A legal battle is ongoing after Gov. Greg Abbott’s order to limit mail-in ballot drop off sites to one per county was overturned by a Texas judge on Thursday, causing confusion among student voters as early voting continues.
Numerous groups, including the Texas League of United Latin American Citizens and League of Women Voters of Texas, filed a lawsuit against Abbott’s Oct. 1 order. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Abbott’s order to limit each county to one drop box location for voters to mail-in absentee ballots on Oct. 12, the day before early voting opened in Texas.
The status of voting by mail remains unclear since, on Thursday, Judge Tim Sulak of the 353rd District Court in Travis County blocked Abbott’s order following another lawsuit by the Anti-Defamation League and Common Cause Texas, arguing that closing ballot drop-off locations violated state law. One drop-off location in Travis County at 5501 Airport Boulevard is open to deliver absentee and mail-in ballots between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m.
“The limitation to a single drop-off location for mail ballots would likely needlessly and unreasonably increase risks of exposure to COVID-19 infections, and needlessly and unreasonably substantially burden potential voters’ constitutionally protected rights to vote, as a consequence of increased travel and delays, among other things,” Sulak said in his written ruling.
Katya Ehresman, a government and public policy senior, said Abbott’s argument that having more than one drop-off location would jeopardize election security might actually be causing confusion for students of marginalized communities to figure out how and where to go to deliver their ballots.
“I think it's really frustrating,” Ehresman said. “I think the systemic confusion that surrounds Gov. Abbott's most recent orders, and especially all the whiplash legal rulings that have happened regarding it … (is) getting really frustrating because it's done out of bad faith.”
Ehresman, a student assistant at the New Politics Forum and intern at the Texas Civil Rights Project, said a lot of her friends don’t know what to do about their ballots because of the current status of these rulings.
“A lot of my friends … are confused about where they are currently eligible to drop their ballot off and are now having to call the county in between classes in order to actually be able to figure out where to go vote and where they drop off their mail-in ballot,” Ehresman said.
TX Votes president Anthony Zhang said the organization has been going to different Zoom classes to educate students and answer any questions they may have about voting. Even though it is harder to vote, Zhang said students should know that they still can mail their ballots through the U.S. Postal Service.
“I definitely personally feel like the decision to close down all those locations absolutely is not going to help anyone vote, for sure,” said Zhang, a chemistry and public health senior. “But there's still the option to vote, just sending it in the mail in USPS, so it's not like you're totally gonna miss (voting) if you can’t access your one county’s location.”
