Texas Election Cases, National Impact

An appeals court ruling that upholds voter-ID requirements has national implications, as much as congressional redistricting fights that have leapt out of Texas.

The big news about elections these days is coming out of Texas — beyond the re-redistricting fight after Democrat state legislators fled to Illinois to block the Republican House majority’s plans to re-draw favorable congressional maps.

A federal appeals court ruling in Texas has election-law experts cheering after it upheld a Texas law that requires voters to use an ID number to cast mail-in ballots.

Three judges on the 5th Circuit Court of appeals ruled unanimously to uphold SB1, which the Texas Legislature passed in 2021.

The court said it had “no difficulty concluding” the ID requirement did not present an impediment to voting.

In other words, the Texas law does not “violate a federal law preventing states from imposing voting requirements ‘not material’ to the validity of ballots.”

The “material” provision in the ruling is important. Progressive groups and open borders activists have attacked voter-ID requirements in lawsuits that claim they violate civil rights — despite wide popularity in support of voter ID laws that make clear the identity of the voter.

It’s a big win for election integrity, said Justin Riemer, president and CEO of election-law outfit Restoring Trust and Integrity in Elections (RITE), on social media today.

Riemer noted:

Like many states, Texas law requires voters to provide an ID number on their absentee request forms and return ballot envelopes.

This allows officials to verify the identity of those casting mail ballots. It's a cleaner and more objective method of verifying identity than signature verification.

[Predictably], leftist groups challenged the ID requirement, alleging it violated the "materiality provision" of the Civil Rights Act which prohibits paperwork requirements that are not material to determining a voter's qualifications.

States should follow the lead of Texas, Georgia, and others who have implemented these ID requirements. Rulings like the 5th Circuit's yesterday will help ensure they survive legal challenge.

As Judge James Ho pointed out in the ruling:

The Election Protection and Integrity Act of 2021 combats mail-in ballot fraud in Texas by generally requiring voters who wish to vote by mail to provide an identification number—such as a driver’s license, social security, or other personal identification number—first, on their mail-in ballot applications, and second, on the mail-in ballots themselves.

We have no difficulty concluding that this ID number requirement fully complies with a provision of federal law known by the parties as the materiality provision of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

Under that provision, “[n]o person acting under color of law shall . . . deny the right of any individual to vote in any election because of an error or omission on any record or paper relating to any application, registration, or other act requisite to voting, if such error or omission is not material in determining whether such individual is qualified under State law to vote in such election.

The League of Women Voters was among the groups who brought the lawsuit against Attorney General Ken Paxton, the Texas Secretary of State Jane Nelson and various Republican party groups in Texas over the law.

Perhaps most important, the appellate court upheld a requirement that voter-ID must be used to request a mail-in ballot.

As the appellate ruling notes:

[V]oters who wished to vote by mail- in ballot had to also submit a signed application to their county’s early voting clerk that included the applicant’s name, registration address, and the basis for their eligibility to vote by mail.

But merely requiring mail-in ballot applications to list the voter’s name and registration address triggers significant election security concerns. That information is easily available to anyone who simply requests it from Texas election officials—who readily provide copies of voter files with such information upon request.

As a result, any person can request and receive that information about a registered voter, use that information to apply for a mail-in ballot, and then cast the ballot, with minimal risk of detection.

This insecurity was addressed when the Texas Legislature enacted the Election Protection and Integrity Act of 2021.

The Act alters Texas’s vote-by-mail procedures by requiring voters to provide ID numbers on both their mail-in ballot applications and their mail-in ballot envelopes that match the ID numbers provided on their registration applications.

The 5th Circuit ruling overturned a district court that allowed summary judgment for plaintiffs — despite no showing of harm.

Political media outlets cast the ruling as a set-back for civil rights, ignoring the threat to election security presented when anyone can use a voter list to request and cast a mail-in ballot without confirming their identity.

The ruling lands as Texas Republicans worked through a special legislative session to add five more Republican-friendly districts ahead of the 2026 congressional midterm elections — as Democrats tried to block the move by fleeing to Democrat-led Illinois.

Amid images that flooded social media today of Illinois, one of the most gerrymandered states that suppresses Republican representation, Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) directed arrests of Democrats who fled Texas.

“Today I took emergency action to begin the removal from office of derelict Democrat Texas House members who refuse to show up for the special session,” he said.

The gerrymander issue in congressional seat re-districting is also under review before the Supreme Court.

The high court on Friday issued an order to parties in Louisiana v. Callais to file supplemental briefs addressing whether “the State’s intentional creation of a second majority-minority congressional district violates the Fourteenth or Fifteenth Amendments to the U. S. Constitution,” the post-Civil War amendments that address equal protection under the law.

As NBC News reported:

If the court rules that [Louisiana] did violate the Constitution, it would mean states cannot cite the need to comply with the Voting Rights Act if they use race as a consideration during the map-drawing process, as they currently can.

The world’s attention is on political fights over re-redistricting ahead of the 2026 midterms, with key Supreme Court cases expected to impact on how maps are drawn.

The 5th Circuit’s ruling about voter-ID requirements that govern both the requesting of a mail-in ballot, as well as casting one, at least guarantees the coming fights at the ballot box will be trusted, fair, and accurate. #