What happened the last time (2019):
In February 2019, Texas Secretary of State David Whitley, using the standard method of matching state databases, assigned 95,000 voters for citizenship checks and set them up for possible criminal investigation.(Go here and here.) That campaign was terminated and resulted in a settlement of three federal lawsuits. Whitley resigned his job due to the fallout.
Texas had at the time about 17 million registered voters. Following the settlement, some counties undertook a more careful protocol to identify non-citizens on voting lists. They found several hundred. One person was a staff member of the El Paso County election staff and had had a naturalization party at the office years before.
On August 21 this month, Attorney General Ken Paxton, according to the office’s press release, “has opened an investigation into reports [sic] that organizations operating in Texas may be unlawfully registering noncitizens to vote in violation of state and federal law.” Paxton said that his investigation involved undercover agents and raids on homes of individuals.
The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) has asked the Department of Justice to investigate Paxton’s raids (go here.) One of the individuals whose home was raided at 6 AM on August 20 was the 87 year old LULAC member Lydia Martinez, who stood outside her home in her nightgown while a half dozen law enforcement personnel went through her house and seized her electronic devices.
What are the “reports”? On August 18, Fox News columnist Maria Bartiromo (who was involved in the conspiracy thinking re: Dominion in 2021), posted this on X: “ Friend of mine’s wife had to take her 16 yr old son to the DMV this week for a new license. Couldn’t get an online appointment(all full) so went in person and had to go to 3 DMV’s to get something done. First DMV was in Weatherford. Had a massive line of immigrants getting licenses and had a tent and table outside the front door of the DMV registering them to vote! Second one was in Fort Worth with same lines and same Dems out front. Third one was in North Fort Worth had no lines but had same voter registration drive. (Go here.)
Within 24 hours, Brady Gray, chair of the Republican Party of Parker County (in which Weatherford is located) posted on X the results of his own investigation, which included conversations with pertinent local officials, and completely refuted the allegation, point by point. (Go here.)
A defamatory assault on the integrity of local elections departments, such as Paxton has done, involves attacking one of the nerdiest, most self-disciplined and most exacting cohorts of government employees.
On August 28, Governor Greg Abbott announced that since 2021 the state has found on voter rolls 6,500 non-citizens, of whom 1,930 non-citizens had a voting history. 6.500 is of the current total of 18 million registered voters, three one hundredths of one percent, or one per 2800 registered voters. It is very unlikely that most of these 6,500 are in fact non-citizens, if the state’s earlier misadventure and that of other states are a guide.