Lawmakers questioned state and county elections officials and vendors of electronic voting systems during a hearing to assess the current state of Texas elections.
During a House Elections Committee organizational meeting, representatives heard testimony about the state’s voting systems and procedures.
“It’s important that our constituents have confidence in our election process,” said the committee chair, State Rep. Matt Shaheen (R–Plano). “When it comes to secure elections and efforts to fight voter fraud, Texas is a leader, although there is important policy work ahead of us this legislative session.”
“The urgency of protecting our elections cannot be overstated,” added the committee vice chair, State Rep. John Bucy (D–Austin). “The erosion of trust in our electoral system threatens the very foundation of our democracy. We must act decisively to restore and maintain confidence in our elections.”
Elections Director Fields Committee Questions
Committee members spent the most time quizzing Elections Director Christina Adkins, who works under Texas Secretary of State Jane Nelson.
“Everything that we do at the secretary of state’s office is based on the laws and statutes that our lawmakers have chosen to enact, and these laws serve to keep our elections safe and secure and to prevent voter fraud,” Adkins told committee members.
Adkins highlighted two topics: the state’s voter registration list maintenance program, which she described as “robust,” and the certification program for voting systems and electronic poll books.
The secretary of state’s office operates a statewide voter registration and election management system known as TEAM, but local officials in each county are responsible for maintaining their own voter rolls.
Adkins explained that local voter registrars investigate and potentially remove ineligible voters on a daily basis, using high-quality data from a number of sources in accordance with matching criteria as defined in state law.
Non-citizens are identified and removed based on data received weekly from the Texas Department of Public Safety, as required by legislation enacted in 2021.
“It’s important to know that the voter registration list is the foundation of a strong election,” she said. “Having accurate voter rolls ensures that we are protecting our elections from potential challenges, and this is why it is of the utmost importance and something that we place a high value on.”
Adkins then described the state’s certification program for voting systems, which she said has been in place for more than 50 years and has evolved along with election technology.
“We require all of our voting system vendors to obtain federal certification before they can even embark on the state certification process,” she said, adding that certification reports are posted on the SOS website. “We do have a reputation nationwide of having a difficult examination process. It is very thorough, and we are not afraid to deny certification when appropriate.”
She noted that since 2019, thanks to legislation by committee member State. Rep. Valoree Swanson (R–Spring), Texas is also required to certify the electronic poll books that are used to check in voters at the polls.
“We hope to continue to grow this program so that we can continue to ensure that our counties are using technologies that are complying with our laws in Texas, and we can hold our vendors accountable for the products that they’re selling in this state” said Adkins.
“In Texas, it’s important to realize that our system is one of extreme decentralization,” she concluded. “All of our elections are run in this decentralized manner, which means that the secretary of state’s office does not administer elections. They are run on a local level by elected or appointed county election voter registration officials.”
This decentralized system means that our local election officials, in accordance with Texas law, make all of the decisions related to the administration of their local elections. While the Secretary of State’s office is here to provide support and guidance, we are not an enforcement agency, and have limited enforcement mechanisms under Texas law.
State Rep. Richard Raymond (D–Laredo) asked Adkins about recent calls by President Trump and others to move to paper ballots.
Adkins explained that a 2021 law required all Texas elections to use paper-based voting systems by 2026, and all but a few counties have fully converted—although most of these systems use a ballot-marking device to print completed paper ballots.
She speculated that Raymond and others might be envisioning voter-marked, hand-counted, paper ballots.
Raymond said he wants to “make it as easy as possible to vote and as hard as possible to cheat.”
“I really don’t care what it costs, because this is too important,” he said. “And if we as a legislature get to a consensus that we need to change to where we have more traditional paper ballots because that’s safer, it may take longer to count. I don’t care if it takes longer to count, if that’s a safer way to get the legitimate sort of outcome.”
State Rep. Steve Toth (R–Conroe) asked what the Elections Division has done to clear the voter rolls of ineligible voters, noting his daughter remained on the rolls for years after she moved out of state.
“That’s one of those data points that we are now going to start working with DPS on, that we’ve brought into our data and list maintenance process,” said Adkins.
She testified that most of the processes and required data sets used for voter list maintenance are defined in Texas law.
“All of this information is submitted many, many times to the secretary of state’s office, but also to the local county voter registrar,” she said. “Most of that information passes through us to the local voter registrar, because they’re the ones that are responsible for performing those cancellations.”
Adkins added that legislation passed in 2023 gave the secretary of state’s office the ability to monitor counties’ compliance plus some limited enforcement mechanisms.
“Since that law was enacted, we have seen much greater participation and much greater follow-through from our counties on acting on the data that we have sent,” she testified.
State Rep. Mihaela Plesa (D–Dallas) quizzed Adkins about the cost of hand-counting elections.
Adkins didn’t provide an exact number but said calculations for the previous primary showed that if every county in Texas had opted to hand count, her office would not have had enough money to pay the state’s share of primary costs, primarily due to increased labor costs.
Plesa also asked Adkins about the status of the state’s new interstate crosscheck program to replace services provided by the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC). Texas withdrew from ERIC’s list maintenance data consortium to comply with legislation enacted last session.
Adkins said her office has been developing the new crosscheck program at the same time it has been redeveloping the TEAM system.
“We are about to roll out the updated version,” she said. “We put a lot of work into making sure that this system is fully compliant with Texas law but also safe and secure, particularly when it comes to transmitting data between the state and counties.”
She said her office is obtaining data sets used by ERIC directly from those sources instead of going through a third party.
“Right now we are in the process of finalizing data-sharing agreements,” she said. “We have one signed agreement right now, and we have many in progress.”
She added that “list maintenance still happens every day” and her office continues to get data from states on a daily basis.
Swanson questioned Adkins about “personal knowledge” in relation to challenging a voter’s registration, citing some local registrars’ refusal to accept evidence of ineligible registrations.
“Personal knowledge doesn’t have to be about knowing that voter,” responded Adkins. “There are other circumstances and other evidence you can provide that would demonstrate knowledge of the issue that’s being challenged.”
State Rep. Terry Wilson (R–Georgetown) asked Adkins about recent elections that used hand-tallied paper ballots.
Adkins noted that in 2024, the Gillespie County GOP conducted its entire primary with voter-marked, hand-tallied ballots and Travis County’s Republican Party hand-counted its primary mail-in ballots.
“I think there have been different accounts of whether people found that to be successful,” she testified, adding that the counts were fully compliant with state law and the parties created successful tallying sheets, although the process took longer.
Wilson also asked about ballot secrecy concerns, which arose in part due to legislation authored by him and Bucy last session that allows public access to original voted ballots 61 days after an election.
“Every voter has the right to a secret ballot,” said Adkins. “There’s a constitutional protection for a right to a secret ballot, and I think preserving a voter’s privacy and their right to privacy is of the utmost importance.”
She said some individuals began accessing voted ballots along with other publicly available data, which in certain circumstances could allow them to identify a specific voter’s ballot.
The secretary of state then issued emergency guidance to protect voters’ right to privacy, advising election officials to redact certain ballot information—primarily the voting location—after seeking a ruling from the attorney general’s office that the information could lawfully be withheld from the public.
Adkins called the guidance a “short-term solution”—one the Elections Committee may address this session.
Bucy questioned Adkins about online voter registration, a process he has championed for several sessions.
Adkins responded that online registration is not available to new applicants, but voters can update their registration online through DPS when updating license information or through Texas Online. She said both portals use a “live check” process to validate voters’ identity.
Toth asked Adkins whether Texas could move to a single 13-day voting period, with voting, counting, and reporting all done at the precincts.
“There are a lot of states that do that already,” Adkins replied, adding that it is “a policy decision for the legislature.”
State Rep. Penny Shaw (D-Houston) asked Adkins about the impact of federal REAL ID requirements on validating the voter rolls.
Adkins said the reason her office considers DPS non-citizen data to be a “high-quality data match—which means it’s very actionable—is because of Real ID compliance requirements.”
“That is why we have confidence in that data that DPS is gathering,” she said. “We have been utilizing that for a number of years on the list maintenance side.”
Adkins added that a “majority” of voters use DPS-issued licenses or IDs when they vote, but the specific number is unknown because that data is not tracked.
Texas Department of Public Safety Testifies
Rebekah Hibbs, with the Texas Department of Public Safety driver’s license division, provided committee members with an overview of ways DPS customers can complete a voter registration application.
Hibbs noted she is also the NVRA (National Voter Registration Act) coordinator for the agency. A provision of the NVRA known as “motor voter” requires states to offer voter registration as part of their driver’s license application process.
Swanson asked Hibbs about proof of citizenship requirements for people registering to vote while obtaining a driver’s license.
Hibbs replied that the driver’s license system only allows a voter registration application if a person is a U.S. citizen.
“Once you have presented proof of citizenship, we do not ask that question again,” said Hibbs.
Hibbs testified that applicants who are lawfully present—either permanent residents or visitors—must show proof of lawful presence for every transaction.
She said permanent residents—and also refugees, asylees, and parolees—receive a license that looks the same as a citizen’s license. People considered visitors receive a license marked “limited-term” that expires on the date their lawful presence documents expire.
“How do we keep from treating those people as citizens for purposes of voting?” asked Swanson.
Hibbs said DPS currently sends the secretary of state’s office “a weekly file” of individuals who are lawfully present, and when the new TEAM system becomes operational this summer, DPS will also provide a daily file that includes citizenship status.
County Election Officials Share Legislative Priorities
Hays County Elections Administrator Jennifer Doinoff presented the committee with legislative priorities of the Texas Association of County Election Officials.
Doinoff testified that her association and county election officials across the state support the countywide polling place program.
“The program is efficient, accurate, and is auditable,” she said. “Currently, 99 counties participate in the program, and just about 85 percent of the voters in the state vote in a countywide polling place county on Election Day.”
She said it is “not the case” that countywide polling negatively impacts ballot privacy. “It’s an issue in all counties.”
“This remedy is not 100 percent effective and is not sustainable,” said Doinoff. “We look forward to working with this committee to protect every Texas voter’s right to a secret ballot.”
Doinoff told the committee her association is also advocating for improved post-elections audit processes and allowing voters to transfer registration to another Texas county within the 30 days before an election.
Sherman County Clerk Laura Rogers testified on behalf of the County and District Clerks’ Association of Texas. In Sherman and many other counties, the elected county clerk administers elections.
“Being such a small county, ballot secrecy becomes a top priority,” Rogers told committee members. “Sherman County is a precinct-based voting county, but we strongly support countywide polling.”
Rogers said counties also support legislation that would add criminal penalties to the misuse of election information gained through an open records request, as well as requiring election officials to receive 10 hours of continuing education per year and standardizing logic and accuracy testing.
“Elections are not always a one-size-fits-all operation, but the County and District Clerks’ Association is committed to finding opportunities to support standardized best practices,” said Rogers. “Safeguarding election equipment and ensuring integrity and accuracy is a top priority for our association.”
Voting System Vendors On the Hot Seat
Committee members heard from manufacturers of both voting systems certified for use in Texas: Austin-based Hart InterCivic and Election Systems and Software (ES&S).
Samuel Derheimer, Hart InterCivic’s director of government affairs, said his company designs and builds voting and tabulation equipment but no other election technologies such as e-poll books or election night reporting systems.
According to Derheimer, Hart supplies voting systems to 201 jurisdictions across Texas, including 113 counties plus some cities and smaller districts.
“My attention is focused pretty narrowly on keeping voting systems and election processes secure,” he said.
He testified that Hart systems include “multiple independent and redundant layers of protection” against security threats and emphasized that “no Hart device is capable of connecting to the internet… because the software and hardware necessary to make the connections are not present in our products.”
He noted the e-poll books are connected to the internet, but they do not connect to the voting or tabulation systems.
Derheimer encouraged committee members to support legislation to “strengthen, streamline, and standardize” equipment testing and audits.
“These public tests have become increasingly important to maintain the public sense of integrity in their election systems,” said Derheimer. “Robust audits are one of the best tools an election official has to prove the validity of the elections they oversee. As an election system manufacturer, Hart strongly supports better auditing.”
Toth asked Derheimer how long it had been that Hart tabulators have had “zero connection to the internet.”
“As long as I’ve been at the company, and quite a bit longer than that,” replied Derheimer, adding he’d been with Hart for six years.
Toth pressed, quoting an NBC News article claiming that Hart and other manufacturers “had acknowledged that they all put modems in their tabulators and scanners.”
“I’m sorry, that is incorrect. We have never put a modem in our tabulators,” Derheimer responded. “That is not true.”
Derheimer confirmed to Swanson that Hart tabulators cannot count a ballot twice and said he was “unaware of any in-person hack that has ever occurred.”
Christopher Wlaschin, Election Systems and Software’s senior vice president and chief information security officer, testified that his company provides election technology and support to 142 Texas counties.
He said Nebraska-based ES&S has been in business for more than 45 years, is 100 percent American-owned and operated, and manufactures voter-verifiable paper-based vote tabulation systems, electronic poll books, ballot on demand, and voter registration systems, and also prints paper ballots.
“The state of elections in Texas can be described in four words: secure, accurate, transparent, and auditable,” said Wlaschin.
He acknowledged the problem encountered with ES&S’s electronic poll books during the November 2024 election, which led to decertification of that version of the e-poll book software.
“ES&S accepted responsibility for that issue, and we immediately took corrective action,” he said.
Swanson asked Wlaschin to talk more about the e-poll book problem and what ES&S has done to fix it.
“We got word that a couple of precincts in Dallas County were having issues with the poll book printing more than one ballot card per voter,” explained Wlaschin.
When voters checks in to vote, poll workers verify the voter is in the right place and hasn’t already voted, and then press a button on the poll book to print out the voter’s ballot card.
He said in some cases, impatient poll workers pressed the “print ballot card” button more than once per voter, causing multiple ballot cards to be printed out.
“It was a problem that our poll book didn’t recognize multiple pushes, so we fixed that right away,” he said.
He said the fix is in a new version of software that the secretary of state’s office has tested, and ES&S expects “a favorable certification within the next couple of weeks.”
Wlaschin also confirmed to Swanson that no ES&S voting machines or tabulators used in Texas can connect to the internet “in any way, shape, or form.”
In addition, he testified that ES&S technology built in the last four or five years “has never been hacked in any way, shape, or form,” although older machines from 15-20 years ago, “before cyber security was a thing,” have been broken into by “energetic hackers.”
According to Wlaschin, no Texas counties are using those old generation machines.
Swanson also quizzed Wlaschin about the ability of ES&S systems to count the same ballot “an infinite number of times.”
Wlaschin explained that a modern version of ES&S tabulators is designed to “spray a unique number” on ballots, allowing post-election audits to catch any ballots scanned multiple times. He said counties that haven’t purchased the latest model equipment must rely on trained election officials to observe any attempts to scan ballots multiple times and prevent it from happening.
In addition to invited testimony, the committee accepted public comments submitted online.
The next Elections Committee meeting is scheduled for March 13.
