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How Many Dead People Are On Travis County's Voter Rolls?

Cliff Weathers, bit.ly/NncwS3
Travis County workers say there may be deceased voters on file, but know of no cases of voter fraud.

Closing arguments in the Texas voter ID trial took place in Washington D.C. today.

If implemented, the law would require voters to show a government-issued photo ID at the polls. The state argues that the new law is needed to decrease incidents of voter fraud. U.S. Attorney General has argued that Texas’ ID requirements (and others like it) are tantamount to “poll taxes.”

During the trial, state attorneys cited Travis County as one of the 18 counties that did not properly maintain voter registration records. They further claimed that over 50,000 deceased voters remain on the registry – an open door to voter fraud. 

However, Dee Lopez with the Travis County Voter Registration Office says that the system is working effectively. 

“From what I have seen … [in my] 21 years of experience, I can tell you that we have not come across any situations where voters intentionally frauded the system either through the deceased file, the felon file, or any of those,” says Lopez. “We have not seen any intentional voter fraud cases at all.”

Alejandro Garcia with the Texas Secretary of State’s Office says maintaining records is a combined effort between state and county governments. He added, if all procedures are properly followed, deceased voters should be removed from the registry within a few months.

A federal court in Washington D.C. is expected to rule on Texas’ voter ID requirements by the end of the month.

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