The action came at the urging of several residents who spoke during the public comment portion of Tuesday's commissioners court meeting. It will force county election officials to generate manual ballots for residents outside of Texas, including military members, and require staff to retrofit the more than 1,000 machines with an older version of software.
Montgomery County uses voting machines by Austin-based Hart InterCivic. Harris County also uses the machines.
"I don't have any personal knowledge and any vulnerabilities," Elections Administrator Suzie Harvey said during the meeting. "The actual voting machines only plug into outlets, they don't connect to any network."
Harris County election officials said they have not had any concerns about the integrity of the machines.
In October 2021, commissioners approved the roughly $10 million purchase of 1,900 voting machines to replace older machines purchased in 2005.
Hart developed the Verity Duo, a voting machine with digital and print capabilities. It reportedly has three places to store the ballot, such as two separate hard drives inside the machines and on the paper ballot.
Harvey said the concerns about the voting system are not new and not specific to the updated program.
"I would ask for evidence that these are additional issues with (the updated system)," Harvey said. "I don't believe that they are."
County Judge Mark Keough said he was concerned about potential vulnerabilities in the system but said there was little time to research the claims and take any action before the Nov. 5 election.
"We don't have time to (investigate the claims)," Keough said. "We should just shut this whole thing down right now."
Commissioners said they will revisit the issues about the voting system after the November election.
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