Some 800 ballots were rejected in Tarrant County. We need to figure out why and fix it.

The right to vote is fundamental. It’s a given then, that every vote rightfully cast should be counted.

That wasn’t the case during the Democratic and Republican primaries March 1. So far, it appears to be largely due to changes in the identification requirement as a result of the new voting law.

We need more information, but here’s what we do know so far: 815 mail ballots were rejected — uncounted — in Tarrant County, by each party’s own ballot board, not by county officials. Most seem to have been rejected because of the new ID requirement, some due to missing signatures.

Strangely, only three were in the Republican primary; the rest were in the Democratic primary. We need a review and analysis of every rejected ballot in Tarrant County to determine whether the rejection involved voter ID or something else. Judge Glen Whitley has called for a briefing next month to address specific concerns about election integrity.

The numbers are worse throughout the rest of Texas. Over 18 percent of the ballots cast were rejected in Harris County and almost 23 percent in Bexar County.

Overall, nearly 23,000 ballots — 13 percent — were rejected. For perspective, the normal rate is 2 percent.

Every vote should always count, but especially in a primary year when turnout is predictably low. Slightly over 80 percent of the state’s registered voters didn’t vote at all, meaning only about 3 million voters cast ballots.

We cringed when we read this from the Texas Tribune: “about 14.2 million of registered voters in Texas blew off the primaries.” One way to encourage voter turnout is for both parties to ensure their voices are heard and their legitimately cast votes are counted. If people feel disenfranchised, that’s all they need to stay home.

Republicans might label these rejections as a win, proof that voter fraud was rampant among absentee voters, but that much fraud seems unlikely.

New rules state absentee voters must include their driver’s license number, election identification certificate number, DPS personal identification number or the last four digits of their Social Security number when submitting their ballot. That seems easy enough, but it’s proven difficult in real life.

At least one set of these numbers must match what is already on file with the voter registration office. This requires that those numbers are filed, available, and accurate.

So if a person has listed only their Social Security number or their driver’s license number, but it’s not listed or listed accurately in the voter registration system, it will be rejected even though the same person is trying to vote.

There are numerous other possibilities and ways for a ballot to be kicked back without fraud taking place, and it would take the voter weeks to fix since the system relies on the postal service.

Here are a few more questions that could lead to important changes:

The secretary of state’s website hosts a ballot tracker, which does allow voters to make small corrections, including a wrong ID number, on their web site. Why wasn’t this site more widely used if so many of the problems were related to ID requirements? This could be due to anything from an age-gap to internet access. This is worth knowing.

Furthermore, why doesn’t the secretary of state’s site allow ballots to be submitted online? If ballots could be sent online and via mail it could be more efficient and secure. If a ballot had already been cast via mail, the system could reject it. Or, if the ID number was wrong, the voter would know right away and could change it.

These are suggestions to a complex problem that must be solved and made as simple as possible for 14.2 million registered voters who call Texas home.

The new election law, while drafted and signed with good intentions, seems shoddy and ineffective when it comes to specifics — halting some fraud no doubt while also rejecting hundreds of valid ballots with innocent mistakes.

The primaries were proof and while we are glad to see the flaws on a small scale, many people are saying, “I told you so.” The legislature should have done better when drafting the law but it didn’t. We either need to fix the current system or make significant adaptations to improve voting for the general midterm and especially the 2024 presidential election.

Election integrity is vital. In fact, without it, the fabric of the election process would fray and disintegrate our nation’s fabric. But protections against voter fraud must not come at the expense of tossing out an unusually high number of ballots. We can and must make to the process to ensure every legitimate vote is counted.

This story was originally published March 22, 2022 at 5:00 AM.