State Sen. Nathan Johnson: “They’re actively discouraging voter participation. I find that anything but election integrity.”
DALLAS — State Senator Nathan Johnson, D-Dallas, says he and a group of Senate Democrats have yet to hear back from the Department of Justice.
The Dallas lawmaker is one of a dozen Senators who sent a letter asking the DOJ to investigate whether Republicans are violating the voting rights of Texans.
They specifically point to three examples.
Republican state leaders recently announced that around a million people have been removed from voter rolls since 2021.
The Democratic lawmakers say because of the timing, the large number of folks removed and the lack of transparency, they’re concerned legitimate voters may have had their voter registrations canceled.
The letter also points to Attorney General Ken Paxton’s investigations into voter registration organizations for allegedly registering non-citizens outside some DPS offices in Texas.
Sen. Johnson says the investigations were prompted in the first place by a false social media post that was quickly debunked.
Republican leaders have justified those actions by claiming they’re securing the election and preventing illegal voting.
Senator Johnson says that’s nonsense and insists Republicans are trying to do two things at once.
“Simultaneously rig the election so that they can win, and delegitimize the vote so that if they don’t win, or if they win by a narrow margin, they can blame someone else,” the Democrat told us on Inside Texas Politics. “They are trying to stop people from voting, to scare people from voting.”
Finally, the letter to the DOJ states AG Paxton has also tried to shut down a couple of Catholic organizations along the border that provide shelter and support to migrants and asylum seekers.
The lawmakers claim the AG is targeting those organizations because they don’t align with his political positions.
Paxton says he’s investigating whether the organizations are illegally harboring undocumented immigrants and encouraging them to stay here.
Senator Johnson questions the timing of all the efforts this close to the election.
“They’re trying to lie to the public that there’s some rampant voter fraud going on, so that people will protest the election result when Trump loses, which could foment all kinds of unrest,” said the Democrat. “They’re also scaring people, and that gets base voters to the polls on the far right. I don’t have any respect for these tactics whatsoever.”
The Democrat is also one of two state Senators who’ve appeared on Inside Texas Politics recently, along with Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller, to tell us Texas is running out of water and the crisis is about to take center stage.
This includes discussing new water sources, cleaning existing water and the new statewide flood plan.
Sen. Johnson says he’s heard from several lawmakers, Democrat and Republican alike, who are ready to take a bipartisan, aggressive approach to addressing the problem during the next legislative session in January.
“It is time to start making serious investments in state infrastructure, as opposed to, you know, coming back with another round of property tax reductions while our infrastructure lies neglected,” the Democrat told us. “Because when I look at what my kids will be facing in this state, and what future generations will be facing, they don’t need a $17 property tax break. They need water.”