Texas leans on new voting law to reject thousands of primary ballots
Officials in Texas are rejecting thousands of mail-in ballots ahead of the first 2022 midterm primary votes next month, raising serious alarm that a new Republican law is going to disenfranchise droves of eligible voters.
The state’s 1 March primary is being closely watched as the first important testof one of the dozens of voting restrictions GOP-controlled state legislatures enacted in 2021.
Last August, Texas Republicans passed a sweeping new voting law, SB 1, that imposes new identification requirements in the mail-in voting process, prohibits election officials from soliciting mail-in ballots, provides partisan poll watchers with more autonomy at the polls and outlaws 24-hour and curbside voting.
They claimed it was to reduce fraud, despite little evidence of it being committed in 2020. Critics smell discrimination.
The March primary is the first election cycle the new law is in effect as voters go to the polls to choose their party’s nominee for US House races and the state governor, among others.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/feb/03/texas-new-restrictive-voting-law-reject-thousands-mail-in-ballots