Across Texas and other states, voters face a variety of barriers
Democrats believe they have a shot at making gains this year in Republican-dominated Texas, including winning control of one house of the Legislature for the first time in nearly two decades.
Persuading voters isn't their only challenge. Voting and registration rules crafted by Republicans in recent years also could prove to be a big obstacle.
In a state that's growing rapidly in population and diversity, officials have closed hundreds of polling places, taken steps toward removing thousands of registered voters from the rolls, imposed strict voter identification requirements and made it more expensive to put early voting sites on college campuses — all in the name of election integrity.
“The bottom line in Texas is Republicans are scared to death of demographic changes,” said Anthony Gutierrez, executive director of Common Cause in Texas, “and are doing anything and everything they can think of to keep those changing demographics from affecting elections."
Nationally, Democrats say strict voter ID laws, purging of voter rolls, reduction in polling places, limits on early voting and other restrictive steps are Republican attempts to suppress their voters. Republicans counter that they are merely trying to maintain the integrity of elections and close off potential avenues for voter fraud.
It's an argument playing out across the country, and one that is leading to lawsuits in numerous battleground states.
In North Carolina, litigation over a voter ID requirement passed by Republicans has created uncertainty over whether it will be in place for the November elections. In Georgia and Wisconsin, voter advocacy groups have sued over efforts to revoke the registrations of voters who have not participated in recent elections. And in Texas, Democrats are suing over a ban on mobile polling places.
Attention on state efforts to expand or restrict voting access has been heightened since 2013, when the U.S. Supreme Court eliminated some key protections of the Voting Rights Act. Before that ruling, Texas was among nine states with a history of racial discrimination that needed clearance from the federal government before making significant changes to their voting laws.
All nine now have laws that ask voters to show IDs at polling places, laws that often have led to confusion on Election Day. The Texas law, for example, allows a handgun license to vote, but not a college ID.
Voter roll purging also has accelerated in some states in recent years. Election administrators are supposed to remove people who have died or moved out of their voting jurisdiction, or in some places have failed to vote during the last several elections. How those purges are done is at the heart of legal battles across the country.
Georgia officials removed 313,000 people from voter rolls last year. Fair Fight Action, a group founded by 2018 Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, who has become a major voter rights advocate nationally, has been pushing to have about 120,000 of them restored.
Fights over access to balloting on college campuses, restoring the right to vote for felons and whether interest groups should be allowed to collect voters' completed ballots are playing out in numerous states.
If voting restrictions reduce turnout, they can make the difference in races decided by narrow margins.
Many of these fights are playing out in Texas, the nation's second most populous state and one that has been a Republican stronghold for much of this century.