A group of Texas Democrats asked the Justice Department to investigate a series of raids conducted as part of "an election integrity investigation" led by the state's Attorney General.
In a letter addressed to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, 11 members of congress urged the Justice Department to investigate Texas' AG Ken Paxton's raids targeting several Latino campaign volunteers, community leaders, a state House candidate and a local area mayor.
"AG Paxton has a well-established pattern of using the power of the Attorney General's office to target companies, organizations, and communities that do not align with his personal or political views," the letter read. "Given the Attorney General's history of misusing his power, we believe it is imperative that the Department investigate these raids as potential civil rights violations and potential interference with Latinos' right to vote fairly and freely."
The Democratic leaders exhorted Garland, citing possible violation of the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act, and requested for the federal authority to take any necessary action to prevent further interference with the rights of voters in the state of Texas.
The letter was signed by Democratic Congress members Veronica Escobar, Joaquin Castro, Lloyd Doggett, Jasmine Crockett, and Greg Casar, among others.
"We are concerned that these actions are intended to intimidate American citizens, in particular Latinos and members of minority communities, from exercising their right to vote through political persecution or deny them that right altogether. We request that the Department investigate these actions," they added.
The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), the nation's largest and oldest Hispanic civil rights organization founded by Cesar Chavez, had requested for the Department of Justice to look into these raids last week and accused Paxton of wanting "to suppress the Latino vote" ahead of the 2024 elections.
Paxton has said that "allegations of election fraud and vote harvesting" led to the investigation by his office's Election Integrity Unit, following a two-year probe that yielded enough evidence to grant the search warrants.
"There's a reason Joe Biden brought people here illegally," Paxton said on a radio show in August, accusing the current administration of leading voting fraud efforts. "I'm convinced that that's how they're going to do it this time, they're going to use the illegal vote. Why were they brought in, why did he bring in 14 million people? He brought them here to vote."
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