Texas GOP renews push for new voting laws, unfinished agenda

Austin, Texas (AP) – Texas Republicans on Thursday returned efforts to ban 24-hour polling stations and driving by voting, while Gov. Greg Abbott opened a special legislative session aimed at marking late victories on a long conservative agenda left unfinished last month .

Republicans have revealed details of the revision of the voting laws, overcoming the pressure thwarted by Democrats when they left the cabinet. Like the comprehensive GOP bill, blocked in May, the renewed version will also allow guerrilla observers to polls and ban dropped mailboxes, making it one of the most comprehensive redesigns of the state’s voting and election system. .

But this is far from the only thing on the Texas Republic’s to-do list. Republicans will also try to impose new abortion restrictions, classroom rules and ban transgender athletes from participating in girls’ sports.

Democrats set the agenda as a move to strengthen conservative voters before 2022, when Abbott is for re-election. The two-seat manager has already attracted two main contenders.

The accelerated schedule excited Democrats who attacked Abbott, giving them a to-do list with nearly a dozen items, but ruled out further improvements to the state’s power grid after a deadly eclipse in February and calls for energy savings when temperatures returned to low temperatures.

“That’s what Abbott needs to focus on, not his next primary, not on Donald Trump and his extremist base,” said Democratic Representative Chris Turner, chairman of the Democratic Party of Parliament. “He has to work for the people of Texas.”

Abbott began the final session with a show of force, announcing that his campaign is now worth $ 55 million in the midterm elections, setting another record for governor of Texas. He said the legislature, controlled by the GOP, is ready to adopt its agenda.

“We need to have integrity in our elections,” Abbott told Dallas radio station WBAP.

Under new voting legislation submitted by both the House of Representatives and the Senate, CSO MPs continued to push for a ban on the collection of postal voting applications by an election official, an effort that began in Harris County, which includes Houston and is the largest democratic fortress in the state. The new bills also revive the extended rights of poll observers.

However, some elements originally included in the final version of the May voting bill, which led to the Democrats dropping out, including limiting early voting hours on Sunday, in particular were missing in the versions submitted for the special session.

Republican Republican Briscoe Cain, the author of May’s blocked voting legislation, declined to comment on the special session’s approach to voting laws. The new bill to vote in the House is being passed by Republican State Andrew Murr, who did not respond to a request for an interview Thursday.

The overwhelming majority of the Republican Party in the Texas Capitol is likely to pass the bill. Democrats promised to continue fighting and did not rule out a breach of the quorum again.

Other new bills Abbott wants on his desk before the end of the summer include new restrictions on how race is taught in public schools as the concept known as critical race theory becomes the new GOP lightning rod. Abbott also called for new border security measures, added restrictions on abortions made from drugs, and a law reaffirming existing bans in Texas on transgender student athletes who play girls’ sports.

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