What’s Happening:
This month, Texas was the first state to go to the polls. On March 1, Texans voted in primary elections that would determine their parties’ candidates for the November midterms. It was also the very first election being held after the passage of a major election integrity bill.
You might remember, Texas Democrats fled the state to stop this bill from being passed last year.
It looks like certain parts of this bill have already bared results. Apparently, one Texas county failed to count 10,000 ballots. In the past, this might not have come to light until it was much too late. But this was discovered quickly enough to have an impact.
And impact it did have, because the county election administrator got the ax.
From Gazette:
The election administrator for Harris County, Texas, announced Tuesday that she is stepping from her post following a slew of primary day problems, including the discovery of 10,000 mail-in ballots that went uncounted…
The Harris County Republican Party is additionally suing the county for several alleged violations of the Texas election code. Longoria is also being sued by the state GOP for an alleged breach of contract.
An election is only as fair as the people overseeing it. We’ve seen in recent years how election officials can either protect an election’s integrity or let “irregularities” taint the whole process. And in Harris County, Texas, it appears their election administrator dropped the ball in a big way. Somehow, 10,000 mail-in ballots were not counted. That is more than enough ballots to sway a close race. So, this administrator resigned in disgrace.
You have to wonder just how so many ballots were missed. The new election law requires signature verification for mail-in ballots, ensuring they are properly verified and counted. Yet a large number of ballots were neglected. The real question is, was this just a glaring error or intentional? Longoria is resigning, but that certainly doesn’t get her off the hook.
The state and county chapters of the GOP are suing. They are most likely demanding answers to this very question. How were 10,000 ballots ignored, after the fiasco that was the 2020 Election?
Believe it or not, two races that were largely affected by this problem were Democratic races. Officials from both parties signed a document affirming the problem. It seems that now, even liberals are waking up to the need for strong election integrity. Although this looks like a crisis, this shows the new law is working, since it caught this problem and set out ways to fix it.
Key Takeaways:
- A Texas election administrator is stepping down after the March primaries.
- Harris County is under scrutiny after 10,000 mail-in ballots were counted.
- The missing ballots affected two Democratic races.
Source: Gazette
