Tarrant County election security measures could slow election night results

Tarrant County’s top Republican announced several security measures for election night, some of which might slow down the vote count.
TARRANT COUNTY, Texas – Tarrant County’s top Republican announced several security measures for election night, some of which might slow down the vote count.
The list of actions released by County Judge Tim O’Hare account for what the conservative county judge calls a matter of security and transparency.
The detailed bullet points include actions taken during O’Hare’s time in office and, according to him, they constitute election security enhancements.
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“The purpose of this is to placate election integrity activists, and to uphold the integrity of county elections. A lot of it is window dressing,” said Bud Kennedy, opinion columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
O’Hare’s statement does not come as a surprise to some political analysts. 

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The Tarrant County Elections Department is holding a public test of its voting systems ahead of the November elections.
Kennedy believes O’Hare is under pressure from activists who perceive vulnerabilities in election administration, despite no evidence of widespread fraud or tampering.
The judge’s actions begin with the county implementing pre-printed, sequentially numbered ballots for in-person voting, a livestream camera places in the ballot board storage room and more.
One of the most impactful items on the list is that election night results will be transmitted in-person rather than via the Internet.
“We’re all worried the counting is going to take several days and that it would get meaner and more bitter as the count is slowed down,” said Kennedy.  “What Tim O’Hare has done here is to put out a list of changes that, some of them may not amount to a hill of beans, but they all are what the elections activists really want. They don’t really amount too much to the general people, meaning results are a little slower and it may be a little more expensive to do this. It cost the public money without really having any impact.”
The final action on O’Hare’s list is the formation of the county’s election integrity task force for reporting and investigating voter fraud.
It has been strongly criticized and called unnecessary.

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Early voting is from October 21 through November 1. Here is a list of the Tarrant County early voting locations.
“There is nobody in prison anywhere in Texas for illegal voting. If illegal voting were rampant there might be somebody somewhere in prison for it,” said Kennedy. “The fact is there aren’t illegal voting cases, there aren’t people in prison and the people they’ve investigated didn’t amount anything.”
According to Tarrant County Judge Tim O’Hare, the county made the following changes ahead of the 2024 election.
Information in this article comes from Tarrant County and an interview with Fort Worth Star-Telegram opinion columnist Bud Kennedy.