Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

Judge not buying Texas arguments against online voter registration

mouse clicking check
alexsl/Getty Images

It only took a few days for the revived drive to expand the voter rolls in Texas to get back on track.

A civil rights group has been pushing litigation for four years alleging the second most populous state's voter registration rules violate federal law. And just three days after the first hearing in the latest iteration of the lawsuit, a federal judge in San Antonio signaled he may soon force the state to adopt new online registration practices.

District Judge Orlando Garcia said Texas had presented "no viable defense" for not allowing people to simultaneously update their voter registration information when they apply for or renew a driver's license online.


After making that determination, the judge ordered the state to update the three plaintiffs' voter information so they may register by Monday's deadline for voting in the congressional and presidential primaries on Super Tuesday. He did not make a decision on the underlying suit that would apply to voters statewide.

But his skepticism about the state's position was welcome news for voting rights advocates hoping to boost turnout this year — if not in time for the March 3 voting then at least by November, when Democrats say that a surge in new voters could lead them to carry the state (which has 38 electoral votes) for the first time since 1976.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

This year 38 states and the District of Columbia allow online registration. Texas is by far the biggest state that does not. Michigan, North Carolina and New Jersey are the others with more than 5 million people but no online registration.

The Texas Civil Rights Project has sued on behalf of people unable to update their registration when changing their addresses on their driver's licenses through the Department of Public Safety's online portal. The suit contends a 1993 law, requiring states to register people who ask or alter their voting information when updating their licenses, should apply to people doing so online, not just in-person at a motor vehicle bureau.

Texas now requires people using the DPS site to print, sign and mail in a separate form to update voter information — extra steps the "motor voter law" was intended to eliminate.

"Congress lifted these burdens to make voter registration easier, not more confusing and difficult," Garcia wrote.

This is the second time such an effort has been before Garcia. But after he sided with the group in its first suit in 2018, an appeals court overturned him on the grounds that the plaintiffs had subsequently registered and so their claim was moot.

Read More

"Vote" pin.
Getty Images, William Whitehurst

Most Americans’ Votes Don’t Matter in Deciding Elections

New research from the Unite America Institute confirms a stark reality: Most ballots cast in American elections don’t matter in deciding the outcome. In 2024, just 14% of eligible voters cast a meaningful vote that actually influenced the outcome of a U.S. House race. For state house races, on average across all 50 states, just 13% cast meaningful votes.

“Too many Americans have no real say in their democracy,” said Unite America Executive Director Nick Troiano. “Every voter deserves a ballot that not only counts, but that truly matters. We should demand better than ‘elections in name only.’”

Keep ReadingShow less
Why America’s Elections Will Never Be the Same After Trump
text
Photo by Dan Dennis on Unsplash

Why America’s Elections Will Never Be the Same After Trump

Donald Trump wasted no time when he returned to the White House. Within hours, he signed over 200 executive orders, rapidly dismantling years of policy and consolidating control with the stroke of a pen. But the frenzy of reversals was only the surface. Beneath it lies a deeper, more troubling transformation: presidential elections have become all-or-nothing battles, where the victor rewrites the rules of government and the loser’s agenda is annihilated.

And it’s not just the orders. Trump’s second term has unleashed sweeping deportations, the purging of federal agencies, and a direct assault on the professional civil service. With the revival of Schedule F, regulatory rollbacks, and the targeting of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs, the federal bureaucracy is being rigged to serve partisan ideology. Backing him is a GOP-led Congress, too cowardly—or too complicit—to assert its constitutional authority.

Keep ReadingShow less
One Lesson from the Elections: Looking At Universal Voting

A roll of "voted" stickers.

Pexels, Element5 Digital

One Lesson from the Elections: Looking At Universal Voting

The analysis and parsing of learned lessons from the 2024 elections will continue for a long time. What did the campaigns do right and wrong? What policies will emerge from the new arrangements of power? What do the parties need to do for the future?

An equally important question is what lessons are there for our democratic structures and processes. One positive lesson is that voting itself was almost universally smooth and effective; we should applaud the election officials who made that happen. But, many elements of the 2024 elections are deeply challenging, from the increasingly outsized role of billionaires in the process to the onslaught of misinformation and disinformation.

Keep ReadingShow less
MERGER: The Organization that Brought Ranked Choice Voting and Ended SuperPACs in Maine Joins California’s Nonpartisan Primary Pioneers

A check mark and hands.

Photo by Allison Saeng on Unsplash. Unsplash+ License obtained by the author.

MERGER: The Organization that Brought Ranked Choice Voting and Ended SuperPACs in Maine Joins California’s Nonpartisan Primary Pioneers

Originally published by Independent Voter News.

Today, I am proud to share an exciting milestone in my journey as an advocate for democracy and electoral reform.

Keep ReadingShow less