Texas Rejects 12% of Mail Ballots in First Vote Since Crackdown
(Bloomberg) -- Texas rejected about one in eight mail-in ballots in its March primary, the first election held since the state's Republicans signed a massive overhaul of voting laws.
According to updated data released Wednesday by the secretary of state, 24,636 mail-in ballots were not counted, for an overall rate of 12.4%.
By comparison, less than 1% of mail-in ballots were rejected in the entire U.S. in the 2020 election, according to figures from the U.S. Election Assistance Commission.
In September, Republican Governor Greg Abbott signed a sweeping elections overhaul, adding a new requirement that voters provide their driver's license number or the last four digits of their Social Security number on the envelope used to return a ballot so it can be matched with their voter file.
During the debate on the bill, elections officials testified that nearly 2 million registered voters did not have one of those two numbers in their voter file, meaning their ballot would be rejected if they used that number on the envelope.
The updated data released Wednesday also showed that Democratic mail-in ballots were rejected at a higher rate.
According to the secretary of state's office, 14,281 Democratic mail-in ballots were rejected, or 12.9%, while 10,355 Republican mail-in ballots were rejected, or 11.8%.
Texas's election law fight gained national attention last summer after the state's Democrats left the state in an attempt to temporarily slow Republican efforts to pass legislation.Â
©2022 Bloomberg L.P.
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