Houston, TX – Senator Paul Bettencourt (R-Houston), author of SB 1750, released the following statement in response to today’s news conference by Harris County officials:

“Another frivolous lawsuit by Harris County against the State of Texas!!! My SB 1750 is about performance NOT politics! This bill is the result of election fiascos due to Elections Administrators and other appointed elected officials. The fact that the first Harris County appointed EA had to resign due to problems in the primary seems to escape any mention by the County Attorney and Commissioners Court in this lawsuit.

The current Harris County appointed EA has yet to provide a deposition in the 17 election contests so the public would finally know what happened in the Nov 8th, 2022, election. However, dozens of polling places running out of ballot paper and machine difficulties is no longer debatable. The question is WHY? SB 1750 originally as filed, moved the Elections Administrations back to the elected County Clerk and Tax-Assessor for the 5 largest county EA’s in Texas, after received testimony the bill was amended to just Harris County.

Harris County’s election problems go back to 2020 where they tried to mail out 2 million absentee ballot application forms, losing that case at the Texas Supreme Court. Later an audit by the Texas Secretary of State revealed they had an improper chain-of-custody of 184,999 vote records.

The public will be far better served by elected officials that followed the election code in the past, and will do so in future elections thus, regaining confidence of the voters in the elections process and that’s what SB 1750 is all about.” Concluded Senator Bettencourt.

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