Texas: Voter ID Law Ruled Biased Against Blacks, Latinos | Bloomberg

Texas can’t enforce what would be the strictest voter photo-identification law in the U.S. after a judge ruled its purported goal of preventing voter fraud doesn’t outweigh the discriminatory effect on poor blacks and Latinos. U.S. District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos in Corpus Christi, a 2011 appointee of Democratic President Barack Obama, threw out the measure, agreeing with the Justice Department and minority-rights activists that evidence of in-person fraud was negligible and that the law was imposed with an “unconstitutional discriminatory purpose. The draconian voting requirements imposed by SB 14 will disproportionately impact low-income Texans because they are less likely to own or need one of the seven qualified IDs to navigate their lives,” Ramos wrote in yesterday’s ruling.

Texas: Is the voter ID case on a fast-track to the Supreme Court? | Austin American-Statesman

Texas’ voter identification law, which was the focus of a federal trial that concluded Monday in Corpus Christi, could be on a fast-track to the U.S. Supreme Court before Election Day in November. U.S. District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos, a Democrat who was appointed to the post in 2011 by President Barack Obama, is expected to strike down the law, according to election law experts. The state would then appeal to the conservative 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The plaintiffs, which include the U.S. Department of Justice, likely would lose that round and could ask for emergency relief from the Supreme Court — all possibly within the next six weeks. It’s a scenario laid out by Richard Hasen, a professor at the law school at the University of California at Irvine, who has been closely following the Texas case.

Texas: Criminal Appeals Court Judge Files Suit Over Voter ID | The Texas Tribune

While a federal judge in Corpus Christi mulls whether the state's requirement to show photo ID to cast a ballot violates the federal Voting Rights Act, a judge on the highest criminal appeals court in Texas is taking another approach: He's suing the state over its relatively new voter ID law. Judge Lawrence "Larry" Meyers' lawsuit, filed in Dallas County, claims the voting law enacted last year violates the Texas Constitution because it attempts to "prevent" voter fraud, something he says the state's governing charter never intended.  Meyers' lawsuit states that "the Texas Constitution gives the Texas Legislature power solely to 'detect and punish' election fraud when it has already occurred." In an interview on Wednesday, Meyers said the Constitution says nothing about preventing election fraud.  "It's legally unconstitutional and it's an affront to every voter in the state of Texas," Meyers said.

Texas: Federal judge takes on Texas voter ID law at heart of discrimination debate | The Guardian

The fate of Texas’ tough voter ID law moved into the hands of a federal judge this week, following a trial that the US Justice Department said exposed another chapter in the state’s troubling history of discrimination in elections. State attorneys defending the law signed by Republican Governor Rick Perry in 2011 urged the judge to follow other courts by upholding photo identification requirements. The most recent such case came this month when a federal appeals panel reinstated Wisconsin’s law in time for Election Day. Whether Texas will also get a ruling before then is unclear. US district judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos ended the two-week trial in Corpus Christi on Monday without signaling when she’ll make a decision, meaning that as of now, an estimated 13.6 million registered Texas voters will need a photo ID to cast a ballot in November.

Texas: Plaintiffs Claim Bias During Closing Argument Against Texas Voter ID Law | New York Times

A law requiring Texas voters to show government-issued identification before casting a ballot is the latest example of the state’s long history of discrimination against minorities and puts unjustified burdens on the right to vote for more than half a million Texans, lawyers challenging the law told a federal judge here on Monday. The Justice Department, joined by several black and Hispanic voters, elected officials and advocacy groups, sued Texas in federal court over the state’s voter-identification law, asking a judge to overturn it and arguing that it discriminates against minority voters. Texas officials said the law was necessary to prevent voter fraud and have denied that it discriminates, arguing that the five elections Texas has held using the law’s requirements had yielded few reports of people being unable to produce the types of ID needed to vote.

Texas: Fate of Texas’ tough voter ID law in judge’s hands | Associated Press

The fate of Texas’ tough voter ID law moved into the hands of a federal judge Monday, following a trial that the U.S. Justice Department said exposed another chapter in the state’s troubling history of discrimination in elections. State attorneys defending the law signed by Republican Gov. Rick Perry in 2011 urged the judge to follow other courts by upholding photo identification requirements. The most recent such case came this month when a federal appeals panel reinstated Wisconsin’s law in time for Election Day. Whether Texas will also get a ruling before then is unclear. U.S. District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos ended the two-week trial in Corpus Christi without signaling when she’ll make a decision, meaning that as of now, an estimated 13.6 million registered Texas voters will need a photo ID to cast a ballot in November.

Texas: Justice Department, state clash over Texas voter ID law | San Antonio Express-News

Lawyers for the U.S Department of Justice and minority groups once again made the case that Texas' controversial Voter ID law improperly discriminates against Latino and African American voters during closing arguments in federal court Monday. Attorneys for the Texas attorney general will present closing arguments later Monday. The closing arguments are scheduled to last three hours and are expected to end later Monday. The state has argued the law is constitutional, popular and essential to combat voter fraud. However, cases of in-person voter fraud, which a law like this would help prevent, are rare. Plaintiffs' attorneys have argued that the voter fraud concerns are simply a rouse to impose new requirements that make it harder for minority voters to cast their ballots. The Voter ID law is a “serious problem in search of a solution,” said Richard Dellheim, an attorney with the Justice Department. “That problem is that it violates the Voting Rights Act.”

Texas: Wichita County Commissioners Approve New Election Equipment | Texoma

Wichita County Commissioners are saying yes to the purchase of new election equipment, and for a high price. The commissioners voted to spend $1 million dollars on the equipment, which will include 210 new voting machines. This comes after county officials learned last month the new election equipment system would operate on more current Windows operating systems. While it comes at a high price, commissioners feel the county needs that equipment before election season. Wichita County has used it's current election equipment, by the company Election Systems and Software for 10 years. This system operates on Windows XP and Microsoft no longer provides security updates for that operating system, which is why commissioners have decided the county needs a change. "The security could be compromised. It's not as secure, there's not security patches being put into it. And it's on the internet, so we had had some vulnerability to it, and it didn't work very well for us," Judge Woody Gossom says.

Texas: Abbott defends Texas voter ID law | Houston Chronicle

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott insisted on Thursday that the state's voter ID law has not adversely affected turnout, a day before testimony in a federal court case challenging the legislation is slated to end. "There is absolutely zero proof, zero proof, that there is any suppression of the vote whatsoever because of voter ID laws," Abbott, the favorite to win November's gubernatorial race, told the Houston Chronicle's editorial board. The 2011 law, which took effect the following year, requires voters to show one of seven kinds of photo ID in order to vote, with or without a voter registration card. It was initially blocked after a federal court ruled that it discriminated against minorities.

Texas: Democrats ask for federal probe of AG raid that targeted voter sign-up group | Dallas Morning News

Democratic congressmen from Texas have asked the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate a raid by Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott’s office that targeted a nonprofit voter registration group. The Dallas Morning News reported Aug. 31 on the attorney general’s criminal investigation of Houston Votes, which was accused of election fraud. The probe was closed one year later, with no charges filed. Following the armed raid in 2010, the funding for Houston Votes dried up. Its efforts to register more low-income voters in the state’s most populous county, Harris, ended. The group’s records and office equipment were destroyed under a court order obtained by Abbott’s office last year. In a Sept. 10 letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, the 12 Democratic House members from Texas asked the Justice Department to open an investigation into the matter. “This raid raises serious concerns about the biased use of state resources to prevent Texans from legally registering to vote,” the letter said. Texas has 36 House districts, with Republicans holding 24 seats. A Justice Department spokeswoman said the investigation request is being reviewed.

Texas: State presents case in federal trial over voter ID law | American-Statesman

Lawyers from the Texas attorney general’s office presented witnesses Wednesday in federal court defending the state voter ID law as necessary and attempting to rebuff claims that it is discriminatory. The state’s case in the federal trial, now in its second week, relies in part on the written testimony, read in court, of Republican state legislators. On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos heard testimony from state Sens. Troy Fraser, R-Horseshoe Bay, and Dan Patrick, R-Houston, the Republican candidate for lieutenant governor, who said that the voter ID law had the support of the vast majority of people across that state. Lawyers from Attorney General Greg Abbott’s office are expected to read testimony from more lawmakers Thursday, including from Texas House Speaker Joe Straus. The law was passed in 2011 and has been in effect since last year. Also Wednesday, witnesses for the state and plaintiffs’ lawyers — representing the U.S. Justice Department, as well as several civil rights groups — sparred over the voter ID law and its effects.

Texas: Data discrepancy delays voter ID trial | Corpus Christi Caller-Times

The State of Texas' legal team still plans to wrap up its defense of the voter ID law in federal court Thursday, but it will be a while before the two sides make their final pleas to the judge. Closing arguments were delayed Wednesday after a data discrepancy was discovered this week. Originally slated for Thursday, the closing arguments are rescheduled for Sept. 22 so some experts who provided reports for the trial can reanalyze their data. The trial is over Senate Bill 14, a law passed by the Legislature and signed by Gov. Rick Perry in 2011 that requires Texans to show certain forms of state or federal photo identification before casting a ballot. Opponents say it forces an undue burden on minority and low-income voters, and supporters say requiring photo ID is already commonplace in American society. The data issue comes from a category of about 183,000 voters in the Texas voter registration database who have surrendered their driver's licenses. The opponents' experts counted those individuals as lacking a license, and therefore unable to vote if they don't possess one of the other forms of approved identification.

Texas: Voter ID law’s fate could hang on details | MSNBC

Democracy. Equality. Racial justice. The struggle for voting rights has long been about concepts that go to the heart of the American ideal. But in a sleepy federal courtroom here on the Gulf Coast, access to the ballot for hundreds of thousands of Texans could turn on some far less high-blown concepts: bus schedules, identification cards – and dollars and cents. As the challengers to Texas’s strict voter ID law prepared to rest their case, they presented more evidence Monday in support of the key claims they laid out last week: that a massive number of Texans lack an ID that complies with the law; that blacks and Hispanics are more likely than whites to lack ID; and that getting an ID can be onerous, especially for the poor. The plaintiffs – represented by a team of over a dozen lawyers from the U.S. Justice Department, civil and voting rights groups, and private law firms – will wrap up Tuesday. The case is one of several currently underway that could have major implications both for access to the ballot this fall, and for the the ongoing state of the law protecting the right to vote. Wisconsin’s and Arkansas’s voter ID laws, Ohio’s cuts to early voting, and North Carolina’s sweeping voting law are all being challenged in court.

Texas: Legal challenge of Texas voter ID law kicks off in federal court | Scripps Media

A challenge of the Texas voter ID kicked off in federal court Tuesday in Corpus Christi with opening statements and a first round of evidentiary testimony. The trial comes about two months before the November midterm elections, and opponents of the voter photo ID law are hoping for a quick resolution so the higher standard of voter identification is thrown out before election day. “We’ve made it no secret that this case is important and needs to be ruled on before the next election,” Chad Dunn, an attorney for the plaintiffs opposing the bill, told the Caller-Times after the first day of hearings. “Evidence out there shows that hundreds of thousands in this state don’t have the photo ID they need.”

Texas: In Texas voter ID trial, witnesses describe burden of getting ID | MSNBC

Sammie Louise Bates moved to Texas from Illinois in 2011. She wanted to vote last year, but all she had was an Illinois identification card, and under Texas’s strict voter ID law, that wasn’t acceptable. To get a Texas ID, Bates needed a birth certificate from her native Mississippi, which cost $42. That was money that Bates, whose income is around $321 a month, didn’t have. “I had to put $42 where it would do the most good,” Bates, who is African-American, testified Tuesday, the first day of the trial over Texas’s ID law. “We couldn’t eat the birth certificate.” Another witness, Calvin Carrier, described the difficulties his father, a Korean War veteran, had in obtaining an acceptable ID, thanks to errors on his birth certificate. Myrna Perez, the deputy director of the Brennan Center for Justice, whose lawyers are among those arguing the case for the plaintiffs, said those witnesses were there to show that “there are real people out there who don’t have the ID that’s needed. When you are limited income, it can be very challenging to scrape up the money that you need for the underlying ID, and it requires a tremendous amount of hoops to go through.”

Texas: Testimony Begins in Trial Over Texas Voter ID Law | The Texas Tribune

The U.S. Department of Justice and other plaintiff's attorneys began their challenge Tuesday in federal court to Texas’ stringent voter ID law, the first national test of such laws that have surfaced following a Supreme Court ruling that cleared the way for such measures. Six plaintiff’s attorneys made opening statements in the case, arguing that the law is designed to neutralize the voting power of Texas’ growing minority population. Lawyers from the Texas attorney general’s office countered that the plaintiffs have offered no proof that minority voters were being unfairly edged out of the voting process and that the law helps stamp out fraud. The trial over the law, which has been enforced through two elections since 2013, is expected to last two weeks before U.S. District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos makes a decision. Elizabeth Westfall of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, the first plaintiff’s attorney to make an opening statement, said that 787,000 Texas voters do not have acceptable photo identification to vote now. “And Hispanics and African-Americans make up a disproportionate share,” she added.

Texas: Texas voter ID trial opens in U.S. court | Reuters

A U.S. court in Texas heard arguments on Tuesday in a case over a law requiring voters to present photo identification, a move the state's Republican leaders say will prevent fraud while plaintiffs call it an attempt at suppressing minority turnout. The case is also part of a new strategy by the Obama administration to challenge voting laws it says discriminate by race in order to counter a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June that freed states from strict federal oversight. The trial that started on Tuesday at the U.S. District Court in Corpus Christi stems from a battle over stringent voter ID measures signed into law by Texas Governor Rick Perry, a Republican, in 2011. The law requires voters to present a photo ID such as a concealed handgun license or driver's license, but it excludes student IDs as invalid. Plaintiffs argued in opening arguments the law will hit the elderly and poorer voters including racial minorities the hardest because they are less likely to have such IDs.

Texas: Two Sides Cite Discrimination as Battle on Texas Voting Law Heads to Court | New York Times

Minority groups and Democrats in Texas have loudly opposed a state law requiring voters to show government-issued photo identification before casting their ballots. But one of the law’s biggest critics can be found not in Texas but in Washington — Eric H. Holder Jr., the United States attorney general. On Tuesday, in a federal courtroom in Corpus Christi, Tex., Justice Department lawyers will try to persuade a judge to strike down the voter ID law, the latest skirmish in a three-year legal battle over whether the law passed by the Republican-led Legislature in 2011 discriminates against blacks and Hispanics. If Texas loses the trial — which opens Tuesday and will last about two weeks — it could again be required to seek federal approval before making changes to its voting procedures, a level of oversight it was freed from by the United States Supreme Court.

Texas: Voter ID Law Goes To Trial : It’s All Politics | NPR

Dozens of lawyers will gather in a federal courtroom in Corpus Christi, Texas, on Tuesday for the start of a new challenge to the state's controversial voter ID law. The trial is expected to last two to three weeks, but it's unlikely to be the end of what's already been a long, convoluted journey for the Texas law — and many others like it. First, some background: Texas' Republican-controlled Legislature passed new photo ID requirements for voters back in 2011. Supporters said the law was needed to prevent voter fraud, although opponents noted that there was little evidence of such fraud at the polls. At the time, the state was covered by Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, which meant it needed federal approval for the law to go into effect, because the state had a history of discrimination against minority voters. The case ended up before a three-judge federal court in Washington, D.C., which in 2012 ruled against the state. It said Texas could not impose the new ID requirement, because the state was unable to show that it would not discriminate against blacks and Latinos. Under Section 5, the burden of proof was on the state to show that the law was nondiscriminatory.

Texas: Critics question Abbott’s 2010 Houston voter raid | Associated Press

A previously unreported 2010 state raid of a Houston effort to register low-income voters is raising concerns from critics that the Republican favorite to become the next governor of Texas used his post to suppress voter registration efforts that could favor Democrats. In 2010, armed investigators dispatched by the office of Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott and suspecting election fraud raided the headquarters of a voter registration group called Houston Votes. A year later, the investigation was closed with no charges filed. But Houston Votes never recovered, the Dallas Morning News reported Sunday. Fred Lewis, president of Texans Together, the nonprofit parent group of Houston Votes, said the raid was over the top: “They could have used a subpoena. They could have called us and asked for the records. They didn’t need guns.” Now running for governor, Abbott declined to comment on the case. But his aides said the raid was part of an effort to preserve the integrity of Texas elections.

Texas: Houstonians Without Voter ID Are Mostly Black and Poor | Houston Press

Texas' Voter ID law -- which requires that voters show election officials an approved and up-to-date photo ID in order to cast a ballot -- has long been a point of contention. Since the Lege passed a voter ID requirement in 2011, many of its opponents have questioned whether the law unfairly singles out minorities. While a legal challenge kept Texas' law from taking effect in time for the 2012 election, the landmark US Supreme Court decision in Shelby v. Holder last year invalidated a key provision of the Voting Rights Act, paving the way for Texas to implement its brand new(ish) voter ID law in time for the November 2014 general election. Another lawsuit filed last year in federal court that challenges the law is set to go to trial in Corpus Christi next week. If the state prevails, November 2014 could be Texas' first high-turnout election with a voter ID requirement. … The problem with this equation? Well, opponents of the law say that if you're a poor minority, chances are you're less likely to have an acceptable photo ID, which means you're less likely to vote. Don't believe us? Check out these handy maps assembled by Dr. Gerald Webster, a geography professor who filed the maps in court this summer.

Texas: Hidalgo council candidates drop election contest | Brownsville Herald

An election contest from losing candidates of the Hidalgo City Council election will end quietly after investigators found no evidence of abuse in county voting machines, a plaintiff said this week. The contest, from former mayoral candidate Guillermo Ramirez and council contenders Guillermo Cienfuegos Jr. and Mario Degollado, centered around the same argument as contests filed in the Hidalgo County Democratic primaries — that someone had tampered with voting machines.

Texas: No Attorney Fees for Challengers in Texas Voter ID Case | Legal Times

Texas won’t have to pay more than $300,000 in attorney fees to a group that challenged the state's voter identification law in court, a federal judge in Washington ruled on Monday. The ruling came several weeks after the same judge, U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer, ordered Texas to pay $1 million in fees to groups that challenged the state’s redistricting plans. The two cases raised similar issues, Collyer said in Monday’s decision, but different facts led to the different outcome. Texas sought approval of its voter ID law from the U.S. Department of Justice, a process known as “preclearance.” Under a section of the federal Voting Rights Act, Texas was one of a number of jurisdictions required to get permission from a federal court or the Justice Department before making changes to election procedures.

Texas: DA: No evidence of voter fraud in Hidalgo County forensic audit | The Monitor

The results of a forensic audit ordered monhs ago to validate the results of the March 4 Democratic primary showed no sign of malfunction or malfeasance, Hidalgo County District Attorney Rene Guerra said Tuesday. "Nothing," Guerra said, when asked what the report showed. An election contest based on the possibility the machines were tampered with is scheduled for trial Wednesday afternoon. Guerra said the report will likely lead to the plaintiffs dropping the case. "If you don’t got nothing, nothing’s going to happen," he said.

Texas: Redistricting opponents head back to court to debate Texas map | Lubbock Avalanche-Journal

It is rare for a court to work on Saturdays or even late at night. But that is what the federal tribunal refereeing the three-year Texas redistricting fight did in mid-July. The San Antonio-based court worked six consecutive days and in one of those sessions it heard testimony from witnesses until 9 p.m., according to people who stayed until closing time. “We’re going to be here a while,” state Rep. Garnet Coleman, D-Houston, one of more than 50 witnesses, said before testifying late that afternoon. “This court means business.” The same three-judge panel was back on Monday. After hearing the arguments on the constitutionality of the Texas House map the Republican-dominated Legislature approved in the 2011 session, the court will now focus on the legality of the congressional map the lawmakers approved during the same session.

Texas: Students Challenge Texas Voter ID Law in Court | TIME

Students in Texas have a question for their state lawmakers: Why us? In September, they’ll get to pose that question in court. Over the last year, laws that advocates say place unnecessary burdens on voters have advanced across the country. But a law in Texas is causing a particular stir due to its potential to place the harshest burdens on the youngest voters. A lawsuit challenging it that was filed last year goes to trial Sept. 2. “We work to engage people—young people—in this process,” said Christina Sanders, state director of the Texas League of Young Voters, which is among the plaintiffs in an upcoming voter identification case in the state. “The hurdles these laws create makes it more difficult for us to engage.” “More than cases of apathy, it becomes a case of disenfranchisement,” she added.

Texas: Fight Resumes Over Maps That Curb Latino Power | Bloomberg

Texas and voting-rights activists supported by the U.S. government are set to resume a three-year battle over claims that Republican lawmakers intentionally drew Congressional districts to curb the political power of the state’s growing Latino population. Texas seeks to convince a three-judge federal panel today in San Antonio that its voter maps were designed to improve re-election chances for Republican incumbents and weaken Democratic opponents, not dilute minority voting strength. “Partisan gerrymandering” is legal, the state says. The federal government and civil-rights activists say the state is making a distinction without a difference because minorities tend to vote for Democrats in Texas. “Partisanship is not a defense to intentional vote dilution,” Bryan Sells, a lawyer with the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, told the San Antonio judges last month.

Texas: Taxpayers’ tab for redistricting battle nears $4 million | Houston Chronicle

Texans are on the hook for $3.9 million in costs for Attorney General Greg Abbott to fight for Republican-championed redistricting maps, and that number will only grow as a years-long legal fight continues Monday in federal court in San Antonio. A big tally is expected in complicated redistricting litigation, experts say, particularly with the Abbott legal team's aggressive defense of the congressional and legislative maps approved by the GOP-majority Legislature. "Abbott's attitude has been very much 'I'm going to litigate this to the ends of the earth,'" said Michael Li, redistricting counsel at the Brennan Center at New York University School of Law. Abbott's staff said he simply is doing his job as the state's top lawyer and that the responsibility for the costs lies with those who have challenged the maps. Democrats said Abbott is using taxpayer funds as an ATM to defend discriminatory maps. Minority and civil rights groups, including the League of United Latin American Citizens, Mexican American Legislative Caucus and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, originally mounted the redistricting challenges in 2011.

Texas: Democrats look to get in front of voter ID issue | Houston Chronicle

Texas Democrats are renewing their opposition to the state's voter-identification law, rolling out a program to educate voters ahead of a decisive few months that could see the controversial statute become a top issue in the governor's race. The law is considered one of the toughest of its kind in the country, requiring voters to show one of a few types of identification cards at the polls. Those whose actual names do not match the names on their IDs must sign an affidavit attesting to their identities. The gubernatorial campaign of state Sen. Wendy Davis, Battleground Texas and the Texas Democratic Party on Wednesday announced a "voter protection" program to tackle the issue by dispatching more than 8,000 volunteers to help with voter registration and making sure voters know what the law requires.

Texas: Travis County Developing Electronic Voting System With a Paper Trail | Government Technology

Imagine casting your vote on an everyday touch-screen tablet that prints out a paper copy of your ballot, as well as a take-home receipt you can use to verify it was counted. Such a system could be in place at Travis County polls as early as 2017. For the past three years, the county and a group of experts have been designing the specifications for new voting software that would rein in costs while providing what critics of electronic machines have long requested: a verifiable paper trail. “You can never win the argument over black box voting,” said Travis County Clerk Dana DeBeauvoir. Under the system being developed, a voter would use a device — likely a tablet — to fill out an electronic ballot and then print out a paper copy for voters to check. The electronic ballot wouldn’t be tallied unless the voter deposited the paper copy into a ballot box that scans a serial number printed on it. The voter would also receive a receipt with a code that can be entered online to confirm the ballot was counted.