This morning Texas' voter ID law had opening arguments in the U.S. district court in Corpus Christi.
Texas is among 30 states that passed voter ID laws, and it is one of the strictest in the country according to the National Council of State Legislatures.
The Republican-led Texas Legislature passed Senate Bill 14 in 2011, which established a required photo ID to cast a ballot, over the protests of their Democratic colleagues. The Department of Justice challenged the law under the Voting Rights Act and the law was blocked from implementation. Subsequently the section of the VRA used to block implementation of Texas' law was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Now the Department of Justice strives to enforce the Voter Rights Act without its preclearance teeth, which has everyone watching Texas for how things might go across the country.
State and federal legal challenges have proceeded in several states. In April the Arkansas Supreme Court halted the ruling of a lower court judge, who struck down the law as unconstitutional. The very next day a federal judge in Wisconsin struck down that state's law.
Historically voter ID laws have been popular with large segments of the US. Will voter ID continue in Texas?
- Original Complaint Veasey v. Perry
Guests:
- Rep. Trey Martinez Fischer, leads the Mexican-American Legislative Caucus in the Texas House of Representatives.
- Myrna Perez, deputy director of the democracy program at the Brennan Center for Justice.
*This is the first segment in the September 2 edition of The Source, which airs at 3 p.m. on KSTX 89.1 FM. Audio from this show will be posted by 5:30 p.m.
