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DALLAS — After months of laying the groundwork to hand-count thousands of ballots in the March 3 primary, the Dallas County Republican Party announced on Tuesday it has decided not to do so, opting instead to contract with the county elections department to administer the election using voting equipment.
The decision spares the party the pressure it likely would have faced if a hand-count had delayed results beyond the state’s 24-hour reporting requirements in the state’s closely watched GOP primary for U.S. Senate, among other offices.
In a statement posted on social media, Dallas County Republican Party Chair Allen West said he decided to work with the county to “conduct a precinct-based, community, separate Election Day electoral process.” The move, he said, “reduces the liabilities” of the party. “In this case, discretion is the better part of valor.”
The decision reverses months of statements suggesting the party was seriously preparing to count tens of thousands of Election Day ballots by hand — a move that would have affected all Dallas County voters, regardless of party.
Under Texas law, if one party hand-counts ballots, both parties must abandon countywide Election Day voting at vote centers and require voters to cast ballots at assigned neighborhood precincts. Democrats had planned to use voting equipment to tabulate their results, but would have been forced into precinct-only voting if Republicans proceeded with a hand count. It’s unclear if the GOP’s intention to use precinct-based voting would lock Democrats into the same arrangement; the Dallas County Elections Department has not responded to requests for more information.
Republicans in Dallas County and elsewhere have pushed in recent years to count ballots by hand as President Donald Trump and others have decreased trust in voting machines by spreading unfounded claims about their reliability. However, election officials and voting experts have repeatedly warned that hand-counting ballots at scale is costly, labor-intensive, slower to produce results and more prone to human error than machine tabulation. State law also does not require audits of hand-counted ballots and severely limits public observation of the counting process.
In early December, West said the party had raised more than $400,000 toward a hand-count effort and recruited more than 1,000 workers. But there were still unresolved concerns about staffing, training, security, facilities, and funding, particularly as the Texas Secretary of State’s Office warned counties it may not have enough money to reimburse unusually high primary costs if many jurisdictions choose to hand-count.
Hand-counting would also have required significantly more polling locations and workers than recent primaries. In elections that are hand-counted, Texas law requires ballots to be cast and counted at assigned precincts, and in all elections, the law mandates that counting continue without interruption once polls close. Election workers must be paid at least $12 an hour, and large hand counts can stretch late into the night or beyond.
In an interview on Tuesday, West said the party would need at least 3,000 hand-counters but had recruited fewer than half that number. “We cannot take that risk of not being able to have the appropriate amount of counters because it would put our election judges in an untenable legal position,” he said. “We’ve got 63 days to go — early voting will start the 16th of February.”
Under Texas law, political parties control how ballots are counted in primaries but must report results within 24 hours after polls close. Party chairs have been warned that court orders could be required if hand-counts delay reporting.
By contracting with the county, Dallas County Republicans would avoid those logistical hurdles and allow both parties to continue using voting equipment and established election procedures. According to West, the Dallas County GOP is currently working on a contract with the county and expects it to be signed on Wednesday.
Nathaniel Rakich contributed.
This article first appeared on The Texas Tribune.
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