President Donald Trump’s recent executive order overhauling federal elections may help Texas further secure its systems.
The order, Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections, requires documented proof of citizenship to register to vote, mandates election offices receive all ballots by Election Day, and bans voting machines from counting votes with bar or QR codes, among other things.
“The part that I am most excited about is one of the difficulties we’ve had in Texas,” said Christine Welborn, president of election nonprofit Advancing Integrity, regarding the federal government providing states access to relevant databases to verify voter citizenship.
“We were unable to access those federal databases like Department of Homeland Security, Social Security Administration, those kinds of things,” Welborn added. “I’m really excited to see how many dead people and people who are not citizens were actually on our voter rolls because we have only estimates; we could only imagine from the people who self-identified.”
The EO also mandates the Election Assistance Commission revise the Voluntary Voting System Guidelines 2.0 to ensure that voting systems do not produce ballots with vote information embedded in a bar or QR code except to accommodate disabled individuals.
This will not impact election machine vendor Hart Intercivic; its barcode contains precinct and ballot-style information. Hart provides voting systems to 201 jurisdictions across Texas, including 113 counties, some cities, and smaller districts.
However, the EO would affect Election Systems and Software (ES&S), as their voting system includes vote information in its bar codes and QR codes.
Although the changes will not affect the 142 Texas counties using ES&S during their May municipal elections, the EO requires that the EAC review and re-certify voting systems within 180 days and “rescind all previous certifications of voting equipment based on prior standards.”
The EO also requires a voter-verifiable paper record. Although Texas law requires all voting machines to produce a paper trail by August 2026, the EO eliminates direct-recording electronic (DRE) voting machines one year earlier.
The EO also prevents states from counting mail-in ballots received after Election Day.
“This is like allowing persons who arrive 3 days after Election Day, perhaps after a winner has been declared, to vote in person at a former voting precinct, which would be absurd,” Trump’s EO stated. He alluded to the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2020 decision permitting Pennsylvania officials to receive and count ballots up to three days after the Election Day deadline, so long as they were not postmarked after the deadline.
Former President Joe Biden went on to win the state in 2020.
Additionally, the EO requires documentary evidence from all overseas applicants seeking a ballot through The Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act.
“This would improve the federal postcard application for UOCAVA voters,” said Welborn. “Texas already requires that you have to show that you are eligible to vote in Texas, but other states do not, so that’s good. Requiring proof of citizenship for UOCAVA is an advance we didn’t have.”
Welborn stated that she sees the EO as only applying to federal elections.
“There’s a lot of things that we would like the federal government to do, but that would interfere with state sovereignty, so we do have to be careful because some states could say that this overrides their state sovereignty,” Welborn stated. “But the way I’m reading it is it really focuses on what the federal government can require.”
However, to comply with the new federal changes and save time and money on equipment, states will likely implement them in state and local races.
Welborn also acknowledged that Congress and Texas must be proactive in its laws.
“A lot of this needs to be codified into law so that we don’t have, you know, another administration [that] comes in and reverses all of this,” Welborn added.
She pointed to recent measures like Senate Bill 16, filed by State Sen. Brian Hughes (R-Mineola), which requires new registrants and existing registered voters who did not provide proof of citizenship when they registered to provide documented evidence of U.S. citizenship.
Welborn also said to expect “some legislators who are going to be scrambling to get committee substitutes to their bills or amendments to their bills so that they can be in compliance with this executive order.”
Despite Americans’ overwhelming support for voter ID and paper trails, the measures drew criticism from the left.
“Anytime that we try to improve the accuracy of our voter rolls, people are going to say it’s disenfranchisement, but this is just about accuracy. It’s just about making sure that people who are there are actually supposed to be there,” said Welborn.
“Texas elections are for Texans.”
No ads. No paywalls. No government grants. No corporate masters.
Just real news for real Texans.
Support Texas Scorecard to keep it that way!
