Attorneys gave closing arguments on Thursday morning on the final day of a trial challenging the results of a Harris County judicial race held last November. The possibility of overturning the outcome and calling a new election is now in the hands of the court.
Judge David Peeples, the presiding judge on the case visiting from Bexar County, ended legal proceedings by telling the defense and plaintiff sides not to expect a verdict earlier than a month from now.
Erin Lunceford, a Republican party judicial candidate, attempted to reverse her loss against 189th District Judge Tamika Craft, who was the Democrat incumbent and defeated Lunceford by 2,473 votes.
Andy Taylor, Lunceford’s lead lawyer, kicked off arguments by giving a brief overview to the court. He reiterated that their team claimed 3,000 voters were turned away at 29 polls due to shortages of ballot papers, meaning that thousands of votes that should’ve been cast were not.
However, Taylor also said ballots that were cast at Election Day polling locations were ordered to stay open an extra hour due to operational issues or determined to be either “out of the county,” on the suspense list, or mailed in but not properly processed – shouldn’t have been included in the final count.
Taylor used court transcripts from Election night, when the poles were open longer, to question the discrepancy of the number of locations out of ballot paper. As reports indicated, county officials initially pointed to 10 polls that were out of supplies, which decreased later to two locations “receiving supplies,” despite other analyses showing more than 20 were affected.
Alongside determining the legality of overall votes questioned in this race, Taylor said Peeples will likely need to determine whether the ballots submitted after-hours are eligible for the final count as the Texas Supreme Court has declined to do so thus far.
Lunceford’s attorneys argued it was because of county officials’ failed preparation and calculations that these issues occurred, as they had administered ballot papers for the overall turnout expected at polling locations, not the pattern per location.
Taylor said additional operation issues – particularly with the scanners – likely led to the ability to double vote. These machines were not working properly to process ballots during early voting back in October. He said election and poll workers have to navigate the county’s instruction manual, which is different from what the voting equipment shows them to do.
Lawyers for Lunceford argued that these mistakes were all the difference in their attempts to prove that thousands of illegal votes were cast and eligible voters were turned away in this race, respectively.
However, as Kevin Haynes, lead defense attorney for Craft, began closing arguments on the case, he continued to stick to his claim that the plaintiff’s team had not brought forth legally sufficient evidence to prove anything.
Instead, Haynes said their “expert witnesses” had raised questions unanswered while they were on the stand and pointed out that key pieces of evidence such as the Heat Map (which displayed ballot paper shortages were supposedly concentrated in Republican neighborhoods) ended up ruled as inadmissible.
He claimed that the only “knowledgeable” person brought forward to testify was Christina Adkins, the elections director for the Texas Secretary of State, and yet she was given not a single piece of evidence from this election to provide testimony specific to this race.
And Craft’s attorneys continued to take issue with Lunceford’s team’s attempts to cancel thousands of votes without these voters being aware they were doing so. Haynes argued that they had not contacted voters because it would be “politically inconvenient” for the judicial candidate’s lawyers to do so.
Haynes closed out by citing a case where nearly 250 witnesses testified in person for a case. He said despite Lunceford’s team’s attempts to hide behind expenses, bringing witnesses to the stand was not out of the realm of possibility.
He pleaded with Peeples to do the “right” thing and end the “new normal” of efforts to challenge election results. Haynes said he would set a dangerous precedent if the judge did not stop it, especially as this is a growing issue in the county. Republicans are trying to give themselves an edge after not winning a countywide election since 2014, he said.
Haynes said the only “mistake” Peeples bore witnesses to was the initial filing of this “frivolous” lawsuit full of political talking points and nefarious claims meant to rile up the Republican base.
After both sides closed out opposing arguments, Peeples alerted each side that they could expect a decision within a month or so. There are still 20 other county election contest lawsuits pending civil litigation.
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This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2023.
