Federal Court Upholds Texas Voter ID Requirement for Mail-In Ballots

A federal appeals court ruled Monday that Texas can require voters applying to vote by mail to submit ID numbers matching state records. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the state in a case brought by the Biden administration and voting rights groups.

The three-judge panel found the ID match rule—a provision of S.B. 1, Texas’s 2021 election law—was a legal method to prevent fraud. Judge James Ho, writing the opinion, said the law is “obviously designed to confirm that every mail-in voter is indeed who he claims he is,” and does not violate the Civil Rights Act.

The decision reverses a lower court ruling from November 2023, which had struck down the requirement. That court argued mismatched ID numbers were not material to voter eligibility. However, the Fifth Circuit strongly disagreed, stating it had “no difficulty” finding the law compliant. The prior injunction against the rule is now lifted.

Voting rights advocates and the Biden administration argued the state’s database system was flawed, leading to mistaken rejections. One filing cited over 60,000 voter records with mismatched numbers as of January 2023. Yet during oral arguments in February, the panel did not ask a single question of the state’s attorney.

The ruling comes amid political tension in Texas, where Attorney General Ken Paxton backed a resolution for the arrest of absent Democrat lawmakers. In response, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker vowed to protect the Democrats who fled to Illinois during a redistricting dispute.