

First and foremost, it is unclear to at least me if and how voter registration can update their rolls for individual home address changes. Does this new ruling align Texas DMV with voter registration officials in sharing data even if online person checks NO to register to vote for any and all address changes? If not, my concern is whenever a person checks yes ( in effect by Sep 23rd) especially online for “address changes” essentially getting two votes per election (former and new address).

Lastly, I am confused as to why a simple renewal at the Texas DMV done online triggers the voter registration question in ALL cases. My concern here is not with address changes aligned to the voter registration question. My concern are with people already registered in Texas for voting at the time of doing their DMV renewal online. Grouping such people in with unregistered voters doing renewals online at the DMV site seems problematic. Can you please explain the merits as it pertains to this one example just cited?

Safiel · 2020-08-30T16:03:51.441Z

NickN:

DougBH:

The appeal of the prior case that was overturned for lack of standing of the parties:

My questions for especially Safiel and anyone else here to chime in are two fold:

First and foremost, it is unclear to at least me if and how voter registration can update their rolls for individual home address changes. Does this new ruling align Texas DMV with voter registration officials in sharing data even if online person checks NO to register to vote for any and all address changes? If not, my concern is whenever a person checks yes ( in effect by Sep 23rd) especially online for “address changes” essentially getting two votes per election (former and new address).

Lastly, I am confused as to why a simple renewal at the Texas DMV done online triggers the voter registration question in ALL cases. My concern here is not with address changes aligned to the voter registration question. My concern are with people already registered in Texas for voting at the time of doing their DMV renewal online. Grouping such people in with unregistered voters doing renewals online at the DMV site seems problematic. Can you please explain the merits as it pertains to this one example just cited?

The driver’s license database and the voter registration databases should be cross indexed. If a voter registration exists for an individual, it should automatically be checked against any existence driver’s license for street address.

Because of REAL ID, the driver’s license address should be considered to be controlling. If the voter registration address does not match, the voter should be notified and informed that the voter registration address will automatically be changed to conform to the driver’s license address. If would fix the system so that a change in driver’s license address would automatically update the voter registration address and automatically flag any discrepancies.

If you are registered to vote, any driver’s license change should automatically change the voter registration address.

If a person claims they are not registered to vote and decline the opportunity to register, the system would STILL check the voter registration database to ensure they are not actually registered under a different address.

It would be relatively trivial to make these changes that would ensure against fraud and ensure a person is voting from their correct address.

NickN · 2020-08-30T17:52:09.018Z

Safiel:

The driver’s license database and the voter registration databases should be cross indexed. If a voter registration exists for an individual, it should automatically be checked against any existence driver’s license for street address.

Because of REAL ID, the driver’s license address should be considered to be controlling. If the voter registration address does not match, the voter should be notified and informed that the voter registration address will automatically be changed to conform to the driver’s license address. If would fix the system so that a change in driver’s license address would automatically update the voter registration address and automatically flag any discrepancies.

If you are registered to vote, any driver’s license change should automatically change the voter registration address.

If a person claims they are not registered to vote and decline the opportunity to register, the system would STILL check the voter registration database to ensure they are not actually registered under a different address.

It would be relatively trivial to make these changes that would ensure against fraud and ensure a person is voting from their correct address.

So are you saying “should” because that is not as it is right now?

Also, assuming anything involving database merges is “relatively trivial” is not advisable.

For example, I remember when my residence state upgraded the DMV platform it took years to implement and still several years later their are issues that fall through the cracks sometimes. I imagine an endeavor not built to share information cohesively from the beginning is destined to have issues in accuracy and the like.

Is it safe to assume there will another appeal?

DougBH · 2020-08-30T18:59:28.555Z

Lets look at what we are really talking about.

Currently, you change your address online you are linked to a form which you download and fill out, put in an envelope and place a stamp on to change your registration address.

What the petitioner and the Federal judge are all hot that should happen is that the electronic input for the license should automatically go to voter registration.

We are talking at most about a five minute difference in what has to be done.

If I were the state I guess I would just go ahead and make the change but if I were the Federal judge I would say the law had been substantially complied with, as no real effort had to be added.

Tempest…teapot.