Former Harris County Attorney Christian Menefee won a Jan. 31, 2026 runoff to fill the vacant U.S. House seat in Texas’ 18th Congressional District, according to race calls and preliminary results reported by major news outlets. His victory sets up a crowded March Democratic primary shaped by new district lines that have drawn in longtime Rep. Al Green and former Houston City Council member Amanda Edwards.
On Jan. 31, 2026, Democrat Christian Menefee, the former Harris County attorney, won a special-election runoff to fill the remainder of the term in Texas’ 18th Congressional District, according to preliminary results and race calls reported by the Houston Chronicle and The Washington Post.
The seat opened after Rep. Sylvester Turner, a Democrat and former Houston mayor, died on March 5, 2025—about two months into his first term in Congress. Gov. Greg Abbott did not set the special election until April 7, 2025, issuing a proclamation that scheduled the first round for Nov. 4, 2025; state law does not set a deadline for when the governor must order such an election, and Democrats publicly criticized Abbott for waiting.
Menefee defeated Amanda Edwards, a former Houston City Council member, in the runoff. Local reporting in Houston said Menefee won by a wide margin, and the Chronicle reported he received more than two-thirds of the vote in early counts.
The victory, however, is expected to be short-lived as the district is also headed into a separate 2026 election cycle. Under new district boundaries, Menefee is preparing to run in the March Democratic primary for the next full term, alongside Edwards and Rep. Al Green, a veteran Houston-area Democrat whose existing seat was reshaped by redistricting, according to Houston-area reporting and election previews.
Texas’ 18th District—centered in Houston and long considered a Democratic stronghold—has experienced unusual turnover in recent years. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, who represented the district from 1995 until her death in July 2024, was succeeded in the next cycle by Turner, who then died in office in March 2025.
With the March primary approaching, candidates have framed the contest as both a fight over the district’s future and a test of political generations, with younger Democrats challenging a long-serving incumbent. Early voting for the March primary is expected to begin in mid-February, and the winner is widely expected to be favored in November in a district that typically votes Democratic.
