“In case you assume that you simply’re successful in the present day,” State Consultant Senfronia Thompson, a long-serving Democrat from Houston, i
“In case you assume that you simply’re successful in the present day,” State Consultant Senfronia Thompson, a long-serving Democrat from Houston, informed her Republican colleagues on Friday, “you’ll reap what you sow.”
Republicans’ response was, in essence, that it was not their job to entice extra individuals to vote.
Throughout debate on Thursday, State Consultant Andrew Murr, a Republican from rural Kerrville, utilized Texas Republicans’ mantra of non-public accountability to voting. “I’m unsure the aim of the state is to actively hunt down voters,” he stated. “The state just isn’t so proactive that it tries to seize all of the voters.”
A number of late amendments to the invoice addressed the integrity of voting and poll counting methods, an outgrowth of former President Donald J. Trump’s false claims of widespread fraud in final 12 months’s election. Some handed, like a requirement that enormous Texas counties present livestreaming video of ballot-counting areas. Others didn’t, corresponding to a Republican modification to conduct a “forensic audit” of the 2020 election in Texas.
One of many final amendments on Thursday was aimed toward avoiding legal prosecutions of previously incarcerated individuals for voting — individuals like Crystal Mason and Hervis Rogers — by instructing judges to inform these convicted of felonies that they’re ineligible to vote.
Along with voting on elections on Friday, the Home can be contemplating a variety of Republican priorities which have made 2021 among the many most conservative within the historical past of Texas, together with growing funding for constructing a border wall and a invoice on “censorship” by social media platforms.
The Home’s vote on Friday more than likely signaled the tip of drama that started in late Could when, within the closing hours of the Texas Legislature’s common session, Democratic Home members fled the chamber to cease Republicans from passing an identical invoice.
An irate Mr. Abbott referred to as a particular session to start in early July, urging legislators to contemplate a voting invoice together with proposals to direct extra money towards border safety, limit transgender youths’ participation in interscholastic athletics and restrict entry to abortion, amongst different conservative priorities. Greater than 50 Home Democrats, led by their progressive wing, organized two constitution flights from Austin to Washington, the place they have been initially greeted as heroes by congressional Democrats of their shared combat to enact new federal voting protections.
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