NPR Austin: “It took a lengthy court battle, but the Texas Department of Safety has been allowing voters to update their voter information at the same time they update their driver’s license information online. The Texas Civil Rights Project filed a federal lawsuit against the state on behalf of three voters in Texas who thought they had updated their addresses on their voter registration through the DPS website. They later found out that never happened because online voter registration is illegal in Texas. The plaintiffs in the case were Jarrod Stringer, Nayeli Gomez and John Harms, as well as two organizations, MOVE Texas and the League of Women Voters of Texas. The lawsuit claimed Texas was violating the National Voter Registration Act – which includes federal motor voter laws – and the US Constitution. The Texas Civil Rights Project first sued the state five years ago, but the lawsuit was thrown out on a technicality. The group sued again shortly after.”
“As a result of that lawsuit, a federal judge ordered the state to change its practices last year. This forced Texas to ‘create the first-ever opportunity for some Texans to register to vote online’ starting in September, the group said in a press release. Mimi Marziani, president of the Texas Civil Rights Project, told KUT the DPS data shows that about a million voter registration transactions have occurred in the past 10 months. ‘That means that’s an average of a 100,000 Texans per month are now registering to vote – or updating their voter registration – with their online drivers’ transaction,’ she said. ‘That’s a lot of people.'”