Collin County is going back to using paper and pen for election ballots. And that could happen across the country.
Several Texas counties already have switched.
Why is Collin County going back to voting method that’s decades old? It depends on who you ask.
When county commissioners voted to move from voting machines with touchscreens to hand-marked paper ballots in June, they said they made the switch to follow advice from the Texas Secretary of State’s office and to comply with an executive order from President Donald Trump. That order calls for the Federal Election Assistance Commission to amend its guidelines to ban ballots that have barcodes or QR codes for counting except when accommodating voters with disabilities.
Commissioners have heard a steady drumbeat of calls to change its voting method since 2022, led by volunteers with the Collin County chapter of Citizens Defending Freedom. Many who are part of the conservative Christian advocacy group also are active in the local Republican Party.
And activists across the country have called for the elimination of voting machines, citing concerns about election fraud.
Debbie Lindstrom, the Texas elections director of Citizens Defending Freedom, told KERA via email that hand-marked ballots are a significant step toward increasing voter confidence in Collin County’s election integrity.
“The goal should be to minimize our reliance on any technology that could potentially be manipulated,” Lindstrom wrote. “We should constantly ask: What is the most secure and verifiable way to conduct elections? Hand-marked ballots get us much closer to that goal.”
Continued Advocacy
Lindstrom told KERA her organization hasn’t identified any evidence of election fraud in Collin County. She said her group’s advocacy isn’t driven by fraud allegations.
Election fraud claims about the 2020 election repeatedly have been discredited. And Collin County, which is led by an all-Republican commissioners’ court, went for Trump in 2020 and every other Republican on the ballot.
The Texas Secretary of State’s Office said in a 2020 general election audit that Collin County’s elections are secure. The audit called Collin County “the model of how to run elections in Texas.”
Abraham George, who is now the Texas State Republican Party Chair, told KERA while he was the Collin County Republican Party chair that the precinct chairs who wanted to eliminate the county’s voting machines spoke as individuals at the meetings, not on the party’s behalf. He also said although there were issues in other parts of the country, there was no election fraud in Collin County in 2020.
“We know we didn’t have any fraud,” George said in 2022. “We won every race.”
Collin County commissioners initiated the switch to hand-marked paper ballots that will be counted by a machine in June. Kaleb Breaux, the Collin County elections administrator, said moving to hand-marked ballots has been on the county’s radar for a while.
County Judge Chris Hill first proposed switching the county’s voting method last year ahead of the 2024 November election.
“It's our turn for us to take our step in continuing to pursue election integrity here at home,” Hill said last year.
The proposal failed to pass due to concerns about time and budget. Instead, the commissioners directed staff to look into using paper ballots in the future.
Breaux said his department will make the change in the upcoming constitutional amendment election in November.
“If that's the direction they believe our voters are wanting to go, then I just feel like we should be responsible and reactive to our voters,” he said.
Members of the League of Women Voters of Collin County, a nonpartisan voting rights group, spoke in opposition of the change at commissioners court. They warned county commissioners at a public meeting in June the change could lead to long lines and distrust in elections.
Liz Holland, the president of the Collin County League of Women Voters, said hand-marked ballots have more room for error.
"There's just no reason to do it, and it's a lot of money that the taxpayers are going to have to pay for,” Holland said.
Collin County spent about $2.3 million on equipment for the new voting method. Breaux said the county is saving money this year because it won’t have to pay for maintenance on the ballot-marking machines.
He also said the scanners won’t accept ballots with errors and will prompt voters to correct it.
Integrity Concerns
Collin County is the largest county in Texas so far to change its voting method based on Trump’s order. The order, which asks the Election Assistance Commission to require voters to provide proof of citizenship, faces challenges in court.
David Becker, the founder of the Center of Election Innovation Research, said the president doesn’t have the authority to change how elections are run.
“Trump could no more sign an order that mandates that states change election technology than I could, because the president has no role in directing states how they can run elections,” Becker said.
The executive order directs the federal Election Assistance Commission to recommend states ban barcodes on ballots except when needed to assist voters with disabilities. The commission, which was created under the Help America Vote Act in 2002, sets national guidelines for elections.
Charles Stewart, a professor and director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s election data and science lab, said barcodes help the scanners count votes.
"Because the computer is not reading, ‘ah, vote for Donald Trump. Vote for Ken Paxton. Vote for someone else. They're reading, ah, there's a dot at this XY coordinate,’" Stewart said.
Lindstrom told KERA hand-marked ballots are easier for voters to verify.
“Unlike barcode systems, voters can see exactly what they selected,” Lindstrom wrote.
She called hand-marked ballots “the gold standard in election security."
Rachel Orley, the director of the elections project at the Bipartisan Policy Center, said barcodes help voting machines count ballots more efficiently.
“There are tons of checks and balances built into the process,” Orley said.
Becker said states confirm the voting machine’s accuracy by selecting a random sample of ballots to count by hand. He said states use the written votes printed on the ballots in hand audits, not the barcode.
Moving Forward
Lindstrom told KERA other counties in Texas have followed Collin County’s lead and moved to hand-marked ballots.
"Collin County leads a more recent growing statewide movement,” Lindstrom wrote.
Collin County, which has a population of 1.2 million according to the U.S. Census Bureau, is the largest county in Texas so far to move back to hand-marked ballots for elections.
Williamson County, Cameron County and Bastrop County have also changed their voting methods recently. And Denton County never made the switch to voting machines when they became available.
States don't have to follow the Election Assistance Commission’s recommendations. But several states, including Texas, have passed laws that require following the commission’s standards.
The commission’s Technical Guidelines Committee met in early July and discussed the executive order. Members expressed concern about the order’s call for the commission to decertify equipment that uses barcodes.
“If you tell somebody buy new voting equipment and there's no new voting equipment certified to buy, I'm not sure you've assisted in the process at all,” said Paul Lux, an election supervisor from Florida whose appointment to the committee is pending approval.
Stewart said it will take months for the Election Assistance Commission to finalize any recommendations based on the executive order.
“There is that possibility they might change the standards, say October, November,” he said.
Stewart said if that happens, counties may have to scramble to purchase new machines in time for the 2026 primaries. Breaux said Collin County made the change to its voting system to ensure it could acquire the necessary equipment in time.
“We just didn't want to be behind in making that move," he said.
Got a tip? Email Caroline Love at clove@kera.org.
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