GOP leaders say a list of 95,000 names of suspected non-U.S. citizens on state voter rolls is proof of voter fraud in Texas.
The Secretary of State said the names on the list released Friday were of people who were not citizens when they applied for a Texas driver’s licenses. Of those people, 58,000 have voted. The secretary suggested that counties contact the people on their lists to confirm citizenship, and if they don’t hear back after 30 days – or determine the people are not citizens – purge them from voter rolls.
Travis County Tax Assessor-Collector Bruce Elfant, who manages the county's voter rolls, said the Secretary of State's office told him Tuesday morning to expect a new list of people DPS has cleared as being citizens. The counties will now have to compare that list with the SOS list.
KUT called six Central Texas counties to see how many names were on their lists and what they planned to do with the names.
Bastrop: The county has 145 names on the list.
Blanco: Election officials say there are only seven names on Blanco's list. They plan to send out notices to all seven and see what comes back.
Caldwell: The county election administrator would not tell KUT how many people are on the list. But in a spreadsheet from Travis County, Caldwell is listed as having 63 names on the list. County officials did say it plans on following the Secretary of State’s guidelines of sending notices and purging rolls after 30 days.
Hays: The county has 365 names on the list.
Travis: County Tax Assessor-Collector Bruce Elfant says the county has 4,547 people on the list. His office will investigate each name, but he says it will not be purging the rolls after 30 days.
Williamson: There are 2,033 names on the list in Williamson County. Officials say they’re going to check the names to see if anyone recently became a U.S. citizen. They’ll send out notices to the remaining people.
Monday, several activist groups in Texas strongly came out against the list. A coalition of 13 groups demanded the state rescind it, alleging it could violate federal law.
Then on Tuesday, LULAC filed a lawsuit against the Texas Secretary of State and Attorney General, claiming their released of the list targetted Latinos who are legal voters.
This post has been updated throughout.
