Texas mail ballots rejected under stricter new voting law

By ACACIA CORONADO
Associated Press/Report for America

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — The GOP overhaul of voting laws in Texas is causing problems as some of the first voters in the state’s March 1 primary are seeing their mail-in ballots rejected for leaving off newly required information. Election officials in Harris County said Thursday that in the the first batch of mail-in ballots they have received, about 40% can’t be counted. Harris County Elections spokesperson Leah Shah said most of the more than 1,300 ballots flagged were missing mandatory identification such as voter ID or Social Security numbers. Counties must notify mail voters’ whose ballots have been rejected to give them a chance to fix the problem.