HBA-MSH, CMT C.S.H.B. 1819 77(R)BILL ANALYSIS Office of House Bill AnalysisC.S.H.B. 1819 By: Madden Elections 4/30/2001 Committee Report (Substituted) BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Currently, Texas has 243,394 citizens serving in the United States armed forces, over 182,000 voting age military family members, and more than 312,000 other citizens residing abroad that are eligible to vote. Citizens living abroad are often faced with contingencies that preclude normal mail delivery. The United States Department of Defense has made a number of recommendations to help ensure that military personnel and other citizens living abroad are able to vote in elections, including the expansion of the use of the federal write-in absentee ballot to simplify the voting process and to decrease the number of ballots a voter must send. C.S.H.B. 1819 requires the secretary of state to take certain actions to expand the use of the federal write-in absentee ballot for qualified voters living abroad. RULEMAKING AUTHORITY It is the opinion of the Office of House Bill Analysis that this bill does not expressly delegate any additional rulemaking authority to a state officer, department, agency, or institution. ANALYSIS C.S.H.B. 1819 amends the Election Code to require the secretary of state to prescribe procedures to allow a voter to apply for and cast a state write-in ballot before the time a voter may receive a regular ballot to be voted by mail if the voter is: _a member of the merchant marine of the United States or the spouse or a dependent of a member; _a member of the commissioned corps of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or the spouse or a dependent of a member; _a member of the commissioned corps of the United States Public Health Service, or the spouse or a dependent of a member; _domiciled in this state but temporarily living outside the territorial limits of the United States and the District of Columbia; or _unable to cast a ballot on election day or during the regular period for early voting because of a contingency that precludes normal mail delivery. The bill requires the secretary of state to prescribe procedures to allow a voter who qualifies to vote by a federal write-in absentee ballot to vote for all federal offices in any election held in this state. The bill provides that a federal write-in absentee ballot transmission envelope submitted by an unregistered voter serves as a temporary voter registration by the applicant only for the purpose of voting in the election for which the absentee ballot is submitted if the envelope contains the information that is required for registration and the person submits the envelope to the early voting clerk on or before the 30th day before election day. EFFECTIVE DATE September 1, 2001. COMPARISON OF ORIGINAL TO SUBSTITUTE C.S.H.B. 1819 modifies the original bill by including members of the commissioned corps of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration or the United States Public Health Service, their spouses, and their dependents among the person allowed to apply for and cast a state write-in ballot before the time a voter may receive a regular ballot to be voted by mail. The substitute removes the provision that required the secretary of state to prescribe procedures to allow a voter who qualified to vote by a federal write-in absentee ballot to vote in any general, special, primary, or runoff election held in this state, including elections for federal, state, and local offices, and adds that the federal write-in ballot is to be used only for all federal office elections held in the state. The substitute removes the provision that authorized a person who qualified to vote by a federal write-in absentee ballot to use the transmission envelope for the absentee ballot as a request to register to vote in the election for which the absentee ballot was submitted if certain criteria were met, and adds that a federal write-in absentee ballot transmission envelope submitted by an unregistered voter serves as a temporary voter registration only for the purpose of voting in the election for which the absentee ballot is submitted. The bill removes the provision that changed the title of Chapter 105, Election Code.