{"id":139137,"date":"2026-01-27T00:30:14","date_gmt":"2026-01-27T00:30:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/139137\/"},"modified":"2026-01-27T00:30:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-27T00:30:14","slug":"early-voting-in-houstons-18th-congressional-district-extended-due-to-storm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/139137\/","title":{"rendered":"Early voting in Houston\u2019s 18th Congressional District extended due to storm"},"content":{"rendered":"

Votebeat is a nonprofit news organization reporting on voting access and election administration across the U.S. Sign up for Votebeat Texas\u2019 free newsletter here.<\/a><\/p>\n

This story was first published by The Texas Tribune,<\/a> a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans \u2014 and engages with them \u2014 about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.<\/p>\n

A district judge has ordered Harris County to extend the early voting period for the runoff election in Texas\u2019 18th Congressional District, after polling stations were closed<\/a> Sunday and Monday due to severe weather. <\/p>\n

The Texas Civil Rights Project on Sunday filed a lawsuit against the county on behalf of organizations Houston Justice and Pure Justice, asking to add Jan. 28 and Jan. 29 to early voting. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhile understandable in light of severe weather and safety concerns, these closures will make it impossible for some of Plaintiffs\u2019 members and other voters in Congressional District 18 \u2026 to exercise their right to vote in this important special runoff election,\u201d the lawsuit said. <\/p>\n

On Monday, Judge Latosha Lewis Payne granted the groups\u2019 request. According to her order, the county is required to operate the same early voting locations that were set for Monday on Wednesday from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Meanwhile, the Sunday polling places would have to be open from noon to 7 p.m. on Thursday. <\/p>\n

Harris County Clerk Teneshia Hudspeth\u2019s office didn\u2019t immediately respond to a comment request.<\/p>\n

The runoff election is between former Harris County Attorney Christian Menefee and former Houston City Council member Amanda Edwards, both Democrats. Both support the lawsuit.<\/p>\n

How Texas safeguards elections \u2014 and what still poses a threat<\/p>\n

Get the latest reporting on voting technology, misinformation, the push for hand-counting ballots, and more in Votebeat Texas’ free newsletter, delivered twice a month.<\/p>\n

\u201cFolks in TX-18 have already gone nearly a year without a voice in Congress,\u201d Menefee said in a Sunday post on social media.<\/a> \u201cWe shouldn\u2019t have to settle for just five days to vote early in such an important election.\u201d<\/p>\n

He subsequently called<\/a> the judge\u2019s order \u201ca big win for voter access.\u201d <\/p>\n

The district hasn\u2019t had representation in Congress since the March 2025 death of U.S. Rep. Sylvester Turner.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis district has gone without its voice, without its vote, without anyone to advocate on its behalf of federal funding for far too long,\u201d Edwards told The Texas Tribune Sunday. \u201cWe are finally on the cusp of it getting its voice back and we want to make sure that as many people in this 18th Congressional District as possible have the opportunity to participate in this process.\u201d <\/p>\n

The winner will hold the seat through the end of this year, but will have little time to prepare for the primary election<\/a> on March 3, which will effectively decide who represents the heavily Democratic district starting in 2027. The primary also includes U.S. Rep. Al Green<\/a>, who is changing districts after his district was redrawn<\/a> in the recent mid-decade redistricting, and Gretchen Brown, a candidate with defense policy experience. <\/p>\n

In the Nov. 4 special election to replace Turner<\/a>, Menefee finished first with 28.9% of the vote, while Edwards was second at 25.6%, out of 16 candidates.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Votebeat is a nonprofit news organization reporting on voting access and election administration across the U.S. Sign up…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":139138,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[409,6513,56,58,57,3602,19681,2279],"class_list":{"0":"post-139137","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston","8":"tag-election","9":"tag-election-day","10":"tag-houston","11":"tag-houston-headlines","12":"tag-houston-news","13":"tag-texas-tribune","14":"tag-votebeat","15":"tag-voting"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139137"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139137\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}