Texas attorney general says schools' get-out-the-vote drives are electioneering

[DonViejo]

Source: Fort Worth Star-Telegram




BY STEPHEN ENGLISH
[e-mail]

March 06, 2018 11:08 AM


FORT WORTH - Since mid-January, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has been going after school districts over a resolution meant to encourage voting.

The "Culture of Voting" resolution includes an option for school districts to provide transportation to polling stations.

In January, Paxton said busing students to polls can't be done unless it serves an educational purpose, according to the Denton Record-Chronicle.

A month later he issued cease-and-desist letters to the school districts in Clute, Holliday and Lewisville, stating in a news release, "These school districts used taxpayer resources to distribute messages to their staff and the public advocating for or against certain political candidates and measures."

Read more: https://www.star-telegram.com/news/politics-government/election/article203686204.html

[weissmam]

1. shouldn't he be in jail

[ananda]

12. Yes. He and Tom Delay.

And yet they aren't.

[Fred Sanders]

2. But if the students were in violation of the Hatch Act, it is all good if they are Republican.

Suppressing the vote or stopping education about voting should be a crime.

[Lindsay]

3. If only we lived in a democracy.

Or even a representative republic.

[47of74]

19. I honestly believe voter supression and electoral fraud should be capital offenses...

...and punished just as harshly as treason, if not more so.

[noneof_theabove]

22. k & r

what ever that means

high 5, +100, drink to that [if I drank], ........

congress-critters and SCOTUS stack the $$ should be treason also.

[ProudMNDemocrat]

4. What is Paxton afraid of??????

That high schoolers eligible to vote will vote Democrat? How would he know?

Sheesh! People these days.

[machoneman]

5. That letter doesn't carry the weight of law at all...

no matter if that idiot is the AG. Free speech is still in vogue in TX I'm told. And even if 'taxpayer' money is used, it's local money the state has no sway over. If the local school board and/or town, county etc. sanction these efforts, Paxton can't do a damned thing and he knows it!

[Igel]

20. A lot of school money in Texas is from the state.

And, in any event, if the schoolboard wanted to spend money on non-educational things, then it's a question of what the tax money's being raised for or given to the district for. "I've raised money for education, but instead spent it on political outreach." We have state regulations to keep school districts honest.

It would be interesting to see if it's mostly (D) areas doing this, mostly (R) areas, if it just reinforces local voting patterns fairly equally, or if it's over school bond issues so that the school is basically not just promoting the bond measure in a neutral way but in a less-than-neutral, biased way.

There's always, of course, the little matter that most schools claim they don't have enough money, and here they are paying for GOTV. It's like many other uses of the word "free": "I don't have to pay, so it's free."

That said, my district doesn't send out messages. At best there's a message that there is an election. Now, we get partisan emails from candidates who get the publicly available email addresses and send their compiled lists emails. But any candidate could do that, and it's not from the schoolboard or administration.

[TranssexualKaren]

6. More or less an admission that they want fewer people to vote.

[bluestarone]

8. YEP THAT'S THE RepubliCON WAY

[Sanity Claws]

7. Good civics has turned into electioneering

Good Lord. The Republicans are anti-American.

[SunSeeker]

14. Yes, in every way. nt

[BlueIdaho]

9. Students cant be bussed... unless it serves an educational purpose?

Fine how about saving our democracy? That educational enough for you asshole?

[gademocrat7]

10. Paxton is a despicable man.

Corrupt to the core.

[onetexan]

11. yeap, so is his wife Angela Paxton

they're in politics for the same self-serving reason as the trumps

[kimmylavin]

13. Seriously?

How is helping students learn about and exercise their constitutional rights NOT serving an educational purpose?
Didn't we used to call that civics?

[SunSeeker]

15. Stopping the teaching of voting is itself electioneering.

It is obvious this Republican hack does not want young people taught to vote because he fears they will vote for Democrats. Republicans are always projecting.

[duforsure]

16. He can't stop their social media skills

And what next, he'll ban them talking. Won't happen. He's making it worse and they're all getting scared they'll lose. And they will.

[sarcasmo]

17. Republicans already scared of the 2020, 18-21 voting block.

[beachbum bob]

18. has he gone after evalgelical churches that distribute "voting guides"???

if not, sounds like a good lawsuit for selective enforcement

[displacedtexan]

21. The league of women voters came to my ft worth HS...

... And filled the gym with voting booths. They taught us how to vote, what the electioneering laws were, and how to behave at the polling place. We voted for student council using real voting booths and ballots that day. Now this asshat Paxton wants to keep young voters from getting to the polls unless they have access to transportation? Why isn't election day a damned school field trip?