As the Texas Legislature prepares to begin another special session, election integrity advocates are asking Gov. Greg Abbott to call for bills that amend the Texas Constitution to qualify that voters in state elections must be U.S. citizens.
Americans for Citizen Voting sent a letter to the governor detailing the need to revive legislation killed in the Texas House during the regular session that would have amended the constitution to prevent unlawful migrants from voting in any Texas election.
The organization has led a national movement to get states to adopt such amendments to clarify that only legal citizens have the right to cast ballots in elections.
According to Americans for Citizen Voting, several states, including California, have already seen certain cities pass ordinances allowing noncitizens to vote, and many more have no protection against cities doing so.
Attorney Michael Columbo from the Dhillon Law Group Inc., writing on behalf of the Americans for Citizen Voting, urged Abbott “to support an amendment to the Texas Constitution clarifying that a voter in Texas state elections must be a United States citizen.”
While the state constitution notes that citizens are qualified to vote, it “does not state that noncitizens are prohibited from voting.”
“Enshrining a provision in the Texas constitution clearly prohibiting non-citizen voting would be much more difficult to remove by a future legislature and could more effectively encourage home-rule cities to preserve the right to vote for Texas citizens,” the letter continues.
Indeed, the only limitations currently in the state constitution are that a person cannot be under 18, mentally incompetent, or convicted of a felony: “Notably absent from the above disqualification provisions are persons who are not United States citizens.”
The existence of home-rule cities in Texas, Columbo argues, means that they could conceivably pass an ordinance enabling noncitizens to vote as some cities in other states have.
While some might argue that any such attempts would be preempted by a proper reading of Texas statute, he notes, “a court could interpret it as not speaking with the unmistakable clarity necessary to prevent Texas’s largest home-rule cities from amending their charters or adopting practices that allow noncitizens to vote.”
Additionally, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals overturned a longstanding law that authorized the attorney general to prosecute voter fraud, meaning that local district attorneys could attempt to ignore or dismiss such crimes.
“Given the importance of this issue and the fact that the Attorney General cannot prosecute Election Code violations himself, Americans for Citizen Voting respectfully requests that you support legislation to amend the Texas Constitution to clarify that noncitizens cannot vote in any Texas elections,” the letter concludes.
Charlie Kolean, a Texas spokesman for Americans for Citizen Only Voting, additionally addressed the Texas governor in a statement to The Dallas Express, urging, “Governor Greg Abbott, for the integrity of our elections and the trust of the Texan people, I urge you to add a ‘citizen-only voting’ amendment to the special session’s agenda.”
“Legal analysis indicates that our state’s constitution lacks clarity on this matter,” he added. “It’s imperative that we ensure only U.S. citizens participate in our electoral processes.”
The next special session of the Texas Legislature will start on October 9, according to a letter sent by Abbott, but the governor has yet to officially announce what the scope of the session will be.
Noncitizen voting has been supported in some cities under the rationale that anyone who pays taxes to a government and is affected by its policies ought to receive a vote.
In Washington, D.C., Council Member Brianne Nadeau backed the practice, saying, “Our noncitizen residents are paying taxes, enrolled in school, working here in the District of Columbia, and involved in community affairs.”
“And without this legislation, they don’t have a voice in our elections, which is essentially one of the most fundamental things in our country,” she added. The D.C. City Council did pass an ordinance to enable noncitizens to vote, but it was later overturned by Congress.