Texas voting law is big conservative win. So why was Abbott defensive in signing it?

For a triumphant politician celebrating a hard-fought legislative victory, Gov. Greg Abbott sure sounded defensive Tuesday.

Abbott went to Tyler for a ceremony to sign Republican voting legislation that he called two special legislative sessions to get passed. He and the bill’s sponsors touted the measure as a significant step toward curtailing fraud, especially in mail-in voting.

But Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and legislators spent more time and energy countering criticisms of the law, particularly charges that it would block voters from exercising their rights.

The governor led off by answering a question no one has asked: How does Texas’ early voting compare with that of Delaware?

He was noting that while Texans have a dozen days on which to cast early ballots, the Democratic home state of President Joe Biden — who has led the overheated charge that the new bill is a return to the days of Jim Crow — offers no early voting at all. It’s a fair argument because the Texas bill’s opponents suggest that eliminating drive-through voting and 24-hour early voting is tantamount to closing the polls.

Texans, Abbott correctly said, have ample opportunity to vote. But as the saying goes, if you’re explaining in politics, you’re losing, and the governor clearly felt the need to expound on this point right out of the gate.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick joined in, too, answering critics’ charges that Republicans want to suppress voters.

“We want to see more people vote,” he said. “That’s what Texas is about, turning out people to vote and making sure cheaters are caught.”

Sen. Bryan Hughes, the Tyler Republican who shepherded the bill through the Senate several times, was even more direct. The legislative victory was achieved in part, he said, by leaders “ignoring what we heard from the woke corporations who hadn’t read the bill, ignoring criticism from Washington.”

All this seemed odd because GOP leaders have plenty to celebrate. Twenty years into their dominance of Texas politics, they moved on several conservative priorities this year in ways they had failed to before. The election bill has gotten the bulk of the attention, thanks to House Democrats’ quorum-break to delay it, but the Legislature also enacted sweeping bills on abortion and “critical race theory” in schools.

Perhaps it was just a desire to answer so much pointed criticism. But Abbott, Patrick and Hughes seemed to confirm, if unintentionally, that their victories may have created an opening for Democrats to finally convince Texans that the GOP majority has swung too far to the right.

The abortion law has prompted much speculation nationally that that’s a possibility. The law bars abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected, and its novel enforcement mechanism — via civil suits brought against providers or those who aided the completion of abortion — has given it a temporary reprieve against its obvious unconstitutionality.

Even voters uncomfortable with broad availability of abortion, particularly suburban types whose votes seem increasingly up for grabs, might not support such a sweeping ban, the theory goes. Similarly, the voting bill could catalyze minority voters who see the measure as targeting Black and Hispanic Texans.

Of course, this is the government Texans have voted for, again and again, for decades. Predictions of Texas turning blue could fill volumes, but they’ve never proved accurate.

Even if there’s an opening, there’s little to suggest Texas Democrats can exploit it. They lack candidates who are ready to make credible challenges to Abbott and other statewide officeholders. The national climate in the 2022 midterm elections, expected to be a GOP-friendly backlash to the Biden administration, will be intensified in Texas. Democrats desperately trying to hold control of Congress will be reluctant to sink resources into the state, especially after so many Lucy-and-the-football moments left them flat on their backs here.

Plus, those elections are more than a year off. Legislation challenging the voting bill is already under way, and the abortion law could be rendered moot or even struck down by then. It’s anyone’s guess what the top issues on voters’ minds will be next month, let alone in October 2022.

Texas Democrats’ best hope is that voters, not candidates or party efforts, will lead the way, that enough are fed up to send a message that Republicans have gone too far. There’s no reason to expect it, though, until we see it.

And if voters stay with the status quo, expect similarly conservative agendas when the Legislature gathers in 2023 and even 2025.