Voter ID bill delayed in the Senate

AUSTIN (KXAN) - Though the state Senate was expected to take up the controversial Voter ID bill on Monday, but the first reading was delayed until Tuesday. The second reading is scheduled for Wednesday. Last week the Senate Committee of The Whole passed the bill by a vote of 19 to 12. That vote was right down party lines, with Republicans winning the first round.

The Senate was expected to vote on the bill and pass it before sending to the House Monday. There a committee will hear testimony before deciding whether to allow the full House to vote on it.

The bill would require anyone wanting to cast a ballot to show a photo identification. Republicans said it is necessary to curb voter fraud, while Democrats said it will discriminate against minorities and low-income voters.

While members of the Senate make sure the their “i"s are dotted and their “t”s are crossed when it comes to Voter ID, other lawmakers are gathering an arsenal of information for when the debate makes its way to the House.

“We went out and met the people they’re purporting to have committed voter fraud,” said Rep. Rafael Anchia (D-Dallas).

Anchia said his team spent the interim between sessions cross checking the database of potential illegal registered voters against the DPS database. The thousands of names of potential illegal voters came from comparing jury summons cards to voter registration cards. The registration card said the person was a citizen and the jury summons said they were not.

“We found most of them who had checked ‘eligible to vote’ on a registration card and then ‘illegal resident’ on a jury summons had actually been born in the United States,” said Anchia. “The two who were registered but not citizens had been sent registration cards in the mail even though they marked noncitizen on the card.”

In the past few sessions, the Senate has been the chamber that has stopped the bill after it passed the House. However, this time Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst allowed Republican senators to change a long-standing rule requiring two-thirds support of any bill for it to pass. The rule-change went into effect only for Voter ID, and the move allowed the bill to easily get a floor vote.

According to the State Attorney General Office's, there have been 30 cases of voter fraud prosecuted in Texas since 2005, and eight are pending and 58 have been referred from the November election.

Critics said a Voter ID bill would not protect Texans from the types of fraud that have been reported and that no cases of "voter impersonation," which would be covered by a Voter ID bill, have been prosecuted.

According to a report issued by the State Auditor’s Office, there are potentially 49,049 registered voters who are actually ineligible to vote. That number includes:

• Voter records for 23,114 possible felons
• Records for 23,576 voters who may be deceased
• Duplicate records for 2,359 voters

The report goes on to say that auditors “did not identify any instances in which potentially ineligible voters actually voted during the May 12, 2007 special election,” which is when this investigation was made.

Sen. Troy Fraser (R-Horseshoe Bay), who sponsored the Voter ID legislation, said this confusion is the very reason why Texas needs more defined voting laws.

“Not only is it hard to identify when someone votes illegally, it’s even much harder to prosecute because there is nothing under Texas Law to allow for that,” said Fraser.

Fraser’s bill would mandate a voter either bring a photo identification or two other forms of identification to the polls. It also has a provision for the state to issue free state identification cards to those who do not have the proper identification to present at the polls.

There is no hard figure for the cost of that provision. Another cost will be educating the public about the new law, one of the stipulations of the bill. Sen. Ogden, Chair of the Senate Finance committee added a $2 million rider to the bill for that reason on Monday.

The Senate is scheduled to have its first reading for the bill on Tuesday and a second reading on Wednesday. It will then go to a House committee for a hearing.