Federal Judge Tosses Texas GOP Bid To Invalidate Nearly 127,000 Drive-Through Votes

A federal judge in Texas threw out a bid by Republican activists to toss nearly 127,000 drive-through ballots cast in the most populous county in Texas, which leans Democratic.

“For lack of a nicer way of saying it, I ain’t buying it,” said US District Judge Andrew Hansen of the last-minute challenge to voting rules, adding that the activists lack standing.

“You have a tough uphill row to hoe,” Hanen told the plaintiffs earlier, adding that they would have to do a “fair amount of convincing” in a very short period of time before Tuesday’s general election.

“A lot of people would say, ‘Gee, if I had known there was a question about voting drive-in, I would have parked my car and walked to the polls,” Hansen added.

According to Bloomberg, the hearing took place just one day after the Texas Supreme Court denied efforts to reject drive-through votes in Harris County, which includes the Houston metropolitan area  – home to roughly 4.7 million people which voted for Hillary Clinton by 161,959 ballots.

Republicans argued that drive-through voting is an illegal extension of curbside voting, which is designed for people who are sick or have a physical disability – a method implemented by Harris County officials to limit the spread of COVID-19 during the election.

On Monday, attorney Christina Ford – representing Democratic parties which intervened in the case – said that provisional ballots do not have any way to indicate that they were cast at a drive-thru location, and that invalidating their ballots “would cause mass confusion” and lead to a “frantic situation with voters trying to figure out if they could cast a provisional ballot.”

“Plaintiffs argue that drive-thru voting would result in fraud and corruption,” said Ford, adding “There’s no evidence of that.“

Plaintiffs plan to appeal the ruling to the circuit, and if need be, the Supreme Court.