HOUSTON \u2013 Texas voters head to the polls Tuesday in several closely watched runoff elections, including a high-profile Democratic congressional matchup in Houston and the Republican U.S. Senate runoff drawing national attention.<\/p>\n
In Houston\u2019s newly constructed 18th Congressional District, longtime U.S. Rep. Al Green faces freshman U.S. Rep. Christian Menefee in a race centered on experience versus a new generation of leadership.<\/p>\n
Green defended his decades in Congress during an interview with KPRC 2 on Monday, pointing to federal funding he helped secure for flooding relief and small businesses.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am not running to say what I will do, I am running on what I have done,\u201d Green said.<\/p>\n
The congressman also emphasized the value of seniority in Washington.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause I have seniority and I have experience\u2026 I\u2019m in the top 50 in Congress,\u201d Green said.<\/p>\n
Menefee, meanwhile, said voters across the district are ready for change.<\/p>\n
\u201cFolks are ready for change. Everywhere I go throughout our communities I hear people saying it\u2019s time to pass the baton, it\u2019s time to pass the torch,\u201d Menefee said.<\/p>\n
Menefee also said his campaign is focused on lowering costs for working families.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy goal is to lower costs and to put more money back in people\u2019s pockets,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The winner of Tuesday\u2019s Democratic runoff will advance to the November general election.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the Republican Senate runoff between John Cornyn and Ken Paxton is also drawing national attention. The winner will face Democrat James Talarico in November.<\/p>\n
In a statement to KPRC 2, Cornyn campaign spokesman Matt Mackowiak said:<\/p>\n
\u201cSenator Cornyn has fought for Texas in the US Senate. The stakes could not be higher in the midterms and Ken Paxton would be a disaster as the nominee. Senator Cornyn will continue representing Texas with honesty and integrity if given the chance and he\u2019s asking for your vote on Tuesday.\u201d<\/p>\n
KPRC 2 has also reached out to Paxton\u2019s campaign and is still awaiting a response.<\/p>\n
Polling locations across Texas open Tuesday morning and close at 7 p.m. Election results and continuing coverage will be available on air and online at click2houston.com<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 by KPRC Click2Houston – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON \u2013 Texas voters head to the polls Tuesday in several closely watched runoff elections, including a high-profile…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":308550,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[288,56,66,223,287,76195,27,29,28],"class_list":["post-308549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-elections","tag-houston","tag-local","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-runoff-elections","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308549","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=308549"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308549\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/308550"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=308549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=308549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=308549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}