Sec. 232. 063. OVERTURNING ELECTION. If the number of votes illegally cast in the election is equal to or greater than the number of votes necessary to change the outcome of an election, the court may declare the election void without attempting to determine how individual voters voted.
Election Bill Could Merit Criminal Probe
into Government Document Tampering
Capitol Inside
June 11, 2021
The Texas Legislature's top leaders owe the public an immediate and detailed explanation on the shocking subterfuge of democracy that their voting restrictions bill turned out to be based on the accounts of some Republicans who negotiated the final product.
The conference committee on Senate Bill 7 represents an act of legislative malpractice of the highest order - with potential criminal implications that GOP Speaker Dade Phelan may feel compelled to have the General Investigating Committee explore without delay.
Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick also might feel an obligation to have the Senate investigate the possibility that someone tampered with a government document in the case of the conference report that at least two House negotiators say contained dramatic changes that they'd not discussed or approved.
The most heinous last-second addition to SB 7 by far came with a provision that would have made it easier to overturn elections based on claims of ballot box fraud without proof. The stealth amendment appeared to be a passive tribute to Donald Trump and the baseless election challenge that culminated with the riot that killed five people at the U.S. Capitol on January 6.
The formal compromise on SB 7 featured another eleventh-hour revision that would have limited early voting hours in a clandestine move that appeared aimed at suppressing the Black vote in Texas. The conference report that seven Republicans signed contained nearly two dozen provisions that hadn't been approved in either chamber or heard in committees in some cases.
Two House conferees - GOP State Reps. Briscoe Cain of Deer Park and Travis Clardy of Nacogdoches - say they didn't agree to the insertion of either one of the subterranean revisions in the report that bears their signatures. Neither Clardy or Cain said anything about being caught off guard by the sudden additions to SB 7 that they encouraged colleagues to improve in a resolution to go outside the bounds of the conference committee.
Rookie Republican State Rep. Jacey Jetton of Sugar Land signed the report along with GOP State Senators Bryan Hughes of Mineola, Paul Bettencourt of Houston, Dawn Buckingham of Lakeway and Lois Kolkhorst of Brenham.
The bargaining panel's three Democrats - State Senator Beverly Powell and State Reps. Terry Canales of Edinburg and Nicole Collier of Fort Worth - refused to sign the conference report on SB 7 before the House Democrats derailed the measure with a walkout before a final vote.
Some GOP lawmakers have floated the possibility that someone on the Texas Legislative Council went rogue with the sneaking of the Trump election challenge spinoff into SB 7. They'll be finding few believers with that theory in light of the fact that the conferees all knew that the controversial provisions were in the bill when they pitched it for final votes.
more to come ... |
