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Texas Voter Turnout Efforts Analysis

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Abbott Rejects Obama Criticism Of Texas Voter Turnout Efforts By Jamie Lovegrove Texas Tribune • Mar 14, 2016 ShareTwitter Facebook Google+ Email Texas Gov. Greg Abbott at a press conference on Monday dismissed President Obama's criticisms of the state's efforts to improve voter turnout, arguing that the state must crack down on "rampant" voter fraud. Jamie Lovegrove / Texas Tribune Texas Gov. Greg Abbott repudiated President Barack Obama’s recent criticisms of the state’s voter laws on Monday, arguing that Texas must remain vigilant against voter fraud. “What I find is that leaders of the other party are against efforts to crack down on voter fraud,” Abbott said. “The fact is that voter fraud is rampant. In Texas, unlike some other states…show more content…
Obama has been previously critical of Voter ID laws like the one Texas passed in 2011. A federal judge ruled last year that the Texas law had a “discriminatory effect” by restricting access to the polls for black and Hispanic Texans. Last week the full U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals announced that it would hear arguments over whether the law violates the Voting Rights Act. The law requires most citizens to show one of a handful of forms of allowable photo identification before their election ballots can be counted. One specific policy that Obama suggested the state should adopt to increase turnout would be online voter registration. But Abbott appeared uninterested in the proposal when asked about it at a press conference following the announcement that California-based Pegasus Foods is building a new, 80,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Rockwall, Texas. “We don’t want to open the system up to methodologies or ways of voting that would promote or allow voter fraud,” Abbott…show more content…
Cory Booker, D-New Jersey, said last year, an assertion that PolitiFact found to be true. As of last year, there had been a total of 85 election fraud prosecutions resolved in Texas, including 51 guilty or no contest pleas and 9 convictions, according to PolitiFact. Lorraine Minnite, a Rutgers professor and author of the book The Myth of Voter Fraud, determined that four cases in Texas from 2000 to 2014 involved in-person voter fraud. Shortly before the governor spoke on Monday, the Texas Civil Rights Project filed a lawsuit in San Antonio federal court challenging the state’s voter registration procedures. The complaint alleges that Texas is violating the U.S. Constitution and federal law by refusing to register eligible voters who submit changes to their driver’s license information with the Texas Department of Public Safety. “Plaintiffs, who are eligible Texas voters, have been disenfranchised — just like the thousands of similarly situated voters who complained to election officials about these same problems when their ballots were not counted,” the complaint reads, arguing that this contradicts the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and the National Voter Registration Act of
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