Republican State Rep. Jeff Leach of Allen has refiled a measure that Gov. Greg Abbott vetoed in 2023.
Leach’s House Bill 3162 is purportedly aimed at expanding the voting rights of disabled Texans by allowing “certain voters” access to an electronic absentee ballot.
However, the measure’s vague wording would put the election system at more risk of malfeasance, according to Abbott.
In his veto proclamation, Abbott said House Bill 3159—last session’s proposal—lacked strong parameters around who qualified to apply for electronic ballots and was susceptible to unintended consequences.
Democrat State Rep. John Bucy (Austin), who co-authored the measure last session with Leach, objected to Abbott’s characterization of the measure.
However, Abbott argued that while the measure may have been “intended to ‘benefit blind, visually impaired Texans, people with dyslexia, or persons with limited dexterity,’” the text of the bill “is not limited to assisting this group. [HB 3159] allows any voter who qualifies to vote by mail to receive a ballot electronically.”
Election security advocates supported the governor’s veto.
“Vulnerable voters are already being victimized by harvesters through the mail-in ballot process, adding any online component to the process will further endanger these voters and the integrity of our elections,” Christine Welborne, president of election organization Advancing Integrity, told Texas Scorecard.
Welborne and other election security specialists have repeatedly argued that mail ballots are especially susceptible to fraud.
For example, in 2020 Attorney General Ken Paxton announced the arrest of Gregg County Commissioner Shannon Brown and three others on charges dealing with an organized vote harvesting scheme during the 2018 Democrat primary election.
According to Paxton’s office, “to increase the pool of ballots needed to swing the race in Brown’s favor, the group targeted young, able-bodied voters to cast ballots by mail by fraudulently claiming the voters were ‘disabled,’ in most cases without the voters’ knowledge or consent.”
The state filed 134 felony charges against the four defendants, including engaging in organized election fraud, illegal voting, fraudulent use of an application for a mail-in ballot, unlawful possession of a mail-in ballot, tampering with a governmental record, and election fraud.
Leach did not respond to Texas Scorecard’s request for comment before publication.
