Texas Governor Defends Limiting Counties to One Ballot Drop Box

(Bloomberg) -- Texas Governor Greg Abbott defended his decision to limit each county in the state to one ballot drop box for the November election, regardless of size or population, and asked a judge to toss a lawsuit challenging the plan.

Groups including the Texas League of United Latin American Citizens and the Texas Legislative Black Caucus sued, alleging the Republican governor's plan amounted to illegal voter suppression in counties with larger populations where election officials were planning to have multiple drop box sites. In the state's sprawling urban counties, which lean Democratic, Abbott's plan could force voters to drive long distances to reach the single drop box.

In a court filing Wednesday, Abbott said he put the limit in place because counties that planned to use multiple drop box sites would have “inconsistent safeguards to preserve the integrity of the election, such as a lack of poll watchers overseeing ballot deliveries.” The governor, echoing claims by President Donald Trump, claims that vote-by-mail fraud has been a “frequent and enduring problem in Texas,” according to the filing.

Abbott took credit for expanding access to voting during the pandemic and argued the limitation he announced Oct. 1 was reasonable because he'd earlier agreed to extend the time period for personally dropping off mail-in ballots in the state's 254 counties.

“As part of this expansion of voting opportunities, Governor Abbott has simply put in place the practice of requiring voters to deliver those ballots to a single location within the county with poll watchers present,” the filing said.

Read More: Texas Sued Over Plan to Limit Ballot Drop Boxes for Election

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