Texas is suing its own largest county over how voters were invited to vote. The Office of the Texas Attorney General filed suit on Thursday, October 29, against Harris County Clerk Teneshia Hudspeth, alleging that her office's get-out-the-vote social media advertisements unlawfully targeted voters by race and ethnicity — a claim Hudspeth's office rejects, saying its outreach was lawful, nonpartisan and aimed at giving every qualified voter accurate election information.
Source: Houston Press
The lawsuit, filed in district court in Harris County, also names the clerk's Director of Communications, Irene Nunez, individually. It asks the court for a temporary restraining order, a temporary injunction and a permanent injunction over a set of advertisements worth $43,429 that ran on Facebook and Instagram, according to the complaint and the Attorney General's office.
Source: The Washington Sun
What the state says the ads did
At the centre of the case is the clerk's 'Plan, Check, Vote!' campaign. The 16-page complaint alleges the campaign intentionally targeted African American, Asian, and South American or Latino groups by using Meta interest tags such as 'African-American history', 'African American literature', 'Hispanic kitchen' and 'Latin dance', so the ads would surface for users interested in those subjects, while not targeting other demographics. Those are allegations in a court filing, not findings by a court.
'Nothing in the Texas Constitution or the statutes of the State of Texas permit a subdivision of the State to direct targeted ads towards people on the basis of race or ethnicity,' the complaint states. The Attorney General's office said in a press release that by classifying based on race when advertising election information, the clerk's office 'exceeded its authority' and 'engaged in racially discriminatory advertising in an effort to increase voter turnout among particular races and ethnicities but not others.' The suit alleges the practice violates the Texas Constitution's Equal Rights Amendment and state law, and that using taxpayer money for the ads also violates the state constitution — again, claims the court has not yet ruled on.
The clerk's answer: outreach was lawful, and the targeted subsets are now off
Hudspeth answered on Thursday evening, in a statement issued at 9:42 p.m. on October 29. 'The Harris County Clerk's Office is committed to ensuring that all qualified voters have access to accurate, timely, and nonpartisan election information. We are confident that our voter outreach efforts are lawful,' she said. She added that 'the Meta audience subsets have been deactivated to avoid unnecessary distractions', that her office 'does not engage in political rhetoric, nor do we seek to influence how any individual votes', and that its job is to administer 'fair, transparent, and accessible elections in accordance with federal and Texas election laws'.
Attorney General Ken Paxton himself has recused himself from the lawsuit because he is on the November 3 ballot — he is the Republican nominee in a closely watched U.S. Senate race against Democrat James Talarico. His office said the suit was brought 'to ensure that all Texans have an equal opportunity to be informed of and participate in the electoral process, regardless of race or demographic'.
U.S. Congressman Christian Menefee, a Democrat who represents part of Harris and Fort Bend counties, said the Attorney General's office filed the suit with just one day remaining in the early voting period because Republicans fear losing their 30-year stronghold in Texas. '[Paxton is] whining about ads that do nothing more than tell neighbors when to vote and where to get information about voting,' Menefee said, naming neighbourhoods including Third Ward, Acres Homes, Cypress, Tidwell and Sunnyside, and urging every eligible Harris County voter to cast a ballot.
Why Harris County, and why this week
Harris County, anchored by Houston, is Texas's largest county and a Democratic stronghold, and it is also one of the most diverse counties in the United States — home to large Black, Latino and Asian communities, including a significant Punjabi and South Asian population in the Houston area. That is why a fight over ads aimed in part at Asian voters lands directly with this site's Texas readers: the interest tags at issue are the kind used to reach South Asian audiences online, and the question before the court is whether a county may use them at all when the message is simply when and where to vote.
The timing sharpens everything. Harris County had already recorded an unprecedented early-voting turnout of 862,659 ballots as of Thursday afternoon, the Houston Press reported, and the state's filing itself stressed the clock, arguing that every moment the advertisements remain active the county is violating the Texas Constitution, while once the 2026 election is over 'the harm will be done'. Meta's own ad library explains that ads can be bought to reach users by age, gender and location and may also reach people beyond the stated targeting criteria who are likely to find an ad relevant — a detail that is likely to matter when the court examines how narrow the targeting really was.
What happens next
A Texas district court must now decide, on an election-eve timetable, whether to grant the temporary relief the state seeks — deactivating the ad or removing the targeted tags and barring such targeting in the future. Early voting ends Friday, October 30, and Election Day is Tuesday, November 3. For Harris County voters, the practical position today is unchanged: the clerk's office continues to run the election, the targeted Meta subsets have been switched off by the clerk herself, and voting information remains available through the county. No court has yet ruled that the ads were unlawful.