How Many Registered Voters In Harris County Texas

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A potential nightmare for Texas Republicans began to materialize early Tuesday, taking the class of tens of thousands of voters lined upwards at the polls in Harris Canton.

Past 24-hour interval's end, the number of ballots cast on the showtime day of early on voting in Houston and its suburbs had shattered all records.

The early numbers are almost certainly bad news for Texas Republicans. Control of the White House depends on Republican domination of Texas, which in plow relies on containing a voting surge in the nation's third most populous county, which is only solidifying as a Autonomous stronghold.

Much of the Democrats' dream of turning Texas blue is pinned on ramping up turnout in Houston and other Texas cities where voters, many of whom are people of color, trend heavily their style.

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When was the last day to register to vote?

The deadline to register to vote in the 2020 full general election was October. five. Check if you're registered to vote hither. If not, you'll demand to fill out and submit an application, which you tin can request here or download here.
When tin can I vote early?

Early voting for the 2020 general election runs from October. 13 to Oct. thirty. Voters can bandage ballots at whatever polling location in the county where they are registered to vote during early voting. Election Day is Nov. 3.
How will voting exist different because of the pandemic?

In general, polling locations will take guidelines in place for social distancing and regular cleaning. Several counties will offer election marking devices so voters avoid contact with election equipment. Poll workers will likely exist wearing face masks and other protective equipment, but masks will not exist required for voters.
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Non always. You lot'll desire to check for open up polling locations with your local elections part before y'all head out to vote. Additionally, y'all tin ostend with your county elections office whether Election Day voting is restricted to locations in your designated precinct or if you can cast a election at whatsoever polling place.
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In a bitterly contested election, overlaid with the fears and risks of an uncontrolled pandemic, Harris Canton has become a example study in raw politics and partisan efforts to manipulate voter turnout. Republican leaders and activists have furiously worked the levers of power, churning out lawsuits, unsubstantiated specters of voter fraud and official country orders in their bid to limit voters' options during the pandemic.

Their ability hemmed in by country officials, Houston Democrats have launched a robust effort to brand voting as like shooting fish in a barrel every bit possible, tripling the number of early and Election Day polling locations and increasing the county's election budget from $four meg in 2016 to $33 meg this autumn. They reject GOP claims that making voting easier carries inherent risks of widespread voter fraud.

The battle lines were acknowledged in 1 of the many lawsuits Republican leaders and activists filed in the by few months attempting to rein in Harris Canton's efforts to aggrandize voting access.

"As Texas goes, so as well will the rest of the country. As Harris County goes, and then too will Texas," the GOP lawsuit read. "If President Trump loses Texas, it would exist hard, if not incommunicable, for him to be reelected."

Local political observers agree the writing is on the wall: Nigh of Houston's residents are people of color, its local leaders are Democrats, and it is the fastest-growing canton in the land, co-ordinate to recent census data.

"This county looks similar what Texas is going to look like in ten years, and they know that if Harris Canton can become solidly entrenched in the Democratic Party, it'southward just going to disperse from there," said Melanye Cost, endowed professor of political science at Prairie View A&Thousand Academy and a Harris County voter. "I think in some means they're going to have more of an influence, and the governor knows that, and the chaser general knows that, and that is why they've decided to hobble them at every plow."

It's no coincidence, Harris County Clerk Chris Hollins said, that GOP efforts to tightly enforce Texas voting laws — among the nation's about restrictive — target an of import Autonomous stronghold and one of the country'southward most diverse cities.

"If you wait at [election results] for Harris County, y'all see a very clear trend," Hollins said. "If I were in the business of trying to suppress Autonomous votes, I know where I would target."

Harris County residents waiting in line at the Bayland Community Center during the first day of early voting in Houston on O… — Harris Canton residents wait in line at the Bayland Community Centre in Houston on the first twenty-four hours of early on voting . Credit: Annie Mulligan for The Texas Tribune

Harris County going bluer

With Harris County slipping from its grasp, the GOP's road to political safety in Texas and beyond grows more perilous as Democratic candidates from the top to the bottom of the ballot siphon more and more votes from the county'due south 2.4 million registered voters.

In 2008, near 600,000 Autonomous votes were cast in the presidential ballot in Harris County, edging out Republican votes for the kickoff time in recent history. In 2016, the spread was even wider: Democrats cast more than 700,000 votes for president, while Republicans bandage closer to 550,000.

In 2018, 17% of the land'south Autonomous votes for U.S. Senate candidate Beto O'Rourke were cast in Harris County alone.

"The number of Democratic votes that come out of Harris County is very important for who wins the country," said Austin attorney and public-interest advocate Fred Lewis, who helped organize voter drives in Harris County after President Barack Obama won the canton in 2008. "It's no longer important for who wins Harris because that'southward over."

Jared Woodfill, a local chaser and erstwhile Harris Canton GOP chairman who has sued both Abbott and the county over the ballot, said conservatives aren't trying to thwart Democrats but are trying to enforce election laws.

"To the extent that the law is what it is, you've got to follow it," he said. "If the Democrats want to flaunt or violate the law, information technology'southward just illegal. The reason that these laws are in place is to protect the integrity of the ballot box. So it's interesting that the Democrats desire to somehow unilaterally suspend the law and put provisions in identify that will permit voter fraud to thrive."

Requests for interviews with Harris County GOP officials, including Chairman Keith Nielsen and several precinct chairpersons, and the Republican Political party of Texas were non answered. The offices of Abbott and Steven Hotze, a Houston conservative activist who has filed several lawsuits with Woodfill, did non respond to requests for interviews. A spokesperson at Texas Attorney Full general Ken Paxton's office referred questions to his previous statements and court filings.

A line outside a polling location during the first day of early voting in Houston on Oct. 13, 2020. — Masked voters wait in line outside a polling location in Houston. Credit: Annie Mulligan for The Texas Tribune

Expanding voter access

When Harris County Clerk Diane Trautman resigned in May, the commissioners on a party-line vote appointed Hollins, vice chairman of finance for the Texas Democratic Party and a local personal injury lawyer, to serve on an interim basis until her successor is elected in November. Hollins is non running for election.

Since Hollins' June engagement, he and Houston elections officials accept launched a robust effort to expand voter admission.

Hollins created a 23-point initiative this summer to turn effectually a decadeslong history of chronic election problems in the county of 4.8 million and avoid a drop in turnout due to the coronavirus, which disproportionately affects Black and Hispanic people.

But Republican activists, party officials and land leaders take voted against local initiatives, sought injunctions and filed multiple lawsuits to halt the unprecedented effort in Harris Canton.

Their resistance has almost uniformly advanced nether the banner of guarding against "voter fraud."

"The Country of Texas has a duty to voters to maintain the integrity of our elections," the state's elevation Republican, Gov. Greg Abbott, said subsequently issuing a contempo proclamation aimed at Harris and Travis counties that forced them to close down multiple drop-off locations for absentee ballots. "Every bit we work to preserve Texans' power to vote during the COVID-19 pandemic, nosotros must take actress care to strengthen election security protocols throughout the state."

Abbott'southward nod to "ballot security" is in line with efforts by Republicans nationally seeking to cast doubtfulness on the security of mail-in ballots even as they encourage their ain voters to employ them.

At that place are documented cases of voter fraud in Texas, including contempo highly publicized arrests in Gregg County and Carrollton, only they are rare and have been pocket-size efforts to manipulate local elections.

"Ballot fraud, specially an organized mail ballot fraud scheme orchestrated by political operatives, is an barb to democracy and results in voter disenfranchisement and corruption at the highest level," Paxton said in a statement about one case.

Fraudulent efforts on a calibration large enough to impact the consequence of a statewide or national election have not been discovered, experts point out.

Beth Stevens, a former voting-rights activist who is now a senior adviser for voting rights for Harris County, said it has tried to place itself on the "cutting edge of voter access" in the months leading up to the Nov ballot.

"That has absolutely resulted in backlash from state leadership that wants to undo or prevent access that Harris Canton is trying to create for all eligible voters and, in the process, confusing voters and suppressing votes," said Stevens, an attorney who took a temporary leave from her job equally voting rights manager for the Texas Civil Rights Project in July to work on elections in Harris County this cycle.

Hollins' decision to hire Stevens was celebrated by Democrats, who view her as an ally in their efforts to increase voting accessibility and turnout.

"Hollins has shown that he actually understands that anybody who tin lawfully vote should exist allowed to vote, and that voting should exist like shooting fish in a barrel and accessible, and I call up that by appointing Beth, he showed a real commitment to that," said Nicole Pedersen, who spearheads the Harris County Democratic Party's voter protection efforts.

No. 3 on Hollins' listing for improving admission was to "promote and maximize vote-by-mail inside the bounds of the law."

Commissioners had already approved $12 one thousand thousand — tripling the budget for the 2016 elections — in Apr to help with post-in voting expansion as voters became increasingly concerned about catching the virus at the polls and big Texas counties joined the telephone call to expand mail-in voting.

In Texas, absentee ballots are available but to people age 65 or older, those confined in jail merely otherwise eligible, people who are out of the county for the ballot flow, and voters who cite a disability or illness.

Voter Lovely Washington cheers aboard a METROLift vehicle after casting her ballot during the first day of early voting in H… — Lovely Washington cheers aboard a MetroLift vehicle afterward casting her ballot in Houston. Credit: Annie Mulligan for The Texas Tribune

The all-Republican Texas Supreme Court scuttled that vote-by-mail expansion attempt in June. The court said susceptibility to the coronavirus could non in itself constitute a disability that would make a voter eligible for a mail-in ballot.

But the court likewise said that voters could decide for themselves whether their personal health histories, forth with susceptibility to COVID-19, qualified nether the disability provision.

In Baronial, Harris County commissioners, along party lines, approved another $17 million to expand access to voting, most of it funded past a federal coronavirus aid package.

The county moved its election headquarters to NRG Park, home to the rodeo and the Houston Texans football team, including a 100,000 square pes infinite in the NRG Loonshit where administrative work and some voting will take identify.

For the starting time fourth dimension in Texas, drive-thru voting was implemented in x locations.

Officials also increased the hours of several early voting sites and announced that six locations would be open 24 hours a mean solar day in the concluding days of early voting.

Election machines were added in districts that expected heavy turnout, and changes in technology promised no more delayed results — an ongoing headache in Harris for decades — or simulated waiting times.

Officials authorized 12 locations for voters to mitt-deliver their mail-in ballots. In previous elections, only ane drop-off point had been used.

Then Hollins announced plans in September to send post-in election applications to the county's 2.4 million registered voters.

Chris Davis, the elections administrator for Williamson Canton, chosen Hollins' innovations "very impressive" and said he thinks other elections administrators will look to Harris County as an case if all goes well this fall.

"Personally, I like what I'm seeing," said Davis, who has served in leadership for the Texas Association of Elections Administrators. "He's thinking outside the box, and maybe that's what this kind of work needed."

But by the time the county'southward attempt began picking upward steam, the political power struggle had already moved to the courts.

Fight from Republicans

For nigh every stride it has taken, Harris Canton has faced opposition from state and Harris County Republicans. The virtually basis gained by the GOP has come in fighting efforts to expand access to mail-in voting.

With but 3 weeks to go earlier Ballot Day and early on voting in Texas already underway, mail-in balloting remains the hottest flashpoint for the national GOP try to raise concern over the integrity of the elections — and in Harris, the decisions and challenges mutate on a daily basis.

Paxton and others take insisted in court filings, every bit have GOP country lawmakers who take supported other measures limiting voters' options, that their efforts are not partisan just rather in the interest of election integrity.

Commonly the target of criticism from Democrats, Abbott has as well been sued past members of his own party over the steps he's taken to expand voting — an actress week of early voting and allowing early on drop-off of absentee ballots — using his pandemic-era powers in the proper noun of election integrity to tinker with ballot law in response to the tug-of-war in the courts.

In August, both the Harris Canton Republican Party and the Texas chaser general's office filed legal challenges to Hollins' plans to transport mail service-in ballot applications to every registered voter, arguing that it invited ballot harvesting and would encourage ineligible voters to put false information on their applications in social club to qualify. Local officials had planned to include eligibility information with the mailers.

In September, a core of statewide Republican politicians and party leaders sued to stop Abbott's order assuasive early voting to start a week early, on Oct. thirteen, to combat long lines and crowds during the pandemic. That lawsuit failed.

Days later, Hotze, members of the Harris County Republican Party, and a number of Republican officials and candidates asked the Texas Supreme Court to strike the early-vote expansion in Harris and limit the county'due south mail-in drib-off locations to one spot. That lawsuit was dismissed after Abbott effectively made the change with an executive proclamation, citing his emergency powers during the coronavirus pandemic.

On October. 1, a few days after Harris County opened its 12 locations for hand-delivering mail-in ballots, Abbott issued his proclamation limiting counties to 1 location, causing some of the land'south strongest Democratic counties to shutter multiple locations and triggering legal challenges.

Harris Canton has already received nearly a quarter of a one thousand thousand absentee election requests. In improver to the influx, there likewise are concerns almost delays from the U.South. Post.

Court rulings over the by week affirmed Abbott's determination to expand early voting and blocked Hollins from a program to ship some 1.9 meg unrequested absentee ballot applications to registered Harris County voters under the age of 65.

The Texas GOP unsuccessfully sued Harris County on Monday, fighting Hollins' work to expand access to curbside and bulldoze-thru voting and so that locals can cast their ballots from the condom of their cars, the latest in a long list of challenges to the county's efforts this summertime.

Also this calendar week, after much dorsum-and-forth in court, Abbott was immune to limit postal service-in drop-off points to 1 location per county in a federal appeals court ruling — a battle that followed Harris County ballot officials' decision earlier in the summer to let 12 drop-off points to make voting more convenient for hundreds of thousands of voters casting post-in ballots.

Pinkie Powell shows off her "I Voted" sticker after casting her ballot at the Bayland Community Center during the first day … — Little finger Powell shows off her "I Voted" sticker later on casting her ballot in Houston. Powell says she didn't mind the hour wait in line because "it'due south time for my vox to be heard." Credit: Annie Mulligan for The Texas Tribune

Woodfill has filed a dozen petitions and lawsuits related to government action on the pandemic and the elections since May.

He and his clients oppose all election-law changes — particularly those pushed past the Harris County Clerk's Role and ordered by Abbott — that fall outside the scope of the Texas Legislature, which is majority Republican.

"He [Hollins] is really changing the whole system upward to make it a lot more conducive to voter fraud, and you lot have to ask yourself why," Woodfill said.

Stevens said the county's efforts, even though some have been thwarted, volition brand a departure in turnout for this year's election.

"Despite all of the attempts to walk back and suppress the efforts that Harris Canton has taken to brand sure that all voters have access, this will exist more access than voters have e'er had in Harris Canton, because of the initiatives that the clerk's part has put forrad and that have been supported by county leadership," Stevens said. "So we're excited to see that unfold."

Disclosure: Prairie View A&M Academy has been a fiscal supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organisation that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune'due south journalism. Discover a complete list of them here.

Correction: A previous version of this story said NRG Stadium would serve as Harris County'south election headquarters. In fact, NRG Park, home to NRG Stadium, is the county'south headquarters.