NBC News: Republicans may have found a crafty way to keep Democrats down in Texas

Keep Texas red? Republicans may have a new law for that.

Age- and race-related demographic changes, as well as a statewide blue-wave fueled by opposition to President Donald Trump, threaten to put numerous state and federal races in play for Democrats after decades of Republican wins.

But under a rule that went into effect this month, the threshold for third parties to get on the ballot in Texas was lowered in a way that watchdog groups, nonpartisan experts and progressive activists all say is designed to siphon votes from Democratic candidates and boost the prospects of the GOP in contests where the margin of victory in 2020 is expected to be razor-thin.

“This is part of a very clear strategy by the Texas GOP to keep the demographic changes we’re seeing in Texas from being reflected at the ballot box,” said Anthony Gutierrez, the executive director of the Texas branch of the government watchdog group Common Cause. “This is one of the ways they could use a third-party candidacy to knock off a percentage point or two from a Democrat, allowing Republicans to retain power for a bit longer than maybe they otherwise would have.”

Texas House Bill 2504, passed along party lines by the state’s Republican-controlled Legislature in May and signed into law by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in June, lowers the threshold that minor political parties — defined in the law as parties that nominate by convention, as opposed to by primary — must meet to have their candidates appear on the ballot.

Under the new law, a third party’s candidates can qualify to appear on the ballot if any one of them got 2 percent of the vote in a statewide race in the last five elections. Previously, a third party’s candidates earned a spot on the ballot if any one of them won 5 percent of the vote in any of the most recent statewide elections.