Harris County is among the most populous within the U.S. and more and more influential in Texas politics.
For Black communities in Houston and the encircling area, native and county-level places of work typically carry extra fast influence on housing, faculties, catastrophe restoration, public well being, and enterprise fairness than statewide races alone.
Monitoring key contests in 2026 is due to this fact important. Listed below are the first elections to look at in 2026.
1. Governor
The upcoming race for Texas governor in November 2026 is already shaping up as some of the consequential in state historical past.
Present Governor Greg Abbott formally introduced his bid for a fourth consecutive time period in November 2025, highlighting his intention to turn out to be Texas’s longest-serving governor. His determination to run once more ensures excessive stakes not just for statewide coverage but in addition for communities in Harris County and throughout Texas, who’re keenly watching points resembling schooling funding, infrastructure funding, and catastrophe restoration.
A number of candidates are vying to problem Abbott, together with former U.S. Rep. Chris Bell, State Rep. Gina Hinojosa, Bobby Cole, a rancher and retired firefighter, and Andrew White, a Houston-based businessman and son of former Gov. Mark White. The first election is scheduled for March 3, with the overall election on Nov. 3.
2. County Decide: Harris County
The workplace of county choose is probably the most crucial govt place on the county stage in Texas, overseeing price range, catastrophe response, and the county courtroom system.
Incumbent Democrat Lina Hidalgo introduced she is not going to search re-election in 2026, opening up a aggressive race.
The final election is scheduled for Nov. 3, 2026, with the primaries on March 3.
Former Houston mayor Annise Parker and Houston Metropolis Council member Letitia Plummer are the declared Democratic candidates.
The county choose is the pinnacle of Harris County’s governing physique, overseeing the third-largest county within the U.S. with a inhabitants of greater than 4.5 million individuals and a price range of greater than $2.7 billion.
The choose can be the presiding officer on the Commissioners Courtroom, which performs a crucial position encompassing administrative, legislative, and judicial duties. Their many duties embrace adopting a price range, setting tax charges, calling for bond elections, constructing and sustaining roads and bridges, and overseeing county courthouses, jails, libraries, parks, and the Harris County Flood Management District.
By state regulation, the County Decide can be the county’s director of emergency administration, main the Harris County Workplace of Homeland Safety and Emergency Administration.
3. U.S. Home of Representatives: Texas seats
All 38 Texas congressional seats can be on the poll in 2026.
These seats are important, particularly after the redistricting saga that set off a nationwide pattern. Initially, Republicans explicitly aimed to choose as much as 5 further U.S. Home seats within the 2026 elections by means of newly redistricted maps. A decrease courtroom blocked the implementation of the brand new congressional maps. Nonetheless, Supreme Courtroom Justice Samuel Alito put a short lived maintain on the decrease courtroom order.
In August 2025, the Texas Legislature redrew the state’s congressional map mid-cycle, a uncommon transfer outdoors the usual post-census course of. Dozens of Home Democrats fled the state to dam the plan, returning solely after fines and arrest threats. The GOP-backed map, signed by Gov. Greg Abbott, reshapes minority-heavy districts in methods critics say dilute Black and Hispanic voting energy.
The brand new maps redraw a number of districts held by Democrats, influence minority‐heavy districts and shift district boundaries in ways in which critics say will weaken the electoral energy of Black and Hispanic voters.
This election is controversial due to mid-cycle redistricting. Redrawing districts in between the decennial census is uncommon in fashionable U.S. politics. Civil rights teams argue that the map reduces the flexibility of Black and Hispanic communities to elect their most popular candidates.
4. U.S. Senate: Texas seats
The U.S. Senate election in Texas can be held on Nov. 3, 2026, to elect a member to symbolize the state of Texas. Major elections can be held on March 3, 2026, with a runoff election held on Might 26 if no candidate receives a majority of their respective primaries.
The statewide Senate race options incumbent four-term Republican Senator John Cornyn, who was re-elected in 2020, and is now operating for re-election to a fifth time period in workplace. Cornyn is dealing with a major problem from Rep. Wesley Hunt and Texas Lawyer Normal Ken Paxton.
Democratic candidates embrace Texas State Consultant James Talarico and former U.S. Rep. Colin Allred.
Republicans have gained each U.S. Senate election in Texas since 1990, and an incumbent senator has not misplaced a major since 1970.
5. Texas Senate and Home races
16 Texas State Senate seats and all 150 seats within the Texas Home of Representatives can be on the poll in 2026, setting the stage for important shifts in state policymaking.
State Senators serve four-year phrases, whereas Home representatives serve two.
With the whole Texas Home additionally up for election, 2026 presents a possibility to affect the path of the state legislature on key points, together with property-tax reform, college funding, prison justice, and voting rights. Native turnout will decide whether or not city, suburban, and rural priorities align or collide contained in the Capitol subsequent session.
6. Notable races
Different notable races embrace these for the Lieutenant Governor, Lawyer Normal, Comptroller of Public Accounts, Commissioner of the Normal Land Workplace, and Commissioner of Agriculture, all of which have four-year phrases.
In the meantime, the Railroad Commissioner’s time period lasts six years, which will even be on the poll.
7. Judicial and native places of work
The Texas Secretary of State’s information exhibits that 2026 will embrace judicial places of work (district and county courts) on the poll.
4 members of the Texas Supreme Courtroom can be on the poll, together with Chief Justice (Locations 1, 2, 7, and eight), three Members of the Courtroom of Prison Appeals (3, 4, and 9), and three Members of the fifteenth Courtroom of Appeals (Locations 1, 2, and three).
8. State Board of Training
Eight of the 15 seats on the Texas State Board of Training will even be on the poll in 2026, influencing how curriculum requirements, textbook approvals, and commencement necessities are decided for the state’s 5 million public college college students.
The districts up for election embrace Districts 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9,13, and 14. These members collectively symbolize numerous areas from the Gulf Coast by means of Central and East Texas, together with giant elements of the Houston metro space and surrounding counties.
For Harris County residents, particularly dad and mom and educators, the 2026 State Board of Training races imply illustration on a physique that determines what information future generations of Texans encounter within the classroom.
9. Judicial and County Workplaces
Past statewide and legislative contests, Harris County voters will assist resolve the end result of dozens of judicial and county-level places of work in 2026.
On the judicial aspect, seven Chief Justices of the Courts of Appeals are up for re-election, all serving six-year phrases. These courts deal with appeals from trial courts throughout Texas, shaping interpretations of state regulation in prison, civil, and household instances.
Voters will even select numerous Courtroom of Appeals and District Judges, Prison District Judges and Household District Judges, alongside an array of county places of work with four-year phrases, together with these of County Decide, County Commissioners for Precincts 2 and 4, County and District Clerks, County Treasurer, County Surveyors and Justices of the Peace.
These races have a direct influence on all the things from courtroom entry to household regulation.
What’s subsequent?
The 2026 election cycle can be some of the pivotal in Harris County and Texas historical past, offering voters with a possibility to form the state’s political and social trajectory for years to come back.
For residents, notably inside Houston’s Black communities, these elections considerably influence how faculties are funded, how neighborhoods get well from disasters, and the way justice and alternative are distributed all through the county.
