HARRIS COUNTY, Texas — The Texas Supreme Court has ruled that Harris County can't send mail-in ballot applications to all registered voters.
Harris County Clerk Chris Hollins was hoping to give all registered voters the chance to vote by mail.
“We need to make voting easy for people not difficult," Hollins said. “Just because we are doing something the AG (Attorney General) doesn’t like, doesn’t mean it’s outside the law."
Last presidential election, 5% of voters in Harris County voted by mail. This year, in the primary, it was 34%.
“I think virtually all voters who can, will vote by mail, in Harris County alone – that could be close to half a million voters," said KHOU political analyst Bob Stein.
That’s anyone 65 and older, voters not in the county on election day or in jail, and anyone with a disability. Stein said fear of COVID-19 can't be the only reason you can't vote in person.
“The Clerk is not responsible for determining your disability, you are. Now, you are liable under the law for making false presentations, but the court didn’t define clearly what a disability was," Stein said.
That could cause confusion and legal battles if the validity of mail-in ballots is challenged.
“Many, many people will be voting ... by mail who are not necessarily qualified, according to the Attorney General – I think there will be some showdown there," he said.
Hollins said he still anticipates having the early and mail-in vote ready to be released on election night.
“Absolutely, there will be some mail ballots that come in that evening or the following day, which of course we will count and make sure that every vote counts, but the results that we have in, we will share, as we always have, on election night," Hollins said.
Texas does allow pre-processing of mail-in ballots. Meaning in mid-October, they start to process the ballots they receive and store the results on secure USB drives. It means we should see faster results in Texas than in some other states.