Justin Doud/Houston Public Media
Harris County Attorney Christian Menefee speaks at a campaign event for fellow Democrat Colin Allred in Houston in July 2025.
While acting Harris County Attorney Christian Menefee is a frontrunner in the race to fill the vacant seat in Houston’s 18th Congressional District, questions remain about what happens next with his elected position as the county’s chief legal advisor.
Though Menefee technically resigned from his position earlier this year after announcing his campaign for the special election to complete the term of late U.S. Rep. Sylvester Turner, he has continued to carry out the roles of county attorney in an acting capacity. Harris County commissioners are charged with appointing an interim.
That hasn’t happened yet, though, and discussions about the position have taken place only during the commissioners’ recent closed-to-the-public executive sessions.
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Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo scheduled a special meeting for Nov. 20 for the sole purpose of entering executive session to discuss the position. But the discussion fell through after scheduling conflicts among commissioners and Hidalgo’s unexplained absence.
“I think there’s several factors here, first is that the majority of commissioners court are generally satisfied with Christian Menefee’s work as county attorney and don’t see an urgent need to replace him at least at present,” said Mark Jones, a political scientist at Rice University’s Baker Institute.
Jones said another issue could be a general disagreement among commissioners on who Menefee’s replacement should be. There are a couple ways to approach the issue of finding a replacement, Jones said.
“One is someone who will not seek the office in the future in 2026. The other is to give a person an advantage over rivals in the Democratic primary in March of 2026,” Jones said. “And so there could also be some disagreement among county commissioners and County Judge Hidalgo about which route to go with — to choose someone who simply is going to be a placeholder and not seek the office, or to give a candidate an advantage by being the incumbent in the March 2026 Democratic primary.”
In a statement to Houston Public Media on Monday, Harris County Precinct 1 Commissioner Rodney Ellis said the commissioners court should not try and influence the upcoming election.
“Voters will soon have the chance to decide between several qualified candidates who have stepped forward to express interest in the county attorney position,” Ellis said. “My preference for this appointment is that commissioners court selects an internal candidate from within the current county attorney’s office at the appropriate moment rather than puts its thumb on the scale ahead of the election.”
Neither Hidalgo nor any of the county’s other three elected commissioners — Democrats Lesley Briones, and Adrian Garcia, along with Republican Tom Ramsey — responded to requests for comment by deadline.
Though Menefee provides legal counsel to the county government and acts as its representative in litigation, he’s repeatedly used his position to fight President Donald Trump’s administration in federal court.
Harris County Attorney Christian Menefee announces a federal lawsuit against the Trump Administration April 29, 2025. (Photo Credit: Sarah Grunau/ Houston Public Media)
Wally Calaway says environmental concerns are what led him to install solar panels. He has a total of 25 panels on his roof. (Photo Credit: Lucio Vasquez / Houston Public Media)
FILE: Contact tracers work at Harris County Public Health contact tracing facility Thursday, June 25, 2020, in Houston, Texas. (Photo Credit: AP Photo/David J. Phillip)
In April, he filed a lawsuit against the administration after it clawed back more than $11 billion of already approved and allocated federal health grants distributed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
He filed another lawsuit in federal court against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency following the administration’s move to pull back more than $250 million allocated for solar energy initiatives in Texas.
Menefee, a Democrat, has cited many of those legal initiatives in his campaign for the 18th Congressional District — a Democratic stronghold in Texas. That means continuing to carry out the roles of county attorney in the meantime could give him an advantage in the Jan. 31 runoff against former Houston City Council member Amanda Edwards, who on Nov. 4 received the second-most votes behind Menefee in a 16-candidate race.
Edwards did not respond to a request for comment.
Amanda Edwards campaign
Amanda Edwards ran for Texas’ 18th Congressional District against incumbent Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee in 2024, losing in the Democratic primary.
Menefee’s office also did not respond to a request for comment. In a recent interview with “Hello Houston,” Menefee said his office has continued to secure legal wins while his congressional campaign continues in the background.
One of those wins, he said, came when a Harris County judge ruled in a lawsuit filed by Menefee against two people accused of fraudulently stealing dozens of local properties through a deed fraud scheme. The judge’s July order returned more than 40 properties to their rightful owners.
“I’ll be replaced at the will of commissioners court and I trust that they’ll make a great decision to ensure that that office continues to fight and advocate for everyday folks throughout our county,” he said.
County commissioners’ next scheduled meeting is on Dec. 11, a few days after the state’s deadline for candidates to file for the county attorney race in next year’s primary elections. The position will be on Harris County’s primary ballot in March, with the general election set for next November.
Jones said while questions about the county attorney position remain, it’s possible commissioners run down the clock to backfill Menefee’s position before the primary election.
“Until Menefee is actually elected, which isn’t a certainty, he could continue that role, although eventually you’re going to get to a point where it just seems a little odd that someone has been serving in an interim capacity for over a year or close to a year,” Jones said.
A few candidates have filed to run for the position next year, including Jacqueline Lucci Smith, a former civil court judge who once worked in the county attorney’s office, and civil court judge Audrie Lawton-Evans.