In February, Bexar County accredited the contract for a brand new voter registration system after grappling for months with Texas’ lagging and glitchy system. Nonetheless, yet another roadblock stays earlier than the county can free itself of the previous system: the State of Texas itself.
In an April 28 letter to Bexar County officers obtained by the Present, Texas Secretary of State Jane Nelson states that, despite the fact that the county has accredited a contract with new vendor VR Programs, her workplace doesn’t plan to observe the county’s implementation timeline.
That delay threatens to get in the best way of Bexar County going surfing with the brand new system in time for November’s consequential midterm elections, in accordance with Precinct 4 County Commissioner Tommy Calvert.
To Calvert, Nelson’s letter to Bexar County Decide Peter Sakai and different county officers wasn’t a typical missive from a state company — it appears offended.
“I undoubtedly noticed it as a ‘Go to hell,’” stated Calvert.
The brand new system was initially accredited by county commissioners in September. Nelson’s delay follows a half-year slowdown on the county degree over a contractual deadlock earlier than the finalized contract was accredited in February.
Nelson — an appointee of Republican Gov. Greg Abbott charged with overseeing state elections — despatched her letter in response to a request from Bexar County officers that her workplace expedite offering the voter knowledge county elections officers want so that they swap to the brand new third-party voter system. Calvert cosigned the county’s letter.
The implementation proposal accredited by the county set an April 30 deadline for supply of the primary batch of information from the state’s TEAM 2.0 system so it could possibly be uploaded, in accordance with a replica of the county’s letter, additionally obtained by the Present.
As an alternative of receiving that knowledge, county officers acquired weeks of radio silence from the Secretary of State’s workplace, adopted by Nelson’s letter calling the county timeline “unrealistic.”
The workplace of Sakai didn’t reply to a request for remark by press time. A spokesperson for Elections Administrator Michele Carew declined to touch upon the story. Nonetheless, the Secretary of State’s workplace supplied the next assertion:
“The state has had 5 profitable elections utilizing the brand new TEAM system. Our workers has been working day and evening to deal with any points as they come up. We might be working with Bexar County on an inexpensive schedule.”
Communication breakdown
In Bexar County’s letter to Nelson, Sakai lays out a timeline of delays and “restricted communication” from the Texas Secretary of State’s Workplace as county elections personnel despatched repeated requests for cooperation to make sure well timed implementation of the brand new voting system.
Bexar County Elections Administrator Michele Carew first reached out to Leticia Salazar, the Texas Secretary of State’s director of elections administration, on March 26 “to start the info migration course of,” in accordance with Sakai’s letter. After she acquired no response, Carew despatched a followup to Salazar on March 30, the letter states.
On April 1, Salazar responded with the obligatory Vendor Authorization Kind for Carew to fill out, which she accomplished and returned the next day. After two extra weeks of radio silence, Carew despatched one other followup on April 16.
“As of April 22, we acquired an electronic mail from Leticia Salazar confirming that the County’s request for knowledge export has been acquired and forwarded to the State’s vendor, Civix. Nonetheless, we nonetheless wouldn’t have affirmation that the request for well timed knowledge migration might be fulfilled,” Sakai’s letter said.
Is the slowdown deliberate on the a part of the Secretary of State’s workplace? Abbott’s historical past of choosing fights with Texas’ blue-led cities and counties corresponding to San Antonio and Bexar definitely begs the query.
“I believe that there’s been lots of smoke and it’s as much as them to place it out,” Calvert stated. “That is one thing that seems to be dragging out, and it’s very suspicious.”
In her April 28 letter, Nelson disputes the timeline Sakai laid out, stating “Bexar County didn’t inform my crew of your contractual deadlines together with your new vendor till April 21, 2026 — the day earlier than you despatched us your letter.”
Nelson’s letter additionally describes what she referred to as a “Herculean effort” by her workplace to onboard Bexar County to the state system forward of the November 2025 election. That got here after a previous vendor, Votec, abruptly went out of enterprise in August.
Nelson stated her workers “labored day and evening and over weekends” to convey Bexar County on-line with the statewide TEAM system in time for early voting. She maintained {that a} turnaround that usually can take months was completed in a couple of weeks — and at a price to her workplace exceeding $100,000.
Nonetheless, Calvert stated Bexar County spent $450,000 of its personal cash addressing the 70,000-voter backlog forward of the autumn election.
Past that, as soon as on-line, the state’s TEAM system skilled large errors, in accordance with Bexar officers. Days earlier than final fall’s election, county elections staffers, who have been working in shifts, discovered 11,000 San Antonio streets lacking from the state system.
“If we hadn’t discovered 11,000 streets that they have been lacking, we’d have actually tens of hundreds of individuals disenfranchised,” Calvert stated of the error. “So, [Nelson] beating her chest like she was our hero? … We admire the work they did, however we carried the lion’s share of the associated fee.”
‘Unworkable’ deadline?
In her letter, Nelson acknowledged there was urgency to get Bexar County onto the state’s TEAM system final fall as a result of her workplace feared potential lawsuits ought to the system not be up and operating in time for the contentious Mission Marvel vote.
“We took on this herculean effort understanding that if we didn’t onboard the state’s third-most-populated county, the November 2025 Election was in danger for a possible authorized problem, together with the Metropolis of San Antonio’s poll measure on funding for a brand new stadium for the San Antonio Spurs,” Nelson’s letter states.
Now, Bexar County wants Nelson’s workplace to cooperate with one other tight turnaround and supply the county’s voter knowledge to its new vendor, VR Programs, which already has contracts with 14 different Texas counties. Nonetheless, Nelson is pushing again.
“Your request is to now undergo this entire course of once more forward of the November election emigrate knowledge to a brand new system, underneath an unrealistic timeline based mostly in your contract with a third-party vendor — a contract that my workplace shouldn’t be a celebration to and has no authorized obligations to fulfill,” Nelson said in her letter.
Nelson goes on to state that her workplace sacrificed “core system performance” and its means to serve different Texas counties so it may prioritize Bexar County forward of final fall’s election.
“Nonetheless, you at the moment are asking us to do the identical factor,” she added.
The letter ends by stating: “The timeline that you simply recommend is unworkable.”
Provided that Nelson’s workplace supplied the info on all 18 million Texas voters to the Trump administration in January, Calvert stated he doesn’t perceive why it could possibly’t present a much smaller knowledge set to Bexar County. Particularly because the county makes an attempt to desert the glitchy state-provided TEAM system for its new vendor.
“It is a .CSV file. This isn’t quantum computing,” Calvert stated, including that the Secretary of State’s Workplace is now ready on knowledge from an election administration software program firm, Civix.
“The truth that they’ve been making an attempt to get [TEAM] working since August appears completely out of line,” Calvert stated. “[Civix] actually out to be held accountable for a scarcity of service to the Secretary of State’s workplace or the Secretary of State’s Workplace has acquired to determine what’s occurring internally with their administration.”
Forward of the March main, Bexar County’s backlog grew as soon as once more — that point to greater than 7,000 voters — as elections staff’ enter occasions utilizing the state’s TEAM 2.0 system slowed to a crawl. As soon as capable of enter 24 voters per hour, the lag dropped that quantity to simply eight per hour.
County election staff additionally famous that screens generally failed to look as they labored on TEAM 2.0. Different occasions, when staffers enter knowledge, it will evaporate into skinny air, forcing them to submit it once more. Additional, the system tried to ship duplicate ballots to voters, generally as many as 13, officers say.
The county’s new vendor, VR Programs, is a Florida-based firm whose software program allows counties to host voter knowledge on premises. That proximity offers counties safety from a number of the slowdown points and glitches skilled with the state’s system, in accordance with VR officers.
Texas’ TEAM system isn’t outfitted to deal with a county of Bexar’s dimension, Bexar County Elections Administrator Carew informed the Present in earlier interviews. That makes the slowdowns extra pronounced for the county’s database of two million voters.
The lags in knowledge enter created a backlog of over 70,000 voters forward of final fall’s election — and this November’s contest is predicted to draw a a lot bigger variety of voters.
Again of the road
Because the Secretary of State pushes again towards Sakai’s proposed timeline, two different Texas counties — Kaufman and Midland — have already gotten forward of Bexar within the queue for implementation with VR Programs.
In January, the seller warned that such a state of affairs would possibly happen based mostly on the extent of curiosity it acquired from Texas counties at a convention.
“We have been approached by lots of present TEAM counties which might be very sad with TEAM,” VR Programs’ Chief Working Officer Ben Martin informed the Present at a January Commissioners Courtroom assembly. He added that the corporate solely takes one county reside at a time to attenuate danger.
“So, if [other counties] method us trying to signal a contract, Bexar pushes again,” he stated.
Now, that state of affairs has come to cross, doubtlessly jeopardizing Bexar County’s means to go surfing with the seller in time for the autumn election. That will require the county staying on the state’s TEAM 2.0 system by way of an election with excessive stakes and excessive turnout.
Extra residents could also be disenfranchised in consequence, Calvert stated. And that might result in authorized issues and additional undermine religion in our elections.
“It signifies that the big numbers of people who find themselves making an attempt to register to vote on this election is probably not inputted due to the slowness of the state system,” Calvert stated. “It’s gotten a bit of higher nevertheless it’s nonetheless not absolutely useful.”
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