Election Day Voting — What to Know
- Election Day Voter Guide: Learn where and when you can vote on Election Day, what's on your ballot, and what you'll need to bring to the polls.
- When is Election Day? Tuesday, Nov. 5, is Election Day. On that day, polls will be open in Texas from 7 a.m. until 7 p.m. You will be allowed to vote if you're in line by 7 p.m. on Election Day.
- Who or what is on the ballot? Click the links to filter races by category or county: Federal races | State races | Collin County | Dallas County | Denton County | Tarrant County | ISD props | City props
- How many people voted early? More than 1 million people voted early in North Texas. Click here to see daily early voting totals from Collin, Dallas, Denton and Tarrant counties and compare them to those from previous years.
- How can I vote by mail? The deadline to request a mail-in ballot has passed. Mail-in ballots must be received or postmarked by 7 p.m., Tuesday, Nov. 5. More information on voting by mail in Texas is here.
- Nationwide election updates: Follow the latest national election news here.
In the final countdown to election day, a dispute is underway in Texas.
Late Friday, Secretary of State Jane Nelson issued a letter to the U.S. Department of Justice, saying its staff is not allowed in Texas polling places.
“Texas law is clear,” she wrote. “Justice Department monitors are not permitted inside a polling place where ballots are being cast or a central counting station where ballots are being counted.”
Get top local stories in DFW delivered to you every morning. >Sign up for NBC DFW's News Headlines newsletter.
Her response came just hours after the DOJ announced 86 locations across 27 states where it plans to send monitors on November 5th to check for compliance with federal voting laws.
Eight Texas counties — including Atascosa, Bexar, Dallas, Frio, Harris, Hays, Palo Pinto and Waller — were on the list.
“There’s a long history here, and it goes back to the Voting Rights Act passed in the 1960s,” said appellate lawyer David Coale.
Coale, a constitutional law expert, said the practice first began to prevent discrimination against minorities.
The DOJ continued to send monitors to states of its choosing until 2013 when the Supreme Court ruled that states have the right to tell the federal government no.
Until recently, few did.
“As a matter of practice, people have generally been fairly receptive to that, because most election officials are kind of proud of their work and want to show off that they're doing it well. But as things have gotten more politically charged in our country about elections the last couple of elections, a lot of states are pushing back on that,” said Coale.
Federal monitors visited counties in Texas as recently as 2022.
This year Texas isn’t alone in telling the DOJ to stay away.
It joins others like Florida and Missouri, which Coale said the law allows.
“Frankly, I think it's kind of healthy that we have a little skirmishing between the federal and state government here because there's room for difference of opinion about how to conduct our elections. And I think it's probably healthy to not just have one branch of government come in and tell everybody how to do it, unless there's some compelling reason like the Voting Rights Act for so many years,” he said.
In her letter, Nelson told the DOJ to “rest assured that Texas has robust processes and procedures in place to ensure that eligible voters may participate in a free and fair election.”
