Gaskin is among the Texans ensnared in the Lone Star State's restrictive new voting law, passed by the Republican-controlled legislature last year. It imposes a raft of changes in a state that already had some of the strictest voting regulations in the country. As early voting kicks off in the state on Monday, election officials and voters alike are grappling with confusion about the law in the first statewide election since it has taken effect.

At stake: primary races for governor and six other statewide offices, along with contests for state legislative and congressional seats and other local positions. Early, in-person voting runs through February 25. The final day of voting in the primary is March 1.

In addition to the new ID requirements to vote absentee, the law makes it a crime for a public official to mail out absentee ballot applications to voters who haven't requested them. SB1, as the law is known, also takes aim at Harris County -- home to Houston -- which offered 24-hour voting during the pandemic in 2020. The law limits early voting hours and bans drive-thru voting, another tool the county used.

The changes already have resulted in higher-than-usual rejection rates for absentee ballot applications. And some counties have begun to report new problems: Hundreds of mailed ballots flagged for rejection over ID requirements......

"Basically, everything that can go wrong with this has been going wrong," said James Slattery, a senior staff attorney with the Texas Civil Rights Project, said of the implementation of the Texas law. He worries other states are "going to go through this type of ordeal when their time eventually comes."