Thousands of voters in Dallas and Williamson counties showed up at the wrong location to vote in Tuesday’s Texas primary, according to the state Democratic Party.
While voters in both counties were able to cast their ballot at any polling location in the county during the early voting period and in previous elections, casting their ballot on Election Day in this year’s primary is limited to voting sites in each party’s specific precincts, leaving many people confused about where they were supposed to go. Some voters are being turned away, while others are casting provisional ballots, Texas Democratic Party Chair Terri Burke said.
“About a third of voters are having problems,” Burke said in a phone interview, adding that he believed the move to county-level voting and redistricting contributed to the confusion.
Political parties, not local governments, oversee voting on Texas primary election day. Democrats and Republicans in the state often administer elections jointly and outsource operations to county election officials, who in recent years have opted to have vote centers throughout the county that allow voters to cast their ballots wherever it is most convenient for them.
In Dallas County, fueled by election conspiracy theories about the security of vote-counting machines, Republicans opted to hold separate primaries at the precinct level and count their votes manually. Under state law, both Democrats and Republicans must hold their respective primaries at the congressional district level if a party so chooses.
Dallas County Republicans ultimately abandoned their plans to count ballots by hand due to high costs, but district-level voting plans moved forward.
Telephone calls to the Dallas County elections department result in an automated telephone message indicating that voting is based on precincts on Election Day and that voters should cast their ballot at their assigned voting site. The message also offered an option to find “Election Day Voting Centers,” which may confuse voters.
Voters who do not appear on the precinct’s list of registered voters can cast a provisional vote, but if it is not their assigned polling place, it will not be counted.
Rep. Jasmine Crockett, who represents a Dallas-based congressional district and is running for the Democratic nomination for Senate, criticized Republicans for the confusion.
“Voters in Dallas and Williamson counties have become accustomed to voting countywide, including on Election Day,” his campaign said in a statement. “This effort to suppress the vote, confuse and inconvenience voters is having the desired effect as people are being turned away from the polls. We are monitoring the situation and working with our local county party to explore all solutions, including an extension of voting hours on Election Day.”
The campaign of Crockett’s primary opponent, state Rep. James Talarico, said in a statement: “We are deeply concerned by reports of voters being turned away from the polls.”
