Left: FILE – Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton speaks at a rally in support of President Donald Trump called the “Save America Rally” in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File). Right: Right: Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a church service and early vote event at Divine Faith Ministries International, Sunday, Oct. 20, 2024, in Jonesboro, Ga. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin).
In a last-minute attempt to keep federal officials away from Texas elections, indicted and impeached Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) over its plans to monitor polling sites in the state.
Paxton filed a nine-page complaint in U.S. District Court in Amarillo naming U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland and several other federal officials as defendants and accused the Biden-Harris administration of using federal agents to intimidate voters.
The lawsuit is a response to a Nov. 1 announcement by the DOJ that it would dispatch federal observers from several federal agencies to 86 jurisdictions across 27 states, including eight Texas counties, on Election Day. Observers are expected in Dallas, San Antonio, and Houston. The administration said that the DOJ’s civil rights division would coordinate the effort and that throughout the day Tuesday, personnel will maintain contact with state and local election officials.
The DOJ said that the observers will constitute an enforcement effort by the DOJ to ensure that federal elections statutes, including the Voting Rights Act, National Voter Registration Act, Help America Vote Act, Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act and Civil Rights Act, are followed. The DOJ also noted that the Americans with Disabilities Act protects the right of disabled persons to have a full and equal opportunity to vote, and that the DOJ’s criminal section enforces federal criminal statutes that prohibit voter intimidation and voter suppression based on race, color, national origin or religion.
Paxton, however, argued in his filing that under state law, poll watchers must be appointed by a candidate or political party, and that the DOJ’s observers fail to satisfy the legal requirements.
“Texas law allows ‘watchers’ to be present in both polling locations and central counting stations during the relevant election-day and vote-counting periods,” argued Paxton. “But far from creating a broad, catch-all exception under which DOJ monitors may slip into Texas polling stations and counting stations, ‘watcher’ is a tightly defined and closely restricted legal category under Texas statute.”
