After gerrymandering comes eliminating polling places···the Republican ‘voting desert’ operation unfolding in Tarrant County

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A U.S. voter casts an early ballot for the 11·3 midterms at a polling place set up in the Elections and Voter Services building in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on the 18th (local time). Early voting began that day in several states, including Minnesota, Virginia, Idaho, and South Dakota. AP Yonhap News

Tarrant County, Texas, has decided to eliminate one-third of polling places for the November 3 (local time) midterm elections. By a 3-2 vote, the Republican-majority county commissioners passed on the 1st a plan to reduce polling places from 316 to 224, citing “cost savings.”

Polling places have disappeared disproportionately in areas with higher shares of residents of color and higher poverty rates. Some areas have even become ‘voting deserts’ with no polling place at all. Voting has become even harder for residents without cars or low-income people who can barely spare time away from work.

Local voting-rights activists told the Kyunghyang Shinmun in an interview on the 8th (local time) that they suspect Republicans, who previously pushed redistricting (gerrymandering) to shape a favorable electoral map, are now testing a new strategy of ‘cutting polling places.’

In the 2020 presidential election, Tarrant County tipped to former President Joe Biden by 1,826 votes. In 2024 it swung back to President Donald Trump by 42,000 votes, but compared with a decade ago, the gap between Republican and Democratic vote totals has narrowed substantially.

Notably, in Tarrant County's primaries last March, roughly 188,400 people participated in the Democratic contest, far exceeding about 145,000 in the Republican one. This indicates greater enthusiasm for the Democratic primary than the Republican's and suggests Democratic supporters' turnout in the general election could rise.

Katherine Godbey, co-founder and board chair of the ‘Justice Network,’ criticized, saying “cost savings are a false pretext” and “Republicans, feeling a sense of crisis, are resorting to tricks to depress turnout among Democratic-leaning voters.”

Tim O'Hare, the Republican chair of the Tarrant County commissioners who led the decision, argued that by reducing polling places, “we've avoided wastefully placing one right across the street. Polling places are distributed fairly and rationally.” However, in reality, the number of polling places fell much more sharply in ZIP codes with higher poverty rates. Among the areas with the steepest cuts are those with higher proportions of people of color.

A comparison of the 2022 and 2026 polling-place lists published by Tarrant County election authorities with American Community Survey (ACS) poverty data from the U.S. Census Bureau shows that in the top 25% of areas by poverty, polling places dropped from 89 to 51, a 42.7% decline. By contrast, in the bottom 25% of areas by poverty, the number fell from 70 to 67, a decrease of just 4.3%.

ZIP code area A (30.1%), with the highest poverty rate in Tarrant County, and area B (1.5%), with the lowest, stand in stark contrast. In area A, where Election Day polling places were cut by more than half from seven to three, 78.4% of residents are people of color and 9.3% of households lack a car. By contrast, in area B, where only 1.9% of households lack a car, polling places increased from three to four.

In particular, ZIP code area C, which had three polling places in the 2022 election, lost them all, leaving none open on Election Day. Area C has a poverty rate of 16.2%, and roughly 6.4% of households lack a car. Even accounting for residents without voting rights, such as non-citizens, this suggests there is a meaningful number of eligible voters who may face access barriers because they do not have a vehicle.

For example, from a home on Oakland Boulevard in area C, it took only a two-minute walk to reach a polling place in the 2022 midterms. But for the November midterms, it will take about a 50-minute walk to reach a polling place in the neighboring ZIP code.

The polling place that had been on the University of Texas at Arlington campus has also been removed. Because Election Day is not a public holiday in the U.S., when on-campus polling places are eliminated, students must use free periods to travel to off-campus sites. Lisbeth, whom we met in front of a dorm on the 10th, said, “I live in a dorm so I don't have a car. Voting is going to be very cumbersome.” Alexandria, a master's student in architecture, also remarked, “They're always saying young people should vote, so how does it make sense to deliberately remove the polling place that used to be on campus?”

Katherine Godbey during a video interview with the Kyunghyang Shinmun on the 8th (local time).

Godbey, the chair of the ‘Justice Network,’ which has campaigned against the cuts, said in a video interview on the 8th that it is “plainly racial discrimination that polling places in low-income and communities of color were eliminated in a concentrated way,” adding, “Some places require crossing a highway to get to the next-closest site. In some cases, if you don't have a car, access has become impossible.”

Michael Bell, a Black pastor who has spoken out on civil-rights issues including race, education, and police reform, also noted in an interview that “for low-income people of color, the reduction of polling places directly affects their time and money.” He said, “In the areas where they live, there's little economic base, so people go outside their neighborhoods to work. Before, they could stop by and vote on the way home, and if the neighborhood school was a polling place, they could vote while picking up their kids. Now, in some cases they have to take the kids home from school and then go back out to find a polling place, which can mean paying extra for after-school care.”

Bell warned that “Tarrant County is like a ‘leading indicator’ for Texas and the Republican Party,” adding, “If cutting polling places proves influential on turnout, Republicans could spread it to other areas to shape the electoral landscape to their advantage.” Godbey added that redistricting was first taken up in Tarrant County and then spread to other parts of Texas.

Michael Bell during a video interview with the Kyunghyang Shinmun on the 8th (local time).

Indeed, Steve Bannon, a MAGA·Make America Great Again influencer, has long cast Tarrant County as a strategic hub that will shape the direction of conservative politics in Texas and nationwide. In his podcast last November, he said, “As Tarrant goes, so goes Texas; as Texas goes, so goes the nation.”

Godbey voiced concern not only about the cuts to polling places but also about various Trump administration measures that seek to restrict voting rights, such as the ‘Save America Act’ that President Trump is pressuring Congress to pass. The bill would require proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote; because a driver's license alone cannot establish citizenship, applicants would have to navigate a complex process to obtain additional documents. This is not an easy hurdle for low-income people and rural residents. Bell said, “Married women may have mismatches between their current legal names and the names on their birth certificates because their surnames changed,” adding, “once you start demanding citizenship documents, it will become a nightmare.”

The Trump administration and the Republican Party's continued attacks on the election system and attempts to restrict voting rights have fueled fears that the federal government might intervene in the upcoming midterms. Reuters reported that many state governments and election officials have taken unusual steps to prepare for contingencies. In some places, election offices have installed bulletproof glass and surveillance cameras, and some have even conducted drills simulating scenarios in which Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents appear at polling sites.

Pastor Bell said, “Trump's ultimate goal is to make people lose faith in the election system itself,” adding, “if they don't believe, they stop participating. They start thinking, ‘What's the point of my voting, anyway?’” Godbey said, “I lived assuming democracy was simply a given until I was about to turn seventy, but I now feel a real sense of crisis that we could lose it,” adding, “but the people are stronger than those in power. If everyone joins forces, we can stop it.”

Civil groups in Tarrant County, including the ‘Justice Network,’ plan to counter the cuts by encouraging voters to cast early ballots and by providing transportation on Election Day for those who would have difficulty getting to the polls.