The American Democracy Minute Radio Report & Podcast for April 7, 2023
Today’s Links
Articles & Resources
Democracy Docket – Texas Senate Committee Advances Several Anti-Voting Bills
Texas Legislature – SB 990
Texas Tribune – Many Texans’ votes are lost when they go to the wrong polling place. Counties see countywide vote centers as an answer.
Texas Legislature – SB 1039
Houston Public Media – GOP claims of Election Day mismanagement, fraud don’t explain Democrats’ 2022 sweep of Harris County
Texas Legislature – SB 1070
Texas Legislature – SB 260
Dallas Morning News/Tyler Tribune – Skipping elections could put Texas voters at risk of being purged from rolls under bill
Groups Taking Action:
LULAC, NAACP Texas Conference, ACLU Texas, Texas Right to Vote, Common Cause TX, League of Women Voters TX
Today’s Script: (Variations occur with audio due to editing for time)
You’re listening to the American Democracy Minute, keeping YOUR government by and for the people.
Democracy has had a rough couple of weeks in Texas. Conspiracy-inspired legislation moved forward last week which changes polling place rules, puts voters on a purge list for not voting, and removes Texas from a program tracking voter registration changes.
Last week, the Texas Senate State Affairs Committee endorsed SB 990, which stops residents from being able to vote at ANY county precinct, rather than just their local polling place. While it doesn’t restrict voting, it does restrict convenience to out of town workers.
Under SB 1039, party officials, candidates, judges, and political committees could request an election audit to be conducted. If the audit turns up irregularities, a conservator could be appointed to run elections. This is a response to 2022’s paper shortages and technical problems in liberal Harris County which spawned fraud allegations, though no fraud has been found.
SB 1070 guts a law facilitating an interstate program identifying duplicate voters and registration changes. In reality, it targets ERIC, the Electronic Registration Information Center, the recent victim of conspiracy theories suggesting it is linked to a liberal election fraud plot.
Most concerning to voting advocates is SB 260, which puts voters who have not voted in only 25 months on a list to be potentially purged, unless they respond to an election official’s inquiry. Most states allow four or more years until this step.
We have links to the legislation and groups taking action at AmericanDemocracyMinute.org. I’m Brian Beihl.
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