Texas Election Official Forced to Resign After Discovery of 10K Uncounted Ballots
Secure elections are essential to a fair outcome, but Democrats recoil at the mere mention of measures like voter ID laws or restrictions on casting absentee ballots.
Their resistance to shoring up the process doesn’t improve faith in fair elections. Neither do situations like the one in Harris County, Texas, where 10,000 mail-in votes — 6,000 Democrats and 4,000 Republicans — went uncounted after the March 1 primary, Fox News reported.
The votes were to be counted Tuesday, a full week after the election, according to The Texas Tribune.
Harris County Elections Administrator Isabel Longoria, who was appointed to the position in 2020, announced her intention to resign Tuesday, in a move that comes just one day after the Harris County Republican Party announced legal action to oust her.
Harris County, Texas, election official resigns amid vote count discrepancy https://t.co/vPpUGMYXNp
— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) March 9, 2022
Longoria was appointed elections administrator by Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo, a progressive Democrat, according to Fox. (In Texas, the presiding officer of county commissioners is known as the “county judge.”)
Longaria’s resignation came hours after Hidalgo called for a “change of leadership” in the elections office, Fox reported. It will take effect July 1.
In addition to the missing ballots, Longoria’s county was plagued with other problems including a shortage of poll workers, and issues with voting machines.
Longoria claimed that her office reported the votes immediately upon discovery, but Harris County Commissioner Tom Ramsey disputed that claim, according to the New York Post.
“We know about them because of the protocol if the Secretary of State was able to call us and say, ‘Hey, you’re short the 10,000,'” Ramsey said, according to the Post.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who signed tougher election laws that led to thousands of mail-in votes being disqualified ahead of the election, according to The Hill, was incensed that Longoria so badly “bungled the election” in her county.
“Republicans & Democrats agree: Harris County elections chief bungled the election,” the Republican governor tweeted Wednesday.
“Bad staff & inadequate voting machines were just part of it. They ‘found’ 10,000 more votes a week AFTER the election,” he pointed out.
“There are 254 counties in TX. Only 1 got it wrong.”
Republicans & Democrats agree: Harris County elections chief bungled the election.
Bad staff & inadequate voting machines were just part of it.
They “found” 10,000 more votes a week AFTER the election.
There are 254 counties in TX. Only 1 got it wrong.https://t.co/pnGJ0QLLyZ
— Greg Abbott (@GregAbbott_TX) March 9, 2022
The home of the city of Houston, Harris County is the most populous in Texas.
The problems there appear to be the result of gross incompetence, but this matter does serve to illustrate how easy it is to undermine the process without even trying.
Elections security has been a growing concern following the 2020 presidential election, though to say so was taboo at the time.
It was called the most secure election of all time but was later found to be fraught with problems. Charges of outright fraud that were once deemed impossible have also come to light since then, all while proposed voter identification laws have been challenged by Democrats as a return to Jim Crow-era racism.
With so many moving parts to the process and so much on the line during elections, it would make sense to take every measure to ensure elections are properly conducted and ballots correctly counted.
However, Democrats continue to resist procedures that make it tougher to stuff ballot boxes while their corporate cronies and celebrity blowhards back them up on it.
Meanwhile, distrust in the process continues to fester among the American people who see things like what happened in Harris County and the Democratic Party’s hysterical rejection of commonsense election measures and wonder if their votes are really counted properly.
If this continues unabated, there’s no hope for a united country behind any president or politician going forward — and that’s a grave consequence that simply must be avoided.
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