Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) has removed over one million individuals from the state’s voter rolls in an ongoing effort to prevent ineligible voters, including non-citizens, from participating on election day.
The move on voter fraud comes 69 days out from the Tuesday, November 5 2024 presidential election.
According to Newsweek, 1.1 million people have been removed from the voter rolls since Senate Bill 1 (SB 1) was signed into law in September 2021. This group includes individuals who have moved out of state, are deceased, or are not American citizens.
At the time, the law was viewed as part of a broader effort by Republican-led states to ensure voter integrity following the 2020 presidential election.
Governor Abbott’s office reports that those removed from Texas voter rolls include over 6,500 noncitizens, more than 6,000 voters with felony convictions, over 457,000 deceased individuals, more than 463,000 voters on the suspense list, and over 134,000 voters who confirmed they had moved in response to an address confirmation notice.
Another 65,000 voters who failed to respond to a notice of examination have been ruled out along with over 19,000 voters who requested to cancel their registration.
“The Secretary of State and county voter registrars have an ongoing legal requirement to review the voter rolls, remove ineligible voters, and refer any potential illegal voting to the Attorney General’s Office and local authorities for investigation and prosecution,” Greg Abbott said in a written statement.
“Illegal voting in Texas will never be tolerated. We will continue to actively safeguard Texans’ sacred right to vote while also aggressively protecting our elections from illegal voting,” he added.
The move follows Governor Abbott’s comments in June about voter fraud, “especially in Houston,” after a judge invalidated more than 1,400 votes in a 2022 district court race, leading to the results being discarded.
“Voter fraud is real. Especially in Houston,” the governor posted on X. “The court has found that 1,430 illegal votes were cast in the race for the 180th District Court,” he added.
The ruling came after Republican candidate Tami Pierce filed a legal challenge against the results, following her narrow loss to Judge DaSean Jones (D) by just 449 votes.
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