View Scorecard for Year
Responsive Gov’s Grade TL;DR
The Texas Legislature advanced some meaningful reforms during the regular session, including adopting voter-centric cure procedures, extending early voting to encompass the weekend before Election Day, and insulating election workers from harassment. However, these gains were undercut during a subsequent special session, where lawmakers preemptively rescinded pending registration improvements and substantially broadened the attorney general’s prosecutorial authority over election offenses. Consequently, Texas earned a C+ on this year’s progress report.
Looking Back
Where Texas Started at the Beginning of 2025
- Automatic Voter Registration: No
- Online Voter Registration: No
- Same-Day Registration: No
- Restoration of Rights: Parole and/or Probation Disenfranchisement
- Vote by Mail: Excuse-Only
- Electronic Registration Information Center Member: No
- Early Voting Opportunities: Regular Ballot Early Voting
- ID Requirements: Photo ID Requested
Relying on the Cost of Voting Index for Texas as of 2024, we considered the state a bottom tier state for pre-existing voting policy and compared its 2025 activity against other bottom tier states.
How Our Tier Compares
2025: This Past Year
Legislative Action
During the regular session, the Texas Legislature passed several pieces of legislation to improve voter access, while also enacting reforms that could penalize election workers for making mistakes and enacted additional paperwork requirements for voters that need to utilize curbside voting. During the special session, the Legislature gave the attorney general the power to independently prosecute election crimes and it repealed legislation that would have allowed existing Texas voters to update their address at the polls.
- SB 2753 shifts the early voting period so that it will end the day before an election rather than four days out and requires standardized weekend early voting hours, among other things.
- SB 2964 revises ballot cure procedures to require clerks to notify voters sooner of any defects and expands cure options to allow voters to cure by mail or via the online ballot tracking system.
- SB 510 allows the secretary of state to withhold funds from a registrar for failing to perform one of their required duties within the state’s specified timeline. Although dereliction of duty should be taken very seriously, the appropriate mechanism is to punish individual wrongdoing and not withhold funds (and further compromise services) from the entire jurisdiction.
- HB 5115 revised the definition of voter fraud to include counting votes the person knows are invalid or refusing to count votes the person knows are valid. The bill also raises the offense level from a misdemeanor to a felony for several voter fraud crimes.
- HB 521 requires curbside voters to complete a form affirming their need to vote curbside and expands the list of election crimes related to providing voter assistance.
- HB 493 expands the reasons an individual may not be allowed to serve as a pollworker to include certain felony convictions, including those related to committing an election offense.
- SB 1470 requires the Department of Public Safety to share driver’s license data with the secretary of state to facilitate the search for voters that have moved, voters that are registered in multiple states, and voters that are disqualified to vote due to felony convictions.
- SB 1540 shields election office employees and volunteers from having their personal information disclosed in public records.
- SB 1454 allows certain local political subdivisions to shift their general election date to November in odd-numbered years so long as they make the change by the end of 2025.
Special Sessions: