Top Texas County’s Voters Cleared for Mail-In Applications
- County clerk can send out 2.4 million forms, state judge rules
- Houston is launchpad for Democratic bid to tip red state blue
Photographer: Logan Cyrus/AFP via Getty Images
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Democrats got a boost in a key swing state on Friday when a judge ruled that Texas can’t stop a local clerk from sending applications for mail-in ballots to all 2.4 million registered voters in the state’s biggest county.
Texas had claimed that mailing out unsolicited applications to millions of voters, many of whom don’t qualify under state rules as disabled, absentee or senior citizens, would encourage people to vote by mail illegitimately in November. Harris County District Judge R.K. Sandill disagreed, finding that while the state’s legislature had spelled out 43 provisions for mail-in ballots, it made no rules about how voters should get applications for those ballots.