Texas Ballot Box Restrictions Reinstated by Appeals Court
- Court says people can mail ballots if drop-off too distant
- Governor Abbott limited drop boxes over alleged fraud concerns
A worker puts a ballot into a lock box at a drive-thru mail ballot hand delivery center in Austin, Texas, U.S., on Oct. 2.
Photographer: Sergio Flores/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
Texas restrictions allowing only a single drop-box for mail-in ballots in each county were reinstated by a federal appeals court that said the governor’s concerns about ballot security outweigh voting-rights activists’ worries that millions of voters won’t be able to safely access the drop-box.
The federal appeals court in New Orleans late Monday sided with Republican Governor Greg Abbott who on Oct. 1 ordered the shuttering of multiple drop boxes where thousands of ballots in some of Texas’s largest counties were already collected.