SAN ANTONIO — This article includes reporting by The Texas Tribune.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, continuing a crusade against what he deems potentially illegal voting-related practices in the months leading up to November election, has now set his sights on Bexar County.
On Wednesday, Paxton said he sued the Bexar County Commissioners Court after it OKd a proposal to print and mail voter registration forms to new residents. This comes after a letter Paxton sent to Commissioners Court on Monday in which criticized he proposal and threatened to file a lawsuit. He followed through on those threats Wednesday.
“Despite being warned against adopting this blatantly illegal program that would spend taxpayer dollars to mail registration applications to potentially ineligible voters, Bexar County has irresponsibly chosen to violate the law,” Paxton in a Wednesday press release. “This program is completely unlawful and potentially invites election fraud. It is a crime to register to vote if you are ineligible.”
Hours later, Bexar County District Attorney Joe Gonzales said he would defend the Commissioners Court from what he called an "attack" by Paxton.
"My office will do everything in its power to defend that decision from the attack by Attorney General Ken Paxton and his meritless attempt to stop democracy through the improper use of our court system," Gonzales said in a statement.
In order to be eligible to vote in Texas, residents must be a U.S. citizen; live in the county where they applied to register to vote; and be at least 18 years old on Election Day. Convicted felons aren't allowed to vote until they have completed their sentence and any probation periods, nor can those deemed by a court to be mentally incapacitated register.
Gonzales said he reviewed the Commissioners Court proposal after the governing body received Paxton's letter this week. The district attorney called the initiative, which officials said will target new residents or those who have changed addresses, "a simple yet profound decision to expand participation in our democratic process."
Disagreements in legality
Paxton disagreed. He said in his Monday letter that those who find a voter registration form in the mail as a result of the county's initiative could become confused about their eligibility status.
"At worst, it may induce the commission of a crime by encouraging individuals who are ineligible to vote to provide false information on the form," Paxton wrote in Monday's letter, specifying those individuals in a news release as potential felons or noncitizens. "Either way, it is illegal, and if you move forward with this proposal, I will use all available legal means to stop you."
County commissioners voted 3-1 to hire Civic Government LLC – a group which purports to "maintain the most comprehensive unregistered voter database available" – to send the mailers. Agenda materials say such an action would constitute an exemption to the Texas County Purchasing Act, which requires county governments to engage in a competitive bidding process for expenditures of more than $50,000.
Sakai, who voted in favor of the mailers, said in a Wednesday press release that the mailers would focus on those who have recently moved to the area and may not be registered. He also insisted that the county's actions are within its parameters, having received the legal opinion from Gonzales' office.
“The right to vote is a foundation of democracy, and voter registration is a gateway to civic participation," Sakai said. "Bexar County’s nonpartisan effort to provide voter registration applications to targeted eligible citizens is within the authority of the County and consistent with State law."
The Commissioners Court agenda also cited an exemption centered around "an item that can be obtained from only one source." However, Paxton wrote Bexar County leaders that he believed registering voters constituted a service and not an "item."
In his Monday letter, Paxton also further condemned what he called the "Biden-Harris administration's open border policies," saying that Texas has "ballooning noncitizen populations" that he suggested the county's voter registration mailer efforts would target.
"It is more important than ever that we maintain the integrity of our voter rolls and ensure only eligible voters decide our elections," he wrote. "Your proposal does the opposite by indiscriminately inviting county residents to register to vote regardless of their eligibility. I urge you to abandon this proposal."
A similar letter was sent to Harris County leaders, whom Paxton said are considering a similar plan as Bexar County's.
The attorney general's letter comes on the heels of his Election Integrity Unit executing search warrants in Bexar, Frio and Atascosa counties last month—the result of an election integrity investigation that started in 2022, according to a news release. The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) said the raids targeted six of its members, including a Democrat running for a state House seat that includes Uvalde.
Paxton’s office has said little about that probe other than it pertains to allegations of election fraud and vote harvesting. Affidavits for warrants obtained by The Texas Tribune show that investigators were looking into allegations that a Frio County political operator had illegally harvested votes for multiple local races.
LULAC called the searches an effort "to suppress the Latino vote through intimidation and any means necessary to tilt the electoral process in favor of his political allies." And, just before the holiday weekend, a coalition of Texas Democrats called on the DOJ to investigate Paxton's actions.
Commissioners and the elections administrator chime in
Precinct 2 Bexar County Commissioner Justin Rodriguez expressed his support for the voter registration initiative in a statement, calling it a commitment to making sure everyone who is eligible to cast a ballot does so this November.
"The voter registration initiative we have championed is designed to expand access and simplify the registration process, empowering more people to exercise their fundamental right to vote," Rodriguez said. "Despite the baseless claims and legal challenges from the Texas attorney general, this initiative remains a pro-democracy effort aimed solely at strengthening the voice of our community."
Grant Moody, Bexar County commissioner for Precinct 3, doubled down on why he voted against the measure, stressing continued doubt regarding the county's bypassing of the competitive bidding process and questioning whether the third-party vendor's CEO has partisan-filled motivations.
"There's just so many concerns in my mind, whether it's the organization that we're working with... there's two different organizations (Civitech and Civic Government Solutions), they have the same CEO, one's supposed to be nonpartisan," Moody said. “Clearly, based on all the presentations and what we heard from our elections administrator about all the different PACs and parties that are doing the same exact thing today, I’m very skeptical to think that CGS is the only person who can do this job if the county thought we needed to do it, which I don’t."
Bexar County's Elections Administrator Jacque Callanen, who will relinquish her position after November, also released a statement, saying that while she's listed in the lawsuit, it's purely based on her role.
"Not because I was involved with, nor encouraged, the county’s decision to award a $393,000 to Civic Government Solutions, or CGS," Callanen said. "I will go on record saying that I was not consulted in advance about hiring CGS. The Bexar County Elections Department encourages all potential Bexar County voters through an active voter registration push."