DOJ targets Texas again; lawsuit challenges voting restrictions in new state law
The Justice Department filed new legal action against the state of Texas Thursday, challenging a new state law that imposes restrictions on balloting by mail and aid provided to disabled voters in polling locations.
“Our democracy depends on the right of eligible voters to cast a ballot and to have that ballot counted,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said, referring to the Texas law known as SB1 that was signed into law in September. “The Justice Department will continue to use all the authorities at its disposal to protect this fundamental pillar of our society.”
The federal lawsuit contends that the law violates the Voting Rights Act by "improperly restricting" voters with translation needs and visual impairments from seeking help to cast their ballots. Justice also took aim at a separate provision that would allow for the rejection of mail-in ballots for errors or omissions unrelated to the voters' eligibility status.
“The Civil Rights Division is committed to protecting the fundamental right to vote for all Americans,” said Kristen Clarke, the department's civil rights chief. “Texas Senate Bill 1’s restrictions on voter assistance at the polls and on which absentee ballots cast by eligible voters can be accepted by election officials are unlawful and indefensible.”
The new legal action comes as Justice is pressing a challenge at the Supreme Court to Texas' abortion law that bars abortion after six weeks, one of the most restrictive laws of its kind in the nation.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has described the voting law as bolstering election "integrity," while rejecting claims by civil rights advocates and Democratic opponents that it would restrict access to voters of color.
"No one who is eligible to vote will be denied the opportunity to vote," the governor said after signing the legislation in September. "It does, however, make it harder for people to cheat."
Abbott's office did not immediately respond to the Justice action.
Efforts to re-write state voting laws prompted an uproar within the Texas Legislature earlier this year when Democrats staged a walkout in an attempt to block such proposals.
In addition to the new Justice lawsuit, the Texas law also faces other legal challenges brought by civil rights advocates.
In a lawsuit joined by a coalition of groups, including the Texas Civil Rights Project, the state law was described as "drastically" altering the Texas Election Code.
"SB 1 erects a litany of needless hurdles to voting and couples those hurdles with ill-defined criminal and civil penalties," the lawsuit states. "Egregiously, SB 1 takes particular aim at voters with disabilities, voters with limited English proficiency—who, in Texas, are also overwhelmingly voters of color—and the organizations that represent, assist, and support these voters.
"The law does so by imposing new hurdles to voting by mail and voting with an assistant, two processes that are open only to limited subsets of voters, including persons with disabilities and with limited English proficiency," the advocates' lawsuit states.
NAACP President Derrick Johnson lauded the Justice action.
"Finally, a justice department that fights for justice," Johnson said in a statement. "Texas is torpedoing American democracy and our constitutional right to vote. We are encouraged to see the DOJ pushing back.”