Performing Harris County Lawyer Christian Menefee leads the particular election for Texas’ 18th Congressional District with 32.44% of the vote, in accordance with early voting totals launched Tuesday evening by the Harris County Clerk’s Workplace. Former Houston Metropolis Council member Amanda Edwards is working second with 25.15%, whereas Jolanda Jones is in third place with 18.9%.
If not one of the 16 registered candidates pull within the minimal required 50% of the vote plus one for a first-round victory as soon as the Election Day outcomes are finalized, the competition will proceed to a runoff election between the highest two vote-getters. A runoff date has but to be scheduled, however it will possible happen someday in late January or February, underneath a federal legislation to accommodate serving navy personnel and different residents residing abroad.
Talking at an election watch get together Tuesday evening, Menefee mentioned he thanked his workers for his or her onerous work in the course of the marketing campaign.
“I’m working for Congress, not for Christian Menefee,” he mentioned. “I’m working for Congress as a result of I deeply care about these communities and I need to get to work for them in Washington each single day.”
Michael Adkinson/HPM
Edwards, talking at her election watch get together, mentioned her marketing campaign was a collective effort.
“Each single time that we discuss this mission or purpose, it’s by no means been simply to get me elected,” she mentioned. “It has all the time been about ensuring that we create an 18th Congressional District the place every single individual, it doesn’t matter what their background, irrespective of the place they reside, has the chance not simply to get by daily however … to actually have folks thrive every single day.”
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The 18th Congressional District has remained vacant for a lot of the previous 16 months. Longtime U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee died in July 2024 after a battle with pancreatic most cancers. Gov. Greg Abbott referred to as a particular election to complete her time period in November 2024, on the identical poll as which voters have been to select her successor for a full time period. Jackson Lee’s daughter gained the particular election, whereas former Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner gained the overall election contest.
Turner died in March 2025 after barely two months in workplace. Abbott then waited a month earlier than saying in April that the particular election to fill Turner’s seat wouldn’t come till this November. Abbott cited Harris County’s earlier difficulties conducting elections as the rationale for the prolonged delay. Democratic critics accused Abbott of holding the seat open, and leaving district residents and not using a voice in Congress, to be able to protect Republicans’ skinny majority within the U.S. Home of Representatives.
In July, Abbott directed state lawmakers to redraw the state’s congressional boundaries, largely underneath strain from President Donald Trump, who mentioned he needed Texas Republicans to flip 5 Democratic seats to GOP management. Texas’ 18th Congressional District stood on the coronary heart of the combat, after the Justice Division’s Civil Rights Division alleged in a letter to Abbott that the district, drawn to signify a majority coalition of nonwhite voters, was an “unconstitutional racial gerrymander.”
The Texas Legislature took two particular periods to perform that purpose, succeeding solely after Democratic representatives fled the state for weeks, denying Republicans a quorum and pushing the problem of redistricting into the nationwide highlight. A slew of different states, led by each Democrats and Republicans, subsequently moved to redraw their legislative boundaries as a part of the trouble to determine management of Congress.
Instantly after the Texas Legislature handed its redistricting plan, a coalition of civil rights teams challenged the plan in courtroom.
A federal district courtroom in El Paso will decide whether or not the prevailing congressional map or the brand new one will probably be used for the 2026 midterm elections.
