Thousands of mail ballots face possible rejection in Texas during early voting

The 2022 midterm elections are officially underway, with voters in Texas heading to the polls during early voting and sending in their mail ballots. But thousands of those mail ballots are being flagged because of their failure to comply with the state's new election law.

The changes come from a sweeping new election law Texas Republicans passed last year over the objections of Democrats and voting rights advocates. 

Among the provisions in the bill is a requirement that voters provide a driver's license number, personal ID number or the last four digits of their Social Security number when applying for and returning a mail ballot. The number that voters provide has to match the registration that's on file. 

That's the requirement that is causing many of the issues with mail ballots. Some voters haven't provided the number on their registration file, while others haven't filled out that information because they're not used to that process, county election officials said. 

In Harris County, 34% of the 13,325 mail ballots processed as of Thursday have been flagged for rejection for issues with compliance with the new ID law. In Dallas County, 20% of the 2,448 mail ballots returned as of February 16 had ID information that was missing or contained incorrect information. In Williamson County, north of Austin, 17% of the 939 returned mail ballots are missing ID information. Some of the problems stem from the fact that voters are unaccustomed to providing the ID information on their ballots.

"Every vote from Harris County residents who are eligible to vote should be counted," said Nadia Hakim, deputy director of communications and voter outreach for Harris County. "And for something like this to happen, where it could put people's votes in jeopardy of not being counted towards this election, it is very concerning for us."

Harris County officials on Thursday wrote a letter asking the Justice Department for help, given the high number of ballots and ballot applications that have been flagged for rejection. The Justice Department sued Texas last year over the new voting law. 

"Our message today is simple: please exhaust every legal option available to ensure that each eligible voter in Harris County and the State of Texas has their vote counted," Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo and Harris County Attorney Christian Menefee wrote. "No action is too small to preserve our democracy."

Texas already has strict regulations to determine which voters are eligible to vote by mail. In order to be eligible to cast a mail ballot, a voter must be at least 65 years or older, be sick or disabled, expecting to give birth within three weeks of Election Day, out of the county during early voting and on Election Day or confined in jail but otherwise eligible to vote. 

The Texas secretary of state's office has been encouraging voters to update their registration online to ensure that voters have both their Social Security number and a driver's license or other acceptable ID number on file. State and local election officials have also been advising voters to fill out both ID numbers when returning a ballot to ensure that there isn't an issue. 

There is a major time crunch to ensure that any ballots with issues are corrected and able to be counted. Some larger counties, such as Harris County, have more resources to contact voters over the phone and notify them if their ballots have flaws that must be addressed. Voters can fix an ID issue online through a new ballot tracking system, in-person or by mail, a process that can take several days. 

"We hope that all of those voters who have had their ballots initially rejected are able to go correct that," said Sam Taylor, assistant secretary of state for communications at the Texas secretary of state's office. "We'd like that rejection rate to be zero. We don't want any eligible voters who are voting by mail to have their ballots kicked back and not able to vote."

While election officials across Texas are working to ensure that voters have the opportunity to amend their ballots, they're concerned that not every voter will be able to fix the problem. 

"Our whole goal is to get more people out to vote," said Nic Solorzano, the communications manager for the Dallas County Elections Department. "It's a bit frustrating to see this high rejection rate in applications and ballots."

The issues in Texas come as lawmakers in other states are considering adding ID provisions to their mail ballots. In Iowa, Republican lawmakers have proposed adding an ID requirement to an absentee ballot envelope. In Florida, there's a proposal to have voters include either their driver's license number, state ID number or last four digits of a Social Security number on a certificate when returning the ballot. 

Taylor said the primary has been a "test run" for the new law and the secretary of state's office will be doing major education efforts highlighting the new absentee ID requirements before the November general election, when turnout will be much higher. 

While the ID issue has added a responsibility for local election offices to contact voters, some officials say it's voters who are paying the price. 

"At the elections office, we'll deal with those burdens, but what we don't like seeing is it's putting a burden on actual voters," Solorzano said. "It's putting a burden on the actual people who need to vote by mail. These are people over the age of 65, people with disabilities, people dealing with things already."