Harris County enters the Nov. 3 midterm with 2.7 million registered voters, according to Texas Secretary of State figures. This is an increase from the 2.5 million registered voters in 2022.
“We’ve hit a historic milestone in Harris County,” said Annette Ramirez, the county’s tax assessor-collector and voter registrar.
She credited a new effort, Harris County Get on the Roll, launched in August as the office’s first full-scale nonpartisan registration campaign. Her staff visited high schools, universities, nonprofits, and even a Metro station transfer point.
“Instead of having folks come to us, we tried to get out in the community,” Ramirez said.
Turnout is following registration
Harris County set a midterm record on the first day of early voting, when more than 104,600 people voted in person, topping the 2018 first-day record of 63,188.
The Harris County Clerk’s unofficial tally through Saturday, Oct. 24, shows 581,580 early voters.
They include 546,651 in person and 34,929 by mail, or roughly 21% of registered voters.
Clerk Teneshia Hudspeth said earlier that the initial momentum suggested the county “could probably break a number” on opening day.
“Any challenges that might come our way, I will tell you that my leadership and all of our offices, including our chief election officer in the state of Texas, the secretary of state, they’re prepared as well,” Hudspeth said.
University of Houston political scientist Nancy Sims noted that because Harris County voters can cast ballots at any location, it is hard to extrapolate from voting locations.
Some of the surge is also simple growth, since the county has about 400,000 more registered voters than in 2018.
Suspense status: not a bar to voting
Registration totals include voters on the “suspense list,” people whose addresses county officials cannot confirm.
The state lists 282,402 such voters in Harris County. Ramirez said the peak was 325,000 this summer.
About 30,000 people updated their information before the October deadline, bringing the figure to 295,000, she added.
The numbers vary by date, and Ramirez said they are still declining as voters confirm their addresses.
She added that suspense does not mean ineligible.
“If you do see that you’re in suspense when you check, please still show up. You can still vote,” Ramirez said.
Voters should bring ID and complete a statement of residence, after which they can vote. They can check status at hctax.net or call 713-274-VOTE (8683), where staff assist in English, Spanish, Vietnamese, and Chinese.
“It’s the first time this office did a full-blown nonpartisan initiative…and increased voter registration in Harris County.”
Annette Ramirez, Harris County tax assessor-collector and voter registrar
Processing problems
The registrar’s office faced two surges of late records.
The Associated Press reported that, according to state officials, a software glitch delayed registration applications and updates across Texas, including more than 75,000 in Harris County.
Ramirez said the records arrived around Sept. 22, weeks before the registration deadline, and that her most experienced processors worked with their phones turned off to clear them by Oct. 3. About 11,000 of those records needed manual review, she added.
Then, the Thursday before early voting began, the Secretary of State notified counties that some files from the Texas.gov update site had never been sent.
Harris County received about 2,400 additional records and processed them, Ramirez said.
The Secretary of State’s office has said a county processing delay does not change the effective date of a registration submitted through DPS. Her office has said anyone who shows up and is not on the rolls can still cast a provisional ballot.
Ramirez credited staff dedication and said transparency is the best defense against distrust.
“My number one goal is to make sure that our residents have confidence in the work that our office has done,” she said. “That involves education for our residents and sharing how we do things and why we do things the way we do. That’s how we make sure that people aren’t questioning and they’re comfortable with what we’re doing here.”
