NBC News: “Texas Republicans are rolling out a slew of restrictive election bills, taking particular aim at early voting after Democrats enthusiastically embraced the practice last year. More than two dozen GOP-sponsored elections bills are under consideration as lawmakers seek to tighten ID requirements and voter rolls, limit early voting and up the penalties for errors. The broad interest – and a directive last month from the governor to prioritize election legislation – makes changes to Texas’ election law likely this year. ‘Texas has been working on election integrity for a while,’ said state Sen. Bryan Hughes, a Republican who chairs the State Affairs Committee and introduced a 27-page omnibus bill with several new restrictions and penalties. ‘This was already in process, but then the 2020 election was so in the national spotlight, and so many people have questions, so many people have concerns,’ he said. ‘I would say that has raised the profile of the issue.'”

“Former President Donald Trump’s stolen election lie has convinced 3 of every 4 Republicans that there was widespread voter fraud in last year’s election, according to a December Quinnipiac University poll, even though there is broad evidence that it is extremely rare. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office spent 22,000 hours looking for voter fraud and uncovered just 16 cases of false addresses on registration forms, according to The Houston Chronicle. Nearly 17 million voters are registered in Texas. And while Texas already had some of the most restrictive laws on the books, that isn’t stopping state lawmakers from joining their GOP peers across the country to propose new restrictive bills. Republican legislators in Georgia, Arizona, Florida and Wisconsin – many of whom joined with Trump to cast doubt on the system – are legislating to restrict the vote, arguing that new measures are needed to restore trust in the system.”