County election offices across Texas are in an "all-hands-on-deck" sprint to process tens of thousands of delayed voter registration records following a technical error at the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS).

The transfer failure left voter registration applications and address updates stuck in system queues for nearly a year, forcing local election staff to scramble ahead of the October 5 voter registration deadline.

The backstory: In a statement explaining the cause of the backlog, the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) detailed how software changes from an outside contractor interrupted regular file transfers to the state: While state agencies resolved the technical glitch in mid-September, local county registrars now bear the burden of processing the influx before registration deadlines close.