Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) has removed over one million people from the state’s voter rolls in an ongoing effort to bar ineligible voters, including non-citizens, from polling day.
The move on voter fraud comes 69 days out from the Tuesday, November 5 2024 presidential election.
Newsweek reports the removal of 1.1 million people from the voter rolls, which include those who have moved out of state, are deceased, or aren’t American citizens, came since the signing of Senate Bill 1 (SB 1) into law in September 2021.
At the time, the law was seen as one of several efforts driven by Republican-led states to ensure voter integrity following the 2020 presidential election.
According to Abbott’s office, among the people removed from the Texas voter rolls are over 6,500 noncitizens; over 6,000 voters who have a felony convictions; over 457,000 deceased people; over 463,000 voters on the suspense list and over 134,000 voters who responded to an address confirmation notice that they had moved.
Another 65,000 voters who failed to respond to a notice of examination have been ruled out along with over 19,000 voters who requested to cancel their registration.
“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,” Greg Abbott said in a written statement.
“Illegal voting in Texas will never be tolerated. We will continue to actively safeguard Texans’ sacred right to vote while also aggressively protecting our elections from illegal voting.”
Confirmation of the move comes after Abbott called out voter fraud back in June, “especially in Houston,” after a judge ruled that more than 1,400 votes in a 2022 district court race were invalid, forcing the results to be thrown out, as Breitbart News reported.
“Voter fraud is real. Especially in Houston,” the governor posted on X. “The court has found that 1,430 illegal votes were cast in the race for the 180th District Court.”
The ruling was sparked by Republican candidate Tami Pierce who filed a legal challenge against the results after narrowly losing to Judge DaSean Jones (D). Jones won by only 449 votes.
