Texas: Republicans pitch new voter ID law | The Texas Tribune

Top Texas Republicans unveiled legislation Tuesday that would overhaul the state’s voter identification rules, an effort to comply with court rulings that have found that the current law discriminates against minority groups. Filed by Sen. Joan Huffman, Senate Bill 5 would add options for Texans who say they cannot “reasonably” obtain one of seven forms of ID currently required at the polls. It would also create harsh criminal penalties for those who falsely claim they need to choose from the expanded list of options. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has granted the bill “priority” status, carving it a faster route through the Legislature. Nineteen other senators have signed onto the bill, and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton — who is still defending the current ID law in court — applauded the legislation Tuesday.

Texas: Woman fights harsh voter fraud sentence: ‘I just wanted them to hear my voice’ | The Guardian

Rosa Ortega does not deny she made a mistake. What she finds hard to accept is that her error should merit eight years in prison, almost certain deportation to a country she barely knows, separation from her children and notoriety in rightwing circles. “Send me back to Mexico. Get it over with,” she said in an interview with the Guardian on Friday, sitting behind a glass partition in the Tarrant County corrections centre in downtown Fort Worth, Texas. “I’m done, this is already too much, it’s too much and I’m just sitting there, sitting there, sitting there, and I don’t even sleep, I don’t sleep, I don’t do nothing here. On my mind, from day to night, is my kids.” Ortega was brought to the US from Mexico as a baby and lived legally in Texas as a permanent resident. While her green card entitled her to many of the same privileges as an American citizen, it did not confer the right to vote – yet vote she did, repeatedly, in elections in the Dallas area.

Texas: Hundreds of Texans may have voted improperly | Associated Press

Texas election officials have acknowledged that hundreds of people were allowed to bypass the state’s toughest-in-the-nation voter ID law and improperly cast ballots in the November presidential election by signing a sworn statement instead of showing a photo ID. The chief election officers in two of the state’s largest counties are now considering whether to refer cases to local prosecutors for potential perjury charges or violations of election law. Officials in many other areas say they will simply let the mistakes go, citing widespread confusion among poll workers and voters. The Texas law requires voters to show one of seven approved forms of identification to cast ballots. It was softened in August to allow people without a driver’s license or other photo ID to sign an affidavit declaring that they have an impediment to obtaining required identification. Even after the affidavits were introduced, voters who possess an acceptable photo ID were still required to show it at the polls.

Texas: Analysis: Rising Criticism Threatens One-Punch Voting In Texas | San Marcos Corridor News

Partisan efficiency experts might love the time-saving charms of straight-ticket voting, but a number of the state’s top elected officials are ready to outlaw the practice. Straight-ticket, or one-punch, voting allows people to cast a ballot for all of one party’s candidates with one pull of the lever, stroke of the pencil or click of the voting button. Its requires partisan faith on the part of a voter, an expression of trust in a party’s primary voters, a conviction that the chosen candidates — no matter who they are, what they’ve done and whether they are qualified — are better than candidates offered by the opposition party. And it makes the coattails of the people at the top of the ballot very, very influential. Just ask a judge. “I will say only a word about judicial selection, but it is a word of warning,” Texas Supreme Chief Justice Nathan Hecht said this week in his State of the Judiciary speech. “In November, many good judges lost solely because voters in their districts preferred a presidential candidate in the other party.”

Texas: Pasadena won’t fight voting rights order; elections will proceed as planned | Houston Chronicle

The city of Pasadena will not fight an appellate court ruling over its election system, a decision that will allow the upcoming May council elections to proceed with eight-single member district seats, according to the lead attorney for the city in the closely watched voting rights case. The elections will proceed under the district format and will not using six neighborhood council and two at-large seats, a system a district judge ruled was discriminatory against Latino voters. The city, through its attorneys, sought a stay of Chief U.S. District Judge Lee H. Rosenthal’s order, but the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of appeals upheld the order.

Texas: Illegal voter ‘can’t believe’ she got 8 years in prison | The Star-Telegram

Rosa Maria Ortega voted for Republican Ken Paxton for Texas attorney general in 2014. Now, as she sits behind a plate glass window Monday with heavy eyes and wearing a tan Tarrant County Jail jumpsuit, she’s crushed that Paxton and others can celebrate her incarceration as sending a message about illegal voting. Ortega, 37, a permanent resident who arrived in Texas as an infant and has four children, all U.S. citizens, was charged with two counts of illegal voting for voting illegally in elections in 2012 and 2014. On Thursday, a Tarrant County jury handed down a sentence of eight years in prison and a $5,000 fine for each count. After serving her sentence, she will likely face deportation. She believes she is wrongly being used as an example of voter fraud. “I thought I was doing something right for my country. When they gave me the sentence they just broke my heart, and they didn’t just break my heart, but I already knew my family was going to be broken, my kids especially,” Ortega said Monday during an interview at the jail, where she will remain for about a month until being transported to a Texas Department of Criminal Justice facility. “To me, it’s like, ‘Wow, I can’t believe this. I just can’t.’ ”

Texas: Murder, rapes have led to lighter sentences in Tarrant County than voter fraud | The Star-Telegram

The eight-year prison sentence given to a Grand Prairie woman for voting illegally has been touted by politicians as a case that sent a message. “In Texas you will pay a price” for voter fraud, tweeted Gov. Greg Abbott. “This case shows how serious Texas is about keeping its elections secure,” state Attorney General Ken Paxton said. But critics argue that Rosa Maria Ortega’s punishment, which was decided by a jury and drew national attention, was too harsh. “Illegal voting should be sanctioned but not like a violent felony,” The Wall Street Journal wrote in an editorial Monday. Sam Jordan, spokeswoman for the Tarrant County district attorney’s office, said the eight-year sentence was the jury’s decision. “Our prosecutors — one from the attorney general’s office and one from our office — made no punishment recommendation,” Jordan said. “We said do what you think is right. We didn’t ask specifically for penitentiary time.”

Texas: Voter ID law would have prevented 16,400 from voting in November | Austin American-Statesman

At least 16,400 Texans who voted in the November election wouldn’t have been able to cast ballots if the state’s voter identification law had been in full effect, state voting records show. Adopted in 2011 by a Republican-dominated Legislature, the law requiring voters to show one of seven forms of photo identification has been mired in a years-long legal battle, with opponents arguing that it disenfranchises groups that are less likely to carry identification, such as young people, elderly people and racial minorities. Proponents of the law have argued that the measure is necessary to protect the integrity of the vote. In July, a federal appeals court ruled that the law was discriminatory, and a month later U.S. District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos ordered the state to soften the ID requirements for the Nov. 8 election, greatly expanding the types of documentation voters could show to prove their identity. Voters using one of the newly approved documents had to sign statements explaining why they couldn’t obtain one of the seven types of ID originally required by the law.

Texas: Trump voter fraud claim was ‘800lb gorilla in jury box’ at Texas trial | The Guardian

A lawyer has said Donald Trump’s debunked claims of election rigging influenced the outcome of his client’s voter fraud trial, calling the US president’s comments “the 800lb gorilla” in the jury box. Rosa María Ortega, 37, a Mexican national, was jailed for eight years in Fort Worth, Texas, after being convicted of two felony counts of illegal voting over allegations that she improperly cast a ballot five times between 2005 and 2014. Her attorney, Clark Birdsall, said on Friday that Ortega was a permanent resident who was brought to the US as a baby and mistakenly thought she was eligible to vote. He said she voted Republican, including for the Texas attorney general, Ken Paxton, whose office helped prosecute her. Her sentence was tough: voter fraud convictions, which are rare, often result in probation. As a convicted felon, Ortega is likely to be deported after serving her sentence. Tarrant County prosecutors said jurors made clear they valued voting rights, but Birdsall said he believed Ortega would have fared better in a county with fewer “pro-Trump” attitudes.

Texas: Illegal Voting Gets Texas Woman 8 Years in Prison, and Certain Deportation | The New York Times

Despite repeated statements by Republican political leaders that American elections are rife with illegal voting, credible reports of fraud have been hard to find and convictions rarer still. That may help explain the unusually heavy penalty imposed on Rosa Maria Ortega, 37, a permanent resident and a mother of four who lives outside Dallas. On Thursday, a Fort Worth judge sentenced her to eight years in prison — and almost certainly deportation later — after she voted illegally in elections in 2012 and 2014. The sentence for Ms. Ortega, who was brought to this country by her mother as an infant, “shows how serious Texas is about keeping its elections secure,” Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general, said in a statement. Her lawyer called it an egregious overreaction, made to score political points, against someone who wrongly believed she was eligible to vote. “She has a sixth-grade education. She didn’t know she wasn’t legal,” said Ms. Ortega’s lawyer, Clark Birdsall, who once oversaw voter fraud prosecutions in neighboring Dallas County. “She can own property; she can serve in the military; she can get a job; she can pay taxes. But she can’t vote, and she didn’t know that.”

Texas: Citizens United lawyer targets Texas campaign finance laws | Associated Press

A case involving political “dark money” and the founder of an organization tied to President Donald Trump’s accusations of voter fraud could lead to a crush of anonymous cash infiltrating elections in the country’s second-largest state, a Democratic lawyer warned the Texas Supreme Court on Tuesday. The nine Republican justices on Texas’ highest civil court heard arguments involving the legality of the state’s ban on corporate contributions, disclosure requirements for political action committees and the question of when a politically active nonprofit should have to disclose its donors like a traditional PAC. Some believe that the case ultimately could wind up before the U.S. Supreme Court and potentially reshape campaign finance regulations nationwide.

Texas: Appeals court upholds judge’s order in Pasadena voting rights suit | Houston Chronicle

The Pasadena election system that a judge ruled violated the Voting Rights Act by discriminating against Hispanics cannot be used in the upcoming May council elections, a federal appeals court ruled Friday. The Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a ruling by a lower court judge ordering the city to revert to a 2011 system using all single-member districts for the May 6 elections, when the entire city council and the mayor’s seat are on the ballot. The expedited ruling – which came just two weeks before the deadline for candidates to file for office – is a blow to the city and its longtime mayor in a case being closely watched by voting rights advocates nationwide.

Texas: Trump could change Texas voter-ID law by reshaping 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals | McClatchy

During Barack Obama’s second term as president, Texas Sens. Ted Cruz and John Cornyn allowed vacancies on Texas’ federal appeals court to fester, but now that President Donald Trump is in charge they might move quickly to morph the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals into a breeding ground for conservative-leaning decisions. “The one thing Trump said he wanted Ted Cruz’s advice on was judges,” said Kelly Shackleford of the First Liberty Institute, a conservative legal defense organization that talked with Trump about judicial appointments. “You’ve got Cornyn, who was a (Texas state) Supreme Court justice, so you’ve got people who are really known for their expertise.” The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which comprises all of Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi, is generally considered one of the more conservative federal courts in the country, but it struck down Texas’ controversial voter-ID law last July. That might soon change with Trump in office.

Texas: Appeals court panel weighs Pasadena elections in voting rights case | Houston Chronicle

With May elections hanging in the balance, lawyers made their case before a three-judge appeals court panel in Houston Wednesday in an historic voting rights case that will determine how Pasadena elects its city council. The lawyers’ rapid-fire, back-and-forth discussion with the robed trio of judges perched above them drifted from esoteric — how do you properly measure voting power? — to downright gritty — was Pasadena’s mayor motivated by mounting racial tension when he brought a pistol to a city council meeting? The City of Pasadena asked for the expedited hearing before the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on a narrow issue – the structure of Pasadena’s City Council districts for the upcoming election.

Texas: House Speaker Straus calls for end to straight-ticket voting | Houston Chronicle

Texas House Speaker Joe Straus on Wednesday called on his fellow lawmakers to end straight-ticket voting. Straus, R-San Antonio, issued the call in a news release following a speech in which Texas State Supreme Court Chief Justice Nathan Hecht said Texas should end the option for judicial elections. “I agree with Chief Justice Hecht that we should end straight ticket voting in judicial elections, but we shouldn’t stop there,” said Straus, noting that 40 other states do not have the option in any elections.

Texas: U.S. Supreme Court rejects Texas appeal over voter ID law | Reuters

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear an appeal by Texas seeking to revive the state’s strict Republican-backed voter-identification requirements that a lower court found had a discriminatory effect on black and Hispanic people. The justices let stand a July 2016 decision by the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that found that the 2011 Texas statute ran afoul of a federal law that bars racial discrimination in elections and directed a lower court to find a way to fix the law’s discriminatory effects against minorities. There were no noted dissents from the high court’s decision not to hear the case from any of the eight justices, but Chief Justice John Roberts took the unusual step of issuing a statement explaining why the case was not taken up, noting that litigation on the matter is continuing in lower courts. Roberts said that although there was “no barrier to our review,” all the legal issues can be raised on appeal at a later time.

Texas: Pasadena voting rights case heads to appeals court Feb. 1 | Houston Chronicle

With deadlines looming for the upcoming May elections, a federal appeals court has agreed to hear arguments Feb. 1 in a voting rights lawsuit that overturned the Pasadena election system. The Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will consider whether to temporarily halt the order from the Houston judge until after the appeals are exhausted. But that would leave in place an election system that has been found discriminatory against Latinos. The Fifth Circuit court set an expedited hearing at the Bob Casey Courthouse in Houston for lawyers to present argument as to why the city should or should not proceed with its May elections for city council positions using a 2011 map of eight single-member district seats as directed by a federal judge in Houston.

Texas: Did Texas Lawmakers Deliberately Pass a Racist Voter ID Law? | San Antonio Current

This week the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear Texas’ appeal to save its embattled voter ID law, which lower courts have said carries an “impermissible discriminatory effect against Hispanics and African Americans” and blocked from going into effect last year. That means the battle over voter ID in Texas now heads back to a federal court in Corpus Christi, where lawyers for the state, civil rights groups, and the U.S. Department of Justice will argue whether or not Texas lawmakers knew they were passing a racist law. On that point (lawmakers’ so-called “legislative intent”), U.S. District Judge Nelva Ramos was surprisingly blunt in her October 2014 ruling following a trial over the law, known as SB 14. The bill, which established strict requirements for what ID you must have to vote in Texas, included things like a driver’s license or a passport or a concealed handgun license but it left out things like student IDs.

Texas: Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Texas on Voter ID Case | The New York Times

The Supreme Court rejected on Monday an appeal from Texas officials seeking to restore the state’s strict voter ID law. As is the court’s custom, its brief order in the case, Abbott v. Veasey, No. 16-393, gave no reasons for turning down the appeal. But Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. issued an unusual statement explaining that the Supreme Court remains free to consider the case after further proceedings in the lower courts. The Texas law, enacted in 2011, requires voters seeking to cast their ballots at the polls to present photo identification, like a Texas driver’s or gun license, a military ID or a passport. Federal courts have repeatedly ruled that the law is racially discriminatory. The Texas law was at first blocked under Section 5 of the federal Voting Rights Act, which required some states and localities with a history of discrimination to obtain federal permission before changing voting procedures. After the Supreme Court effectively struck down Section 5 in 2013 in Shelby County v. Holder, an Alabama case, Texas officials announced that they would start enforcing the ID law.

Texas: SB 14 gets second chance: With Trump in office, feds may alter course in Texas Voter ID case | Salon

Hours after President Donald Trump was inaugurated, the Department of Justice filed to postpone a hearing on the Texas Voter ID law. The request was granted. The DOJ had previously argued that the law intentionally discriminated against minority voters, but told the court it needed additional time for the new administration to “brief the new leadership of the Department on this case and the issues to be addressed at that hearing before making any representations to the Court.” Chad Dunn, attorney for the plaintiffs in the case, expects Trump’s Department of Justice to reverse course. “I figure the government will spend the next 30 days figuring out how to change its mind,” he said, adding that now he expects the DOJ to argue on behalf of the state of Texas, which has held that there was no intent to discriminate against minorities. “The facts did not change — just the personnel.” The new hearing date has been set for Feb. 28.

Texas: Court grants request to delay Texas voter ID hearing | San Antonio Express-News

Within hours of Donald Trump being sworn in as president Friday, a federal court in Corpus Christi postponed a scheduled hearing in the Texas voter ID case until next month at the request of the Justice Department. Lawyers for the department asked for a delay in the hearing scheduled for Tuesday, citing the change in presidential administrations.“Because of the change in administration, the Department of Justice also experienced a transition in leadership,” the department’s petition states. “The United States requires additional time to brief the new leadership of the department on this case and the issues to be addressed at that hearing before making any representations to the court.”In the past, the agency has asked that hearings in the case be expedited because of the issues involved.

Texas: Voting rights case unsettles Pasadena as elections loom | Houston Chronicle

On the surface, at least, Pasadena’s City Hall was a happy place Tuesday evening as elected officials, city employees and residents filed in for a City Council meeting. Handshakes, hugs and small talk created a glow of bonhomie as everyone waited for the show to start. Yet a shadow hung over this sunny facade. These are troubled days for Harris County’s second-largest city as it absorbs the effects of ongoing voting rights litigation and prepares for a municipal election in May amid continued uncertainty about what the electoral map will look like. A blistering opinion by a federal judge, after a trial that drew national attention, depicted Pasadena as a place where public officials used taxpayer-funded time and resources in a relentless campaign to weaken Latino political influence; where Anglos enjoy superior public services; where residents referred to a Latino candidate seeking their votes as a “wetback;” and where another candidate felt obliged to conceal his Hispanic ethnicity to get elected.

Texas: Federal judge denies delay in Pasadena voting rights order | Houston Chronicle

Hours after candidates began filing paperwork to run for city office, a federal judge Wednesday denied a request by Pasadena officials to delay her order that the city election be run under an 2011 election scheme to protect the rights of Latino voters. Chief U.S. District Judge Lee H. Rosenthal in Houston said Pasadena should conduct its upcoming May elections based on eight single-member districts, throwing out the six single-member and two at-large districts that the judge ruled had diluted the clout of Hispanics.

Texas: Pasadena back under federal oversight through 2023 for Latino voting rights violations | Houston Chronicle

A judge Monday ordered federal oversight of the city of Pasadena’s election system for the next 6½ years, the latest development in a landmark voting rights case that has highlighted contentious racial politics in the blue-collar suburb and beyond. In a final judgment issued Monday, Chief U.S. District Judge Lee H. Rosenthal said the court would keep jurisdiction over Pasadena until June 30, 2023, to ensure “the city cannot immediately return to a map and plan that thwarts Latinos on the cusp of an electoral majority.” The ruling – issued on a federal holiday recognizing the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr., whose civil rights crusade led to the Voting Rights Act of 1965 – said the city must seek “preclearance” from the U.S. attorney general or from the court before changing its election system.

Texas: In Texas, a Test of Whether the Voting Rights Act Still Has Teeth | The New York Times

Within days of the Supreme Court striking down the heart of the Voting Rights Act in June 2013, the mayor of this working-class industrial city set in motion a contentious change to the local election system that critics said was aimed at protecting white control of the City Council in the face of rapid growth in the city’s Hispanic population. It set off a furor, which was only inflamed when at a subsequent redistricting hearing, the mayor, Johnny Isbell, brought a gun. At another meeting, he ordered police officers to remove a council member for violating a three-minute speaking limit. Asked by SCOTUSblog why he was pursuing the change, Mr. Isbell replied, “Because the Justice Department can no longer tell us what to do.” But just after the new year, a federal judge ordered the Justice Department to do precisely that — making Pasadena the first municipality in the country ordered by a court to submit, against its wishes, to federal approval of its electoral system since the Supreme Court’s 2013 decision.

Texas: With Deadline Looming, Pasadena Considers Whether To Appeal Voting Rights Verdict | Houston Public Media

City officials in Pasadena are pondering their options, now that a federal judge has ruled that the city’s method of electing local officials is unconstitutional. U.S. District Judge Lee Rosenthal ruled late last week that the system discriminates against Latino residents. Up to 2013, Pasadena city council members were all chosen by single-member districts, drawn along geographic lines. Latino-backed candidates held four out of eight seats, and looked close to winning a fifth. Then the Supreme Court struck down portions of the Voting Rights Act. Within weeks, Pasadena Mayor Johnny Isbell began promoting a plan to switch to a mix of single-member districts and at-large seats.

Texas: Federal Judge Rules Pasadena Infringed On Latino Voting Rights, Orders Changes | Associated Press

A federal judge ruled late Friday that the the City of Pasadena promoted and implemented a voting plan intended to dilute Latino power at the polls. In a 113-page ruling (a link is below), U.S. District Judge Lee Rosenthal ordered city officials to revert to an eight-single-member City Council voting plan used before 2014. That was the year voters narrowly approved a plan that elected six members from districts and two at large. … Aside from restoring the previous voting plan, Rosenthal also said she will supervise the 2017 municipal elections in May and watch for any efforts to suppress Latino voting rights. The judge also ordered Pasadena to submit any future changes in its voting plan to the U.S. Justice Department for civil rights pre-clearance. One month after the Supreme Court issued its ruling in Shelby County v. Holder, Pasadena Mayor Johnny Isbell proposed changing the council’s structure to a mix of six single-member district seats and two at-large seats.

Texas: Attorney General: Voter ID education documents can be withheld from public | San Antonio Express-News

Details of how Texas spent a big chunk of $2.5 million of taxpayer money for a voter ID education campaign during last November’s election will remain secret. Attorney General Ken Paxton’s Office has ruled that the Texas secretary of state’s office can withhold records from the public showing where the state bought television and radio ads to promote court-ordered changes to a controversial voter ID law. The ruling also allows for the names of an estimated 1,800 community groups that partnered with the state on the education campaign to remain hidden from public view. A voter ID lawsuit has been winding through the courts since 2013, and the U.S. Supreme Court could decide as soon as this week whether it will hear an appeal from Texas. The law was weakened for the November election by a federal judge, who also ordered the state to conduct a robust education effort, after it was found to discriminate against minorities.

Texas: Federal judge: Pasadena deliberately worked to reduce voting clout of Latinos | Houston Chronicle

A federal judge in Houston dealt a major blow Friday to the City of Pasadena in a closely watched voting rights case, ruling that officials deliberately diluted the clout of Hispanic voters by revising the system for electing City Council members. Chief U.S. District Judge Lee H. Rosenthal ordered Pasadena to revert to its previous use of single-member districts for the upcoming May elections and ruled the city would need pre-clearance from the Department of Justice for any future changes. “In Pasadena, Texas, Latino voters … do not have the same right to vote as their Anglo neighbors,” Rosenthal concluded in the 113-page decision released late Friday. Patricia Gonzales, one of the plaintiffs who filed the federal lawsuit, said fairness can be restored to the city election system. “All right,” she said, when informed of the ruling. “Now each section will be able to vote on who they want and their voices will be heard. I’m very pleased with the outcome.”

Texas: Dithering federal judges asked to rule on Texas political maps | The Texas Tribune

Whether they meant to or not, the three federal judges overseeing the state’s redistricting litigation have already decided the maps are legal enough for three general elections. But they have never finally resolved all of the challenges initially made to Texas’ political maps back in May 2011, when lawyers who believe the maps are discriminatory and unfair went to court seeking a remedy. That’s what the courts are for, after all — to protect one party from harming another party. Or maybe that’s to protect one political party from harming another political party. The three-judge panel in charge of the case appears to be stuck; they have not acted since a hearing in 2014. And now that another election has passed, those lawyers ended 2016 with a new plea, asking the judges to wrap up their work by mid-month. In their filing last week, the lawyers wrote that they hope to get a ruling in time to finish this court fight before another federal census is done and another set of maps has been drawn by a Legislature that might have been elected using unfair political lines.