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Allen West, the Dallas County Republican Party chair, resigned Wednesday, according to Dallas County Elections Department officials.
The announcement comes after West said on March 17 he agreed to use countywide polling sites for the May 26 runoff election, a decision that drew opposition from some party members.
Dallas Republicans initially planned to hand count primary ballots before scrapping the plan due to lack of staffing. Instead, they chose to require voters to report to precincts instead of countywide vote centers for the March 3 primary, causing chaos and confusion across the county. More than 12,000 voters from both parties showed up at the wrong polling location on Election Day.
West’s resignation, however, was not tied to the Election Day confusion but followed his later decision to support a return to countywide voting for the May runoff.
West did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In a statement, the Dallas County Elections Department said West informed county elections administrator Paul Adams of his resignation Wednesday afternoon. The department declined to comment further.
West had for months supported the use of precinct-based sites for the primary and the elimination of the countywide polling place program, which allows voters to cast ballots anywhere in the county and had been used for years. But in a March 17 statement he said that using assigned precincts again for the runoff would expose the county party to “increased risk and voter confusion.”
“To then shift for the one day runoff election to precincts would bring about large-scale disruption,” West said in that statement in March.
West expected pushback from his own party for that decision.
In a blog post on the party’s website April 6, he said that continuing to use precinct-based voting for the runoff election would expose the county party to “a most dangerous course of action.” He said the party would face a lawsuit “alleging willful and intentional voter disenfranchisement.”
“The decision that I made was one rooted in years of understanding leadership and its responsibilities, namely, protecting your Troops,“ West, a former Florida congressman and Army veteran, wrote. “If there are those who do not see this as noble and honorable, that is fine with me. I have stated my position and under my watch as Chairman of the Dallas County Republican Party will not expose this organization to potential damaging legal efforts.”
Some Republicans in Texas have for years pushed to eliminate the countywide polling place program to eliminate the use of electronic voting machines and instead hand count ballots. It’s a push that began soon after the 2020 election and the lies President Donald Trump spread about the outcome.
Republican critics of countywide voting claim it makes elections less secure because it could allow people“to double or triple vote, though there’s no evidence that countywide voting is less secure. Texas election officials use procedures to prevent double voting, including the use of technology that tracks in real time who has voted and where.
Texas election officials say the countywide voting program, which has been in use in Texas for more than 20 years, allows counties to save money by operating fewer, centralized polling locations with fewer workers and less equipment.
Natalia Contreras is a reporter for Votebeat in partnership with The Texas Tribune. She is based in Corpus Christi. Contact Natalia at ncontreras@votebeat.org.
