AUSTIN – Democratic and Republican senators skirmished Tuesday over legislation that would require Texans to show a photo ID before voting – but the debate was mainly for show, as the measure was expected to win approval.

From the moment the Senate convened Tuesday morning to consider the GOP-backed voter ID bill, it was obvious that any important votes would wind up 19-12, the exact partisan split in the chamber.

That was the tally on the first vote as senators decided to begin a public hearing on the issue over objections from Democrats.

Republicans – reaching back to Tammany Hall, the Pendergast machine and Lyndon Johnson's 1948 U.S. Senate race – said the threat of voter fraud is present everywhere, including Texas. The only way to prevent it, they insisted, is to require voters to prove their identity.

Democrats, on the other hand, contended there is no evidence of voter fraud in Texas and warned that requiring voters to produce a photo ID will discourage voting by senior citizens, the disabled and lower-income residents.

Democratic Caucus Chairwoman Leticia Van de Putte of San Antonio cited a study indicating that about 1 million of the state's 13.5 million registered voters lack a photo ID and would be harmed by the proposal.

'Recipe for disaster'

"This is a recipe for disaster," she told other senators. "It threatens the voting rights of seniors and lower-income Texans."

Van de Putte said the move to pass a voter ID bill "is not about voter fraud. There is no voter fraud. This is about voter suppression."

But Sen. Troy Fraser, R-Horseshoe Bay, author of the bill, said there are numerous instances of voter fraud in the U.S. and Texas – dating to the Tammany Hall and Pendergast political machines in New York and Kansas City, Mo., as well as LBJ's questionable win in the 1948 U.S. Senate race in Texas.

"Voter fraud not only is alive and well in the U.S., but also alive and well in Texas," he said, arguing the "danger of voter fraud threatens the integrity of the entire electoral process."

Fraser pointed to voter ID laws in Indiana and Georgia that he said helped boost voter turnout in those states. "It actually increased voter turnout because it increased voter confidence," he said.

His legislation would require Texans to show, with their voting card, either one photo ID, such as a driver's license, or two non-photo IDs, such as a birth certificate and a bank statement. A voter could request a state photo ID free of charge.

Senators from both parties spent hours buttressing their arguments on Tuesday, sharply quizzing witnesses whom they disagreed with and helping friendly witnesses with questions supporting their testimony.

Before the hearing began, Democrats raised several parliamentary objections in an effort to postpone the proceedings. But they were overruled on every challenge by Senate President Pro Tempore Robert Duncan, R-Lubbock.

Passage assured

Senate passage of the measure was assured during the first week of the legislative session in January, when Republican senators pushed through a change in rules that exempted the bill from the so-called two-thirds requirement. Under that rule, no bill can come up for debate unless two-thirds of Senate members agree – a provision that allowed Democrats to kill the proposal two years ago.

Senate Democrats sought to question Attorney General Greg Abbott on the $1.4 million his office spent investigating voter fraud – without finding a single case where someone tried to impersonate an eligible voter at a polling place.

Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso, said he wanted to know why all 13 voter fraud indictments returned by the Republican attorney general involved Democrats and most involved minorities.

But the attorney general declined to appear at the hearing, and his decision was supported by Duncan, who said the attorney general may be called on to defend the legislation in court.

The first expert witness for the Republicans was Hans von Spakovsky of the conservative Heritage Foundation, a former federal election commissioner, who pointed to increased turnout after voter ID laws were adopted in Indiana and Georgia.

But Democrats contended that voter turnout jumped in those states because of Barack Obama's campaign for president last year.

Currently, seven states require voters to show a photo ID before being allowed to cast a ballot.