Texas does more to clean up elections

A RINO gets tossed out on her ear

The Texas Tribune would have us believe Hughs was as pure as the wind-driven snow

The Texas Tribune gives us its liberal slant on the ouster of Texas Secretary of State Ruth Ruggero Hughs.

Gov. Greg Abbott will end a second consecutive legislative session without a secretary of state.

Texas Secretary of State Ruth Ruggero Hughs, the state’s top elections official, has notified the governor she would be stepping down from her post, which she was appointed to in August 2019, according to a press release from her office. Her resignation is effective May 31 — the last day of the legislation session.

A secretary of state appointed in between regular legislative sessions is constitutionally required to leave office immediately if the Senate goes through an entire session without confirming them. The Senate Nominations Committee, chaired by Republican Dawn Buckingham, never took up Hughs’ nomination. Buckingham’s office declined to comment on why the committee did not consider the nomination.

Hughs’ departure at the end of the session will allow Abbott to pick her replacement without needing an immediate confirmation vote from the Texas Senate, which will be unable to vet the next pick until lawmakers return to the Capitol in the fall for a special session to redraw the state’s political maps.

Hughs’ predecessor, David Whitley, gave the governor similar latitude by resigning on the last day of the 2019 legislative session even though it was clear he lacked the votes to keep the job after he oversaw a botched effort to scour the voter rolls for supposed noncitizens. The review instead threatened the voting rights of tens of thousands of naturalized citizens, landed the state in federal court and prompted a congressional inquiry into voting rights violations.

Confirmation requires a two-thirds vote. Republicans hold 18 seats in the Senate, and Democrats hold 13.

The Texas secretary of state serves as the state’s chief election officer. Hughs office was responsible for providing guidance to counties as they scrambled to reimagine the voting process during a pandemic election. Since that election, Texas Republicans have been agitating to make major changes to the election process, channeling in part a national movement to focus on voter fraud although there is no evidence it occurs on a widespread scale. A Hughs deputy told lawmakers earlier this year that “Texas had an election that was smooth and secure.”

Hughs stayed out of that political fray and kept a much lower profile during her time in office compared with Whitley.

“During the course of my tenure, I have been humbled to work alongside so many others in improving the lives of all Texans through fostering and strengthening our international relationships, facilitating business growth and trade, overseeing the conduct of our elections, and promoting civic participation,” she said in a statement Friday.

(Read more — including her support of this rag — at the Texas Tribune)

Rather than focus on the ouster of Hughs , this Big-Tech-preferred news source focuses more on the purported “sins” of the previous office holder

It seems Big Tech does not want the reading public to know about the issues surrounding the drive-through voting implemented by the Democrats (only partially discussed below by Newsweek).

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In contraposition to the Texas Tribune narrative, Newsweek told us about a problem with drive-through voting

Hughs approved the Democrat scheme for drive-through voting and would not throw out unverifiable ballots collected through drive-through voting

Newsweek pointed in a 1 November 2020 article to the conflict between Hughs and the Texas GOP over drive-through ballots.

Texas Republicans are seeking to have around 117,000 ballots thrown out by a federal court in advance of the presidential election on November 3. More than 91 million people have already voted nationally.

The request has been brought in Harris County by a Republican state representative, two GOP candidates and wealthy conservative activist, according to the Texas Tribune.

They argue that the votes should be thrown out because they were cast at drive-thru voting locations and drive-thru voting violates the U.S. Constitution. District Judge Andrew Hanen is expected to make a decision by November 2.

Harris County is Texas’ most populous county, with a population of more than 4.7 million, and is largely Democratic in its voting patterns.

The 117,000 votes in question could potentially affect the outcome of the election in Texas and throw the state to former Vice President Joe Biden.

It would be the first time a Democrat had won the state since Jimmy Carter in 1976, but polls show it is a possibility.

Texas Secretary of State Ruth Hughes approved the use of drive-thru voting locations when Harris County brought the issue up in June of this year. Ten drive-thru voting places were set up in the county by Harris County Clerk Chris Hollins.

Voters drive into a large tent and election officials confirm their identity and give them privacy to cast their votes. Texas Republicans began to challenge the procedure on October 15. That was two days after early voting began.

(Read more bilge at Newsweek)

Although there were no reviews that I could find of the problems with drive-through voting, there were many problems

While the the main-stream media seems to do nothing but praise drive-through voting, there were a number of problems with its implementation, including:

• It was unequally applied (with 9 of the 10 drive through locations in Harris County set up in Democrat areas)
• While Democrats were still holding most Americans on lockdown, it allowed up to 16 people into a van (that then became a communal voting booth)
• It allowed the voting tablet be passed from one voter to another without verifying the vote was cast (whereas, in the past for most voters, only the voter went into the booth)
• Poll watchers were not allowed to verify that the number of votes cast per vehicle matched the number of voters

Due to these problems, the Secretary of State should have suspended the scheme as it was applied by Democrat Chris Hollens rather than letting it go through unchallenged.

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The legislature gets the last laugh

Hughs finds that, after siding with the Democrats, there are not enough RINOs to save her

TheTexan.news reports how Hughs was not able to garner enough confirmation votes within the Texas Senate.

This requires a hat tip to the Chris Salcedo Show.

Governor Greg Abbott must now search for the fifth secretary of state during his time as governor after current secretary, Ruth Hughs, announced her resignation this week.

Hughs’ nomination for another term as the state’s top elections officer was not taken up by the Senate Nominations Committee, effectively forcing her resignation.

“During the course of my tenure, I have been humbled to work alongside so many others in improving the lives of all Texans through fostering and strengthening our international relationships, facilitating business growth and trade, overseeing the conduct of our elections, and promoting civic participation,” Hughs said in a release announcing the departure.

“I am proud of the work that this office has accomplished, and by working collaboratively, we have helped to build a brighter future for all Texans.”

Hughs previously served in the Texas Workforce Commission and the Texas Attorney General’s Office.

“Ruth’s exceptional leadership has helped strengthen the Texas brand on the international stage and grow our businesses and trade relationships around the world. Ruth also served as a trustworthy steward of our elections,” said Abbott.

The point of contention over Hughs by many Texas Republicans centers on the 2020 election, during which multiple counties expanded their elections operations beyond the purview set forth in Texas’ election code. Foremost among those was Harris County’s Interim Elections Administrator Chris Hollins whose office attempted to mail absentee ballots to all registered voters, rather than those who qualify and request them.

In Texas, only those aged of 65 or older, those with a disability or illness preventing them from voting in-person, or those who will be outside their home county during the election can vote by absentee ballot.

Hollins and other elections clerks pointed to the “disability or illness” section and said that a lack of immunity to coronavirus triggered that provision, allowing virtually every voter to vote by mail. That contention was swatted down by the Texas Supreme Court. Hollins also unilaterally expanded drive-thru voting operations in Harris County, mail ballot drop-off locations, and seriously limited the ability of poll watchers to observe the electoral process.

Hughs has been criticized by some for not cracking down harder on Hollins and other clerks that drastically changed the way their counties conducted the election, sometimes outright illegally.

The Secretary of State’s Office serves in a guidance-heavy role without much power to issue dictates. That is by design of the legislature. Texas has a bottom-up electoral system with counties responsible for carrying out election operations within the parameters set by the legislature.

(Read more at TheTexan.news)

Thank Heaven that Texas has taken a stand for voting integrity

We cannot go soft within our ranks on the topic of voting integrity. This defacto dismissal is a great example.

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