Important New Date Changes and Filing Period for Texas Elections to Accommodate for Move Act

Same Primary Election Date but all other dates modified

Texas faced a bit of a dilemma in the Texas Legislative Session this past year. The Move Act requires States to send out ballots to troops overseas at least 45 days before an election. And while many of the liberal northeast States requested and were granted waivers from the requirement to make sure troops get their ballots, Texas wanted to make sure that troops got their ballots mailed in accordance with the Move Act. This meant Texas had to either move their primary election date back to a later date or move the candidate filing period deadline to a sooner date.

There was significant pushback to the idea of having to move the Texas Primary Election back to a later date and make Texas even less significant in the presidential primary election.

Instead of moving the primary election to a later date, Texas instead passed SB 100 which will keep the Texas Primary Election date the same but change all the other dates, including moving the candidate filing deadline to an earlier date and moving a primary runoff election to a later date.

Below is the summary of the major, important changes to the Texas Election Calendar:

Summary

Deadline to File as a Candidate = Second Monday in December (Dec. 12, 2011)

Ballot Drawing = Third Tuesday in December

Primary Election Date = First Tuesday in March (March 6th, 2012)

Primary Run off = Fourth Tuesday in May (May 22, 2012)

Local & General = First Tuesday in November (November 6, 2012)

Here is a more detailed Texas Election Calendar.

Thanks to Skipper Wallace of the Texas Republican County Chairmen’s Association for providing the summary of the New Texas Election Schedule