NPR (AUDIO): In the wake of 2020, election officials are beleaguered
Anthony Gutierrez with Common Cause Texas says whether this is a good thing kind of depends.
ANTHONY GUTIERREZ: You know, it really can go both ways. I mean, you see some election administrators who do a really good job because they're professionals who stay in that job for decades in some cases.
LOPEZ: But, Gutierrez says, sometimes appointments can be pretty political. For example, he says, Governor Greg Abbott recently appointed a new elections chief for the state who was part of President Trump's legal team trying to overturn 2020 election results in Pennsylvania. Gutierrez says, in those situations, voters can't weigh in at the ballot box to vote someone out. He says this is why he thinks for this model to work, there needs to be transparency.
GUTIERREZ: With this type of an appointment system, you really need to have citizens involved. You need to have a public, transparent interview process, where you have multiple candidates that people can interact with.