Houston, Tx - Earlier this year Chicago, the third largest city in the country, was accused of instituting a new ID card system that could potentially grant undocumented immigrants voting rights. Now the fourth largest city is dealing with a similar controversy.
A Texas county was just accused of recklessly hiding voter data for non-citizens from the public eye. The Office of the Harris County Voter Registrar is deceptively withholding information related to possible non-citizen voters, according to a new lawsuit filed by The Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF). The PILF is a non-profit public interest firm that specializes in investigating election fraud and advocacy for government transparency.
The suit alleges the county office violated federal law by failing to disclose the data. Section 8 of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 allows individuals the right to request an inspection or seek copies of records related to the operational procedures for official government lists of eligible voters, according to legal experts at the PILF.
According to the PILF, the group submitted a brief in April of 2015 in front of the U.S. Supreme Court that detailed a sample of 13 unique cases. Each of these cases identified individuals who admitted to being non-citizens or refused to declare their status when applying to vote. Despite their fraudulent behavior, they were still registered and granted the same voting rights as non-citizens.
The group has also highlighted testimony from the Harris County voter registrar’s office dating back to 2006 that suggests non-citizen voting “has and will continue to occur.”
The group states that in May 2015 Harris County voter registration officials testified in front of the Texas House Elections Committee.
They claimed “thousands” of non-citizens were discovered in the voter registration system every year. They also said the the District Attorney was regularly made aware of these cases for the purpose of criminal prosecution.
In Harris County voter registration is overseen by the county's Tax Assessor-Collector Ann Harris Bennett, a Democrat who was elected in 2016.
PILF President and General Counsel J. Christian Adams said, “Harris County has previously admitted a problem with non-citizen registration and voting. Election officials should be transparent, and in fact are required by federal law to be transparent. Our requests to inspect records will help educate lawmakers and the public alike on how non-citizens are gaining entry into the voting system; how long they remain; how they vote; and what we can do to fix the issue. The question is not if—but how many non-citizens are participating? Harris County cannot expect to get away with avoiding its federal transparency responsibilities.”
This isn't the only case of alleged Texas voter fraud currently making headlines. The losing candidate in the Dallas County District Attorney’s race says voter fraud committed by fellow Democrats cost her the win in the March primary. District Judge Elizabeth Davis Frizell is suing John Creuzot, the Democrat former state district judge who beat her by a slim margin in the March 6 Democrat primary for Dallas County District Attorney. Her petition alleges serious instances of voter fraud.
Frizell wants the results of the primary election to be “declared void as it is impossible to ascertain the true result.” If that happened, it would prompt a special election.
Pursuit of Happiness Radio reached out to Elizabeth Davis Frizell & Ann Harris Bennett for further comment but, amazingly, none of these Democrats wanted to talk to us.
As these stories develop, we'll keep you posted.
1 of 3 2 of 3 3 of 3