Lawsuit: Texas tried to violate voters’ rights
An advocacy group alleged in a lawsuit that three top state officials conspired to violate thousands of foreign-born citizens’ voting rights when they advised counties to review the citizenship status of suspected noncitizen voters.
The federal lawsuit, filed in Corpus Christi by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund on Friday, names Secretary of State David Whitley, Gov. Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton as defendants. It contends that Whitley, in questioning the status of more than 95,000 registered Texas voters, singled out naturalized citizens because they were born outside the country.
Soon after Whitley sent out a Jan. 25 advisory in which he flagged registered voters who had indicated in driver’s license records they were not citizens, county officials discovered that the list contained thousands of citizens.
Whitley acknowledged the errors but his office has not withdrawn the list, MALDEF noted.
The lawsuit seeks an injunction that would revoke the state’s list until it proves the voters are ineligible to cast ballots and would bar Whitley’s office from probing citizens who were recently naturalized.
MALDEF’s complaint claims the state’s actions violate the federal Voting Rights Act and the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause.
The League of United Latin American Citizens filed a separate federal lawsuit in San Antonio on Tuesday contending that Whitley and Paxton violated the Voting Rights Act’s provision against voter intimidation.
LULAC added an additional filing to the suit Saturday alleging Texas’ proof of citizenship requirement for newly naturalized citizens violates the First and 14th amendments because it is “discriminatory and an unconstitutional burden on the right to vote.”
Thomas A. Saenz, MALDEF’s president and general counsel, cast the episode as further evidence of the state’s “aggressive efforts to target legitimate voters and to deter or suppress their participation.”
“Targeting naturalized citizens is particularly perverse given the high level of participation in voting and civic engagement among those who chose to become United States citizens,” Saenz said in a statement.
Also named as a defendant is Galveston County Tax Assessor-Collector Cheryl Johnson, who mailed letters to people earlier this week seeking citizenship verification.
Abbott on Thursday said Whitley, whom he appointed in December, had made clear that the list contained “weak” matches. State and local election officials should work “swiftly together to make sure our voter rolls are accurate to ensure integrity in the election process,” Abbott said.
In Harris County alone, about 18,000 voters have been cleared from the secretary of state’s list. Election officials in McLennan County found that all 366 local registered voters flagged on the list had proof of citizenship, according to the Waco Tribune-Herald.