Tag Archives: voter suppression

The Texas Tribune reports: Gov. Greg Abbott on Tuesday signed into law Senate Bill 1, sweeping legislation that further tightens state election laws and constrains local control of elections by limiting counties’ ability to expand voting options. The governor’s signature ends months of legislative clashes and standoffs during which Democrats — propelled by concerns that the legislation raises new barriers …

The Hill reports: Voting rights advocates on Friday sued to block a restrictive new GOP-crafted Texas voting bill that the challengers say will make it disproportionately harder for people of color to vote. The 74-page complaint, filed in a San Antonio-based federal court, takes aim at Senate Bill 1 (S.B. 1), a sweeping measure passed this week that would tighten …

The Texas Tribune reports: Three months after House Democrats first broke quorum to stymie a previous iteration of the legislation, Republicans in the House and Senate Tuesday signed off on the final version of Senate Bill 1 to further tighten the state’s voting rules and rein in local efforts to widen voting access. Abbott, a Republican, is expected to sign …

Houston’s ABC News affiliate reports: Outbursts and questions about racism along with claims of voter suppression filled the Texas House chamber Thursday as lawmakers debated the controversial election integrity bill. While debating SB-1, the word “racism” came into play. That sparked a reaction by House Speaker Dade Phelan who told lawmakers the word was banned from the chamber. “We can …

The Texas Tribune reports: After months of drama and political resistance, the curtain lowered Thursday night on Democratic attempts to stave off a far-reaching rewrite of the state’s voting laws coveted by Republicans seeking to retain their hold on power in a changing Texas. One week after finally regaining enough members to conduct business, the Texas House slogged through a …

The Guardian reports: After a 38-day walkout,  the Texas House now has the required two-thirds of members necessary for a quorum to conduct legislative business, and Republicans have already scheduled a hearing on the voting bill for Saturday. The standoff reached a tipping point last week after Republicans authorized law enforcement to find and arrest their missing Democratic colleagues and …

Houston’s ABC News affiliate reports: Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan [photo] on Tuesday evening signed civil arrest warrants for 52 House Democrats still missing from the state Capitol as he aimed to regain the quorum needed for the chamber to begin moving legislation during the second special session. The move was confirmed by Phelan spokesperson Enrique Marquez, who said the …

The Texas Tribune reports: Twenty-two Texas House Democrats sued some of the state’s top Republican leaders in federal court in Austin late Friday, alleging that GOP officials’ efforts to bring them home for a special legislative session infringed on their constitutional rights to free speech and to petition the government for redress of grievances. The lawsuit was filed on the …

The Texas Tribune reports: Gov. Greg Abbott announced Thursday that the second special legislative session will begin at noon Saturday — and with an expanded agenda. The 17-item agenda still includes well-known Abbott priorities like the election bill that caused House Democrats to flee the state at the start of the first special session, which ends Friday. But it also …

The Texas Tribune reports: A showdown in the Texas House was locked into place Tuesday after the chamber voted overwhelmingly to send law enforcement after Democrats who left the state a day earlier in protest of a GOP priority elections legislation. More than 50 House Democrats left Monday for Washington, D.C., to deny the chamber a quorum — the minimum …

Newsweek reports: Texas Governor Greg Abbott has said that Democratic lawmakers who have left the state can and “will be arrested” upon their return as he pushes ahead with changes in voting laws. Abbott, a Republican, gave an interview to KVUE on Monday about the Democrats’ decision to leave the state and whether the special session of the Texas legislature …

The New York Times reports: Democrats in the Texas Legislature are making plans to flee the state on Monday ahead of expected votes on new voting laws, and head to Washington to spotlight what they say is a crippling Republican assault on the ability to cast a ballot. The group had arranged for a pair of chartered flights from Austin …

The New York Times reports: After an extraordinary all-night hearing, a Republican-backed bill to overhaul the state’s voting system cleared a key House committee in the Texas Legislature on Sunday morning, advancing the measure on an accelerated path toward a vote in the full 150-member chamber. The vote by the House committee, which was conducted at about 7:30 a.m. after …

Axios reports: Vice President Kamala Harris announced Thursday that the Democratic National Committee will invest an additional $25 million to expand its voter access initiatives ahead of the 2022 midterm elections. According to the DNC, the $25 million investment will go to efforts aimed at registering millions of new voters, assembling a voter protection team to use the courts to …

CBNC reports: The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled 6-3 to uphold Arizona voting rules supported by Republicans that Democrats alleged unlawfully discriminated against the state’s Native American, Hispanic and Black voters. The case concerned two Arizona voting rules that a federal appeals court found to be in violation of the Voting Rights Act, citing their disproportionate impact on minorities. One …

Via press release from GOP Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp: This lawsuit is born out of the lies and misinformation the Biden administration has pushed against Georgia’s Election Integrity Act from the start. Joe Biden, Stacey Abrams, and their allies tried to force an unconstitutional elections power grab through Congress – and failed. Now, they are weaponizing the U.S. Department of …

The Washington Post reports: The Justice Department will file a federal lawsuit Friday against the state of Georgia for its efforts to enact new voting restrictions that federal authorities allege discriminate against Black Americans, according to people familiar with the matter. The legal challenge takes aim at Georgia’s Election Integrity Act, which was passed in March by the Republican-led state …

The New York Times reports: Senate Republicans on Tuesday blocked the most ambitious voting rights legislation to come before Congress in a generation, using the filibuster to deal a blow to a bid by President Biden and Democrats to counter a wave of state-level ballot restrictions and fueling a political battle that promises to shape the 2022 elections. All 50 …

CNN reports: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell spoke out against the Democrats’ voting legislation that faces a key test vote at 5:30 p.m. ET today. He described it as a “transparent plan to tilt every election in America permanently in their favor,” saying that it would let Democrats “take a red pen to election laws in each of the 50 …

“In my view, SR-1 is the biggest power grab in the history of the country. It mandates ballot harvesting, no voter ID. It does away with the states being able to redistrict when you have population shifts. “It’s just a bad idea, and it’s a problem that most Republicans are not going to sign – they’re trying to fix a …