AUSTIN (Nexstar) — Texas has removed 1.1 million people from voter rolls since 2021, Gov. Greg Abbott's office announced Monday, highlighting efforts to clean up election data and ensure legal registration.
That includes 6,500 potential noncitizens and more than 457,000 deceased people, according to data the governor's office provided. But the largest number of canceled registrations, more than 463,000, came from people on the state's voter suspense list.
When Nico Ramsey went to check his voter record last week, he said he surprisingly found himself among the 2.2 million Texans whose registration status is currently listed as "suspense."
What this means, according to the Texas Secretary of State's Office, is that their counties do not know their address or think they moved, which often happens because either a voter registration card or a jury summons sent in the mail is returned as undeliverable.
"I was confused when I saw 'suspense' on my status," Ramsey said Tuesday. "One, it's not that descriptive on what that means, and it's kind of intimidating, in a way, to see. Will I still be able to vote? Did I miss out on something? And also knowing that any time I move, I'm always filling out that change of address, and that has always in the past sufficed for switching over my voter information."
He said he has now submitted another change-of-address form to resolve this issue, though what's strange is that the information listed on the state's voting portal includes his current address and zip code. Plus, he voted in the most recent round of elections this spring with no issues. He also posted about his situation on Instagram so that his circle of friends and followers could check on the accuracy of their information.
"I believe my network felt the same amount of shock because they know my voting habits. I'm a very loud, active, proud voter," Ramsey said. "However, what that did was it sparked someone to go look at their own voter status because if it can happen to me, an active voter, it could happen to someone who might vote not so often, and that's actually an easier way to fall into a non-active status."
More than 12% of the state's almost 18.3 million registered voters are currently part of that suspense list. People can review whether they're part of it by entering their information into this state portal to check their voter registration status or by contacting their county's voter registrar.
If they're seeking to be removed from the suspense list, voters can update their address online by Oct. 7, which is the deadline to register to vote in time for the November general election.
To use that online service, people will need to share their current driver's license or ID card, their Social Security number or their voter registration card's voter unique identifier (VUID) number.
"If you are on suspense, you can still vote," said Joyce LeBombard, president of the League of Women Voters of Texas, noting that people on the list will have to go through a few additional steps before casting a ballot.
Voters will have to complete a Statement of Residence form either when they vote by mail or at their polling location prior to voting. If they moved to a new county, they'll have to a complete a Limited Ballot application during early voting at the main early voting polling place.
A voter on suspense who moved within the same county, though, would be allowed to vote on Election Day by returning to the precinct in which they previously lived and completing a Statement of Residence at that time.
According to the Travis County Tax Office, it will send two letters through the U.S. Postal Service when it attempts to reach voters at risk of removal from the voter roll. Voters who fail to respond go to a "suspense" file. Voting will move them back to the active voters list. However, state law requires the county to remove the names of those either not voting or who fail to contact the county after four years in that suspense status.
"I think suspense can sound like a scary word, and it's not. Actually, the suspense list is a way to protect voters because you may have accidentally ended up on this list even though you haven't moved," said Alicia Pierce, a spokesperson for the Texas Secretary of State's Office. "The suspense list guarantees that you'll continue to be on the voter rolls for two election cycles, so that means probably about four years. Then, if for some reason you haven't moved but you ended up on the list, the way to take yourself off the list is to just vote in one of the elections."
Ramsey urged people to take all of these steps now so that they can make sure their vote counts come November.
"The message I have for people is to don't assume that your status might always be active," he said. "Double check and check often."
“Election integrity is essential to our democracy,” Abbott said. "The Secretary of State and county voter registrars have an ongoing legal requirement to review the voter rolls, remove ineligible voters, and refer any potential illegal voting to the Attorney General’s Office and local authorities for investigation and prosecution."
On Monday, the League of United Latin American Citizens, or LULAC called for the federal Department of Justice to intervene in the state's investigation into allegations of vote harvesting. The call comes after some LULAC volunteers said the state authorities raided their homes and seized phones and computers.
Attorney General Ken Paxton said the searches are tied to allegations that Frio County officially illegally harvested votes for local races. Those accused deny the allegations and worry the investigation could stifle legal efforts to help elderly voters get registered.
Top Texas Republicans have dedicated significant time and resources to targeting voter fraud, though cases in Texas are exceedingly rare.
The review comes after Abbott signed Senate Bill 1 in 2021, which increased the penalty for lying while registering to vote to a state jail felony and requires the Secretary of State to audit random county election offices every two years.
The focus on penalties has some people worried about the effect on voters.
"It's concerning because we don't want to scare people who are eligible to vote to not go to the polls," LeBombard said. "We are concerned that it might cause some people to not go vote, just based on the way things are being phrased by the Governor and Attorney General."
Eagle Pass Democrat Eddie Morales called state investigations into voter fraud and ballot harvesting a "scare tactic."
"This false narrative that there's all these undocumented folks that are registering to vote, that our election system somehow is rigged... it's not," Morales said. "It is anticipated that there will not be any problems in the November election. We have a great checks and balances system in place."
Lawmakers from both parties stressed the integrity of Texas elections and encouraged Texans to vote with faith that the system is fair, accurate and secure.
"What we want is our voters to say, 'these are fair, these are transparent, my vote counts.' As a state, we need to be the gold standard for the country, and the country, the gold standard for the world," State Rep. Mano DeAyala, R-Houston, said.
The last day to register to vote in the November election is Oct. 7. Check your voter registration at VoteTexas.gov.
Abbott recently said he plans to expand buoy barriers across the Rio Grande to stop migrants from crossing the southern border but is waiting for a court to affirm the state’s right to use them.
In an exclusive interview with NewsNation, Abbott said buoys are one of the most effective ways to discourage migrants from trying to cross from Mexico into Texas. He added the cost is “one-tenth” that of a border wall.
“You can expect to see an increase of the buoys in the Rio Grande River,” Abbott said, but added that he is waiting “on a final decision from the court that has to enforce what the Fifth Circuit already told them to enforce before making that investment.”
In July, the entire appeals court for the 5th U.S. Circuit overturned a previous decision by a divided panel of the court that sided with a federal district judge, who ruled that the buoys must be moved under a preliminary injunction.
The full bench said the court abused its discretion in granting the injunction.
The broader lawsuit is still underway, where the Biden administration accuses Texas of violating the federal Rivers and Harbor Act. The court will decide the merits of the federal government’s claims.
A new study from the Texas Comptroller shows just how widespread housing affordability challenges are in Texas.
According to the report, Texas is more than 300,000 homes short of what it needs and Texans from major cities to rural communities are struggling with housing costs.
Comptroller Glenn Hegar noted in the report, “Housing supply is the crux of the affordability issue, and there are no easy, clear-cut fixes to this challenge.”
"The fact is, we need to be able to make more housing available, both single family and multi family residences, and what that means, in large part, is dealing with local zoning laws as well as the time that it takes permitting to get these applications in these houses being built," Hegar told State of Texas host Josh Hinkle.
Some suggestions to encourage more home construction included the state working to reduce property taxes, increasing funding for low- to moderate-income housing programs as well as offering incentives to increase the housing supply at the price range where it’s most needed.
"When people don't have as much money because they are spending more on housing, they don't have quite the disposable income, and that impacts their quality of life," Hegar noted.
"That doesn't quite get the attention, that maybe road congestion, making sure that we have water quality, public education, higher education, those are all things that are components for a strong economy, but affordable housing is equally important as many of these other topics," he added.
Hegar also advised local governments that they could do their part by possibly making the permitting process simpler and looking into more public-private partnerships to address housing affordability.
Acting on some of those ideas could come next year when state lawmakers return to the Texas Capitol for a new session on Jan. 14.
"The first thing that I wanted to do is bring a greater awareness that this issue is equally as important, or more important in the long term than several other issues, to the economic affordability of the average Texan in this state," Hegar said of the report.
"The next steps are finding what are the more targeted solutions that we can help resolve affordability in the long run, and that's the next step that we'll work with the legislature on," Hegar added.
Josh Abbott is proud of the Texas roots that ring through his red dirt music. His band has risen to statewide stardom since he founded the country group while studying at Texas Tech in 2006. Now, he worries that grit could be grifted by fakes powered by artificial intelligence.
"There's all sorts of ways AI can be used for good in all industries, but there's also ways it can take advantage of people," Josh Abbott told Nexstar after testifying on the issue in front of the Senate Business and Commerce Committee on Tuesday. "My focus right now is to limit how it can take advantage of people like myself, but also all of my friends, colleagues, peers in the music industry."
Josh Abbott warned legislators there are insufficient restrictions on the name, image, and likeness of artists, especially relating to "deepfakes" of a singer's voice.
"Somebody could go out, record a song, put my name on it, have an AI-generated version of my voice and perhaps my band, and it misrepresent our band. Or even, maybe it's really good and it streams a ton, but we're not seeing any royalties from that," he said.
Some AI programs can now produce convincing voice impersonations of artists on demand, mimicking their unique sound and even lyrical styles.
The issue capped Tuesday's hearing where state senators grappled with the benefits, and risks, of the emerging technology.
"We are, in real time, trying to figure out how to govern a thing and regulate a thing that doesn't even fully exist yet," State Sen. Nathan Johnson, D-Dallas, told Nexstar. "We're in a totally new frontier."
Johnson anticipates lawmakers will file a "buckshot" of bills relating to AI when the next session convenes in January, leading to unconventional political alliances around issues that do not fall neatly into ideological lines. He said the issue is about no less than Texas' identity.
"When we're talking about art in particular, that is an economic driver," he said. "But as one of the witnesses said in the hearing, it's also our culture. It's our cultural soul. If we don't protect artists, we won't have any art. If we don't have any art, our whole civilization dies. I don't want to be melodramatic, but really -- it's what we are."
In the self-proclaimed "Live Music Capital of the World," the Texas Capitol is behind other states in protecting artists' intellectual property. In March, Tennessee Governor Bill Lee signed the "ELVIS" Act into law -- "Ensuring Likeness Voice Image Security." The law builds upon state identity protections to include "voice" in the category of protected likeness.
In August, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker signed a law increasing protections for recording artists that will go into effect next year.
Congress is also trying to tackle the issue. In January, Rep. Maria Salazar, R-Florida, introduced the "No Artificial Intelligence Fake Replicas and Unauthorized Duplications Act, or No AI FRAUD Act." The bill has bipartisan support and says individuals have property rights to their likeness and voice. Cosponsors include representatives like Republican Nathaniel Moran and Democrat Henry Cuellar of Texas. The bill is pending in the House Judiciary Committee.
The White House also developed a blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights in October 2022 that includes guidance on data privacy. It says AI developers should seek permission before using someone's data.
Texas won't take any legislative action on the issue until at least mid-2025. Lawmakers return for the 89th legislative session in January.
"Your voice is your brand, your skills are your brand. Your name, your image, your likeness, we have a duty to protect those things," Josh Abbott said. "Texas culture specifically has such a long history and pride when it comes to Texas singers and songwriters... if you think about it from that perspective, it really puts a high importance and priority on protecting those people."
