West Houston News

With communities across the country preparing for a record number of voters to cast their ballots by mail, the heated debate continues over the potential pitfalls of an election in which mail-in votes will play a bigger part in deciding the outcome than ever before.

“Universal mail in voting is not practical for numerous reasons,” Charles "Chuck" Beers, Austin County Republican Party chair, recently told the West Houston News. 

Beers said he has seen first hand how out of date voter registration information can be.

"My son was on the rolls for years after he moved out of state,” Beer told the West Houston News. “Judicial Watch has identified millions of illegally registered voters all over the country.”

Additionally, an all-mail election requires much more on the receiving end than simply getting all the ballots turned in on time, Beers said.

“County election departments are not equipped to handle the volume of mail in ballots and verify their integrity,” Beers told the West Houston News.

Given the short amount of time left to Texas to correct all the problems that a mail-in-only election would create, Beers said there simply is no way the state can ensure a valid election by mail in time for the November election. Beers said the likelihood of fraud could be somewhat reduced if individuals had to request a mail-in ballot rather than ballots being automatically mailed to every name and address on the voter registration rolls.

“But again, the ability of election departments to handle the volume of mail is simply not there,” Beers told the West Houston News.

If the state does go to all-mail voting in November, Beers said that people will need to be prepared for results to be delayed.

‘Inaccurate voter rolls are a blatant invitation for fraud, and the under-staffing in election departments would delay election results possibly for weeks,” Beers said.