General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Every Democrat should be concerned about what Republicans and Paxton did in Texas last night [View all]AldebTX
(803 posts)I live in Dallas. The City is very democratic and the county government is pretty equally controlled.
This problem was caused by the republican party. THEY decided not to have joint primaries with the democrats as they have for the last decade. They decided to do this in just Dallas county and Williamson county (near Austin).
What added to the confusion is early voting did not require the voter to report to their precinct. They could vote in any polling site. The voter only had to vote in their precinct on election day.
Finally what has been under reported is many precincts in early voting had long lines for the democratic primary because the county was required to equally split the machines between democratic and republican voters even though in my area the democrats outnumbered the republicans 10 to 1. When we voted all 20 of the machines were full with a line out the door while on the republican side of the room there was a single voter and 19 empty machines.
In the past your ballot could be used in any machine. Just for this split primary were specific machines set aside.