Well, just CD18, really. I said when I posted the January 2025 reports that I was going to wait on the Congressional reports until July because there wasn’t going to be anything of interest to report on. And then Rep. Sylvester Turner passed away and we got a flock of candidates line up for the now-set-for-November special election, and I couldn’t wait that long to see what was happening. So here we are.
Amanda Edwards – CD18
Isaiah Martin – CD18
Christian Menefee – CD18
Dist Name Raised Spent Loans On Hand
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18 Edwards 375,023 25,337 0 350,900
18 Martin 71,728 28,075 0 215,288
18 Menefee 391,603 16,815 0 374,787
There are more candidates listed on the FEC Congressional candidates page than this, but only those three had any money to report. That’s not too surprising given the timing. I’ll include more reports in July, with some discretion on my part based on how seriously I’ll be taking the candidates. I should note I’m only going to pay attention to the Democratic candidates. There are several Republicans and independents, none of whom reported any money and none of whom will have any chance to even sniff the runoff.
Among the names that are on the candidate list but not shown above are:
Peter Filler, a non-entity who “ran” as a Democrat in CD02 last year.
Robert Slater, the third candidate in the 2024 Dem primary for CD18.
TJ Baker, who ran as a Republican for CD18 some time ago. I don’t care to look to remember when, it’s not worth it. She’s running as a Dem now.
James Joseph, former Houston City Council candidate who has been mentioned before as he was one of the first people to file a statement of intent to run.
Rain Eatmon, Acres Homes community activist who was profiled by the Houston Press last week. Of the names on the not-yet-raised-any-money list, she’s the one I’ll be taking the most seriously.
Other names may yet appear. State Rep. Jolanda Jones and Houston City Council Member Letitia Plummer are both still officially “thinking about it”, and State Rep. Christina Morales, who was in the precinct chair election last year, was included as a candidate in the way-too-soon UH Hobby Center poll for CD18, though I have not seen any indication from her one way or the other. You never know who else might show up. We’ll see what the July reports tell us.
Anyway, on to the three candidates who did raise money in time for the reporting period. Amanda Edwards is the candidate everyone expected to be here, as she ran for CD18 in 2024, at first when it looked like the late Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee would not be running again and then still when she jumped back in. Edwards raised a bunch of money for that race, over $1.6 million, but had spent down her previous balance as of the July 2024 reports. I’m sure she didn’t expect to be back in the saddle again so quickly, but here we are and she got right back on track.
I last reported on Isaiah Martin as of the January 2024 reports, at which point he still had $230K on hand but was no longer a candidate. He’s obviously spent some of that since then but is in good fiscal shape. Fun story, my old college roommate, an El Paso native who now lives in Chicago, texted me last week to ask what Congressional district I live in. Turns out his daughter, my god-daughter, had found Isaiah Martin’s TikTok account and was a fan, and she wanted to know what I knew about him. I was able to tell her that I’d actually had a conversation with him – I am still a precinct chair, so he had reached out to me – and that he made a favorable impression on me. I also told her there were other good, young candidates in the race.
Which brings me to Christian Menefee, who made a big splash when he entered the race. He’s gotten off to the strongest start on the fundraising front, though only by a little over Edwards. I’ll be very interested to see how they’re doing in July. Menefee is still the acting Harris County Attorney, as Commissioners Court deferred naming a replacement (and thus accepting his resignation) until the election was officially set. Now that it is I have to assume they will get back to that bit of business. I have no insight at all about who they will name to fill out the term – I’ve not heard a single name mentioned. We’ll discuss that more in the coming days, I’m sure.
That’s it for now. I’ll be back in July with another full slate of campaign finance reports.
Mr. Menefee is going a good job, so why should Commissioners Court appoint someone else? If Abbott can delay the CD18 election until November, Commissioners Court can delay appointing Menefee’s replacement until November, right?
Based on the following, I think he can, Greg:
Christian Menefee confirmed he has resigned as Harris County Attorney to run for the congressional seat left vacant by the death of U.S. Rep. Sylvester Turner earlier this month.
The Texas Constitution requires any county official who announces a run for another office to resign immediately from their current post.
“The moment that I announced my campaign for the 18th Congressional District, it means that I’ve resigned,” Menefee said. “But under the (Texas) Constitution, I remain in the job as acting county attorney until commissioners court by a majority vote appoints someone to fill the vacancy.”
https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/politics/2025/03/18/516233/christian-menefee-resigns-as-harris-county-attorney-to-run-for-congress/