Texas Supreme Court: Voters don't qualify for mail-in ballots due to lack of COVID immunity

[babylonsister]

Texas Supreme Court: Voters don’t qualify for mail-in ballots due to lack of COVID immunity
By Tessa Weinberg
May 27, 2020 06:59 PM , Updated 30 minutes ago


The Texas Supreme Court ruled Wednesday afternoon that a lack of immunity to the novel coronavirus does not make a voter eligible for a mail-in ballot under Texas law.

Attorney General Ken Paxton had asked the state’s highest civil court to weigh in on the issue to prevent local election officials in some of Texas’ largest counties from processing mail-in ballots for voters who cite the disability category and normally would not qualify.

While the court agreed with Paxton that a lack of immunity to the virus alone would not qualify a voter for a mail-in ballot, they declined to order local election officials to investigate mail-in ballot applications they have received and said there is no evidence election officials have processed faulty ones.

“We agree with the State that a voter’s lack of immunity to COVID-19, without more, is not a ‘disability’ as defined by the Election Code. But the State acknowledges that election officials have no responsibility to question or investigate a ballot application that is valid on its face,” the opinion written by Chief Justice Nathan Hecht read.

Read more here: https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/election/article243039891.html

[still_one]

1. Can this be appealed to the SC? and will it?

[Ilsa]

2. so the texas scotus are all doctors

and epidemiologists now? No one knows who is immune, or if immunity would last more than a few months. Everyone should assume they are not immune.

Tx should change mail-in voting law to permit it without an excuse.

[Laelth]

3. The legislature COULD do that.

I would even agree that the legislature SHOULD do that, but here, the Court acted appropriately and stayed out of the fight—leaving it to the legislature.

Or, so it appears to me.



-Laelth

[panader0]

4. Voter suppression does not get much more blatant than this.

I hope they are swamped with requests for mail-in ballots, with all manner of reasons
for disability. "I have bad knees and cannot stand for long." "I get mentally stressed in crowds."
"My mom needs constant care and I can't leave her." Etc., etc.

[Vogon_Glory]

5. This may be an "Our Lives, Our Fortunes, Our Sacred Honor" election

The Republican jurists may
find that they’ve made this election might be between certain Evangelicals and people who really loathe this administration and are willing to risk their lives and health to throw it out of power.

[MiniMe]

6. They are terrified they will lose Texas