WASHINGTON — Rep. Colin Allred, D-Dallas, introduced a bill Friday to shore up protections for election administrators at the local level in light of mounting attempts from Republican-majority legislatures across the country to alter voting procedures in the name of election security.
“We are now seeing efforts in state legislatures to make it easier to … allow for intimidation, which is what we’re seeing in Texas, to make it so that voters may be intimidated, or elections officials themselves, may be intimidated in terms of the counting of the ballots,” Allred said.
The Protecting Election Administration from Interference Act would expand protections for elections administrators, strengthen currently-existing election infrastructure and provide judicial review for elections records, according to the press release. Texas Reps. Marc Veasey, D-Fort Worth, and Veronica Escobar, D-El Paso, joined Allred on the bill.
“Campaigns are obviously partisan, the outcomes of who wins have a partisan impact, but the election administration itself should be nonpartisan,” Allred said. “It should be done by professionals who are tabulating the votes, making sure the person with the most votes wins, and that should not be influenced, or be able to be overturned, by partisan actors.”
Sens. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., Alex Padilla, D-Ca., Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., and Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., introduced partner legislation in the Senate.
“Across the country, we are seeing election administrators and officials face a barrage of threats and abusive behaviors by those seeking to overturn election results,” Klobuchar said in a press release. “This legislation is key to fighting back against attempts to undermine our elections and ensuring our democracy works for every American.”
The bill in the House echoes a lot of the goals and concerns in other legislation Allred introduced in June, the Preventing Election Subversion Act. Allred said they’re complementary, and he expects both to be rolled into a larger package of bills that address federal voting rights protections.
“The idea here is still similar, which is to target the kinds of election subversion attempts we’ve seen,” Allred said. “The rest of the summer and early fall, we’re gonna have a big focus on voting rights. We’re going back next week to pass and vote on the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.”
In the Texas Legislature, House Democrats broke quorum in both May and July to prevent the Republican-dominated chamber from passing an elections bill that they argued would have amounted to voter suppression and disenfranchisement.
On Thursday, the House achieved its first quorum in months with the return of three Democratic members. Lawmakers signaled they will move forward on not just the elections bill, but the rest of Abbott’s special session agenda.
At the congressional level, Allred isn’t the only member of the D-FW delegation who has sponsored federal elections legislation. Rep. Beth Van Duyne, R-Irving, introduced the Safe and Certain Elections Act in the House on Aug. 13.
“Now more than ever, we must ensure our elections are free and fair. It is my intention that this bill would bolster our democratic system by providing safeguards against potential voter fraud,” Van Duyne said in a press release. “All Americans have a voice in this country. I am working to guarantee their voices are heard, absent threats of malpractice.”
The bill would prohibit connecting voting systems to the internet and call for the removal of ineligible voters from the registration list, among other provisions.
