AUSTIN (1080 KRLD) - A coalition of thirteen voting rights groups Monday sent a letter to the Texas Secretary of State, David Whitley, demanding that he rescind his advisory purporting to identify non-citizen registered voters.
The advisory, released last Friday afternoon, claimed that 95,000 individuals identified by the Department of Public Safety as non-U.S. citizens have a matching voter registration record in Texas. Of the 95,000 the Texas Secretary of State’s office believes 58,000 voted in Texas elections
“Given the long history of anti-immigrant policies and attempts at voter suppression by our Texas officials, we cannot trust that this investigation has been conducted in a fair and non-discriminatory manner,” said Andre Segura, legal director for the ACLU of Texas.
Beth Stevens of Texas Civil Rights Project questions the methodology of the advisory. She says DPS data is notoriously unreliable and out of date.
“Folks can gets a driver’s license before they become a citizen and then become registered to vote after they are a citizen…they fail to explain at all how they accounted for that potential reason for a match.”
In addition to demanding the Secretary of State rescind the advisory, the groups have also asked officials in charge of elections in all of Texas’ 254 counties to take no action on the matter until the Secretary of State has provided greater transparency on its procedures and ensured there are adequate safeguards for not identifying lawfully registered naturalized citizens.