Houston, Texas (October 20, 2022) — Harris County Attorney Christian D. Menefee, Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo, and Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner sent a joint letter to the United States Department of Justice Civil Rights Division requesting that federal monitors be sent to Harris County for the November 2022 election. This action was taken in response to the Office of the Texas Secretary of State announcing that state “inspectors” and a “task force” from the attorney general’s office will be sent to Harris County to perform “random” checks of election materials and observe election processes on election night.

“This ‘audit’ started withformer President Donald Trump calling on Governor Abbott to audit the 2020 election,and now it has led to the state sending a ‘task force’ and ‘inspectors’ tooversee our elections,” said Harris County Attorney Christian D. Menefee.“We’re going to grant them the access the law requires, but we know stateleaders in Austin cannot be trusted to be an honest broker in our elections,especially an attorney general who filed a lawsuit to overturn the 2020presidential election. We cannot allow unwarranted disruptions in ourelection process to intimidate our election workers or erode voters’ trustin the election process. As the County Attorney, I will be at centralcount on election night, ensuring outside forces do not interfere with ourelections. I hope the Department of Justice will be there too.”

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