SAN ANTONIO — Closing arguments took place Tuesday in San Antonio in the long-awaited trial over the sweeping 2021 Texas elections reform bill, known as SB 1.
The case was heard in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas in San Antonio.
"This is a fight across the United States for voting rights," said Jennifer Holmes, a lawyer with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. "There's been a wave of voting laws that have been passed that suppress the vote."
More than 20 state and national organizations brought a collective five lawsuits against the law, often referred to as Senate Bill 1, that have been consolidated into this case. The groups claim several provisions of the law violate federal laws including the Voting Rights Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Rehabilitation Act and the U.S. Constitution.
Some of the groups say it makes voting harder in Texas and it may have been intentionally designed that way. The groups also say the law discriminates against Black and Latino voters as well as voters with disabilities.
Republicans quickly pushed the law through in 2021, with Democrats accusing them of legislating in response to unsupported allegations of nonexistent voter fraud.
"The community needs to be engaged on the front end when this is being proposed in the legislature" before becoming laws, Holmes said.
The Office of the Attorney General previously told the Texas Tribune the law was enacted to prevent fraud, promote voter access, and to make the conduct of elections in Texas uniform throughout the state. None of the challenged provisions created a racially disparate impact, the state maintains, and no challenged provision “blocks or seriously hinders voting by members of any minority group.”
"This lawsuit is definitely more than a legal battle. It's a fight for our democracy," said Elsie Cooke-Holmes, national president and chair of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc., which supported the lawsuit.
Though closing arguments were held this week, experts say it’s unclear and too soon to tell whether a decision will come in time to affect elections and voting in 2024, especially since appeals could draw out the process.
This article includes reporting from the Texas Tribune.
