Transition to Vote
Here is from the Chron today:
The Texas Attorney General’s Office filed an appeal Tuesday asking the Texas Supreme Court to overturn a Travis County judge’s ruling that had temporarily blocked a new state law abolishing the county’s elections office from going into effect Sept. 1.
In her order, 250th District Court Judge Karin Crump ruled Harris County could continue using its elections administrator’s office for the upcoming November election. An appeal filed by the state hours later stayed that ruling. The Harris County Attorney’s Office said Tuesday afternoon that it would file a motion for temporary relief preserving the trial court’s injunction while the appeal is pending.
Senate Bill 1750, which was signed into law by Gov. Greg Abbott in June, is set to go into effect Sept. 1, just weeks before a high-turnout election with Houston’s mayoral race at the top of the ballot.
Crump said in her order Harris County would suffer by being forced to implement “an unconstitutional statute” that was designed “to deprive Harris County of a statutory right available to every other county in Texas.”
And this:
In her ruling, Crump also stated if SB 1750 goes into effect on Sept. 1, the “massive transfers” of county employees and resources weeks before voting begins in the November election would lead to “inefficiencies, disorganization, confusion, office instability and increased costs” that would “disrupt an election that the Harris County EA has been planning for months.”
The temporary injunction barred the Texas Attorney General’s Office and the Texas Secretary of State’s Office from taking any actions to enforce SB 1750 or refusing to accept election results from the Harris County Elections Administrator’s Office.
Here is the entire read: : Texas law abolishing Harris County elections office blocked by judge (houstonchronicle.com).
Here is what the Harris County Clerk put out yesterday:
Currently, I am working to ensure a successful transition of the administration of elections back to HCCO. According to Senate Bill 1750, the elections department must be under the purview of the County Clerk’s Office starting September 1.
In the past couple of months, at political gatherings, Commentary has asked County Commissioner Adrian Garcia, County Attorney Christian Menefee, and the Harris County Democratic Party Chair who is a member of the Harris County Elections Board, if they are preparing for a handoff from an Elections Administrator to the County Clerk / Assessor Collector to make sure the November elections are run smoothly. They have all indicated that they are working on the transition if we lose in the courts.
We will see.
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This is also from the Chron today:
When Houston residents head to the ballot box this November to elect a new mayor and city government, fewer people may actually show up than in Seattle, a city with a third of our population.
About 1 in 5 registered voters in Houston typically participate in municipal elections, and even that figure omits residents who are eligible to vote but are not registered. Seattle, a city of 750,000 people, saw 265,000 people turn out in its November 2021 mayoral election; Houston’s 2019 contest garnered 241,000. In some council districts — where members represent 210,000 constituents — as few as 6,000 people voted.
As a result, the voting base collectively looks far different from Houston’s broader population, skewing dramatically older, whiter and more conservative. Two demographic disparities stand out: The median municipal voter in Houston is over 60 years old, meaning half the electorate was born before Congress passed the Voting Rights Act in 1965. And in a city where 47 percent of residents are Latino, only roughly 18 percent of the city’s voting base will share that background.
And this:
As New York City Mayor Eric Adams once put it: “Social media does not pick a candidate, people on social security pick a candidate.”
Here is the entire Chron read: Half the voters that vote in Houston’s mayoral elections are over 60 (houstonchronicle.com).
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Martín Maldonado is 37 today. Happy Birthday, Machete!
We won last night. Michael Brantley is on a rehab assignment with Sugar Land and hit a dinger. Good.
