The downtown Houston skyline seen over the rooftops of nearby homes — Downtown Houston, the seat of Harris County. File photo, 2017. (Photo: Jason Villanueva / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0)

October 30, 2026 · 3 min read

State Sues Harris County Clerk Over Voting Ads Aimed at Some Ethnic Groups. The County Pulled the Targeting Hours Later

The Attorney General's Office says the Harris County Clerk aimed taxpayer-funded get-out-the-vote ads at Black, Latino and Asian audiences but not others. The clerk says the outreach was lawful but switched off the audience settings Thursday night.

The Texas Attorney General's Office sued the Harris County Clerk on Thursday, accusing the office of aiming taxpayer-funded get-out-the-vote ads on Facebook and Instagram at certain racial and ethnic groups while leaving others out.

Hours later, Clerk Teneshia Hudspeth's office switched off the audience settings at issue, The Texas Tribune reported. The county maintains its outreach was lawful.

The fight comes on the final day of early voting in the state's most populous county, with Election Day on Tuesday.

What the state alleges

The lawsuit names Hudspeth and her director of communications, Irene Nuñez, and was filed in a Harris County district court. It says the clerk's office used Meta's ad tools to steer its "Get Out the Vote" style ads toward people with African American, Asian and Latino interests and backgrounds.

"By classifying based upon race when advertising to provide Harris County voters with election information, the County Clerk's office exceeded its authority," the Attorney General's Office said in a release. "It engaged in racially discriminatory advertising in an effort to increase voter turnout among particular races and ethnicities, but not others."

According to the release, Meta's public Ad Library shows the clerk's office spent an estimated $43,429 over 30 days on one set of ads set to be shown preferentially to certain populations.

The listed audience tags included African-American literature, Latin music, Hispanic kitchen, East Asia, 27 different countries and several foreign cities, including Madrid and Bangkok, the Tribune reported. The ads, which encourage voters to make a plan to vote, began running in late September and early October.

"There can be no legitimate reason for Harris County to intentionally target voter ethnicities, cultural interests, and countries, but not toward any European ethnicities, cultural interests, or countries, never mind towards interests tailored specifically to those in Houston or Texas," the lawsuit said.

The state asked the judge to order the ads pulled or reconfigured to remove any targeting along racial and ethnic lines. It calls the case an "ultra vires" suit, meaning a claim that an official acted beyond her legal authority.

Paxton steps aside

Attorney General Ken Paxton is the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate, and his office said he has recused himself from the case because he is on the ballot. The office did not tell the Tribune when he stepped aside or how it learned about the ad settings.

What the county says

"We are confident that our voter outreach efforts are lawful," the clerk's office said in a statement to KPRC 2. "With that responsibility at the forefront, the Meta audience subsets have been deactivated to avoid unnecessary distractions." The office said it does not seek to influence how anyone votes for a candidate or ballot measure.

The Harris County Attorney's Office called the suit a "pathetic political distraction." U.S. Rep. Christian Menefee, a Houston Democrat, said the ads "do nothing more than tell neighbors when to vote and where to get information about voting."

It is unclear how switching off the tags affects the lawsuit.

A high bar

Seth Chandler, a University of Houston law professor, told KPRC 2 the state must prove intent, not just show who saw the ads. "What the Attorney General's Office is going to have to prove is that the selection of categories was done for the purpose, with the intent, of favoring one race or another," he said.

He also said the case touches a real principle. "It's a fairly benign ad. Very few people are opposed to getting out the vote. But still, it reflects the fact that the government should not be involved in racial profiling," Chandler said.

A fair word

Encouraging people to vote is a good thing, and nothing in the ads told anyone how to vote. But a county election office serves every voter equally, and public money spent on outreach should reach every neighborhood alike. Turning off the targeting was the right call. Every eligible Harris County voter, whatever their background, can still vote early Friday or on Election Day Tuesday.