Texas AG Sues Harris County over Immigration Legal Services Fund
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced that he has sued Harris County, its Commissioners Court, and several officials in their official capacities in Harris County District Court. The defendants include County Judge Lina Hidalgo, Commissioners Rodney Ellis, Adrian Garcia, Tom Ramsey, and Lesley Briones, along with Interim County Administrator Jesse Dickerman and Thao Costis, Executive Director of Harris County Housing and Community Development. The lawsuit targets the county’s funding of the Immigrant Legal Services Fund (ILSF), a program launched in 2020 with an initial $2.5 million and expanded through recent approvals in October 2025.
On October 16, 2025, the Commissioners Court passed Item No. 25-6481, directing about $1.34 million in taxpayer money to five private nonprofits—BakerRipley, the Galveston-Houston Immigrant Representation Project, Justice for All Immigrants, KIND, Inc., and the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services (RAICES)—to provide legal representation for immigrants in detention or facing deportation. Then, on October 30, 2025, it approved Item No. 25-6894, allocating $100,000 to the Houston Immigration Legal Services Collaborative (HILSC) for an immigrant resource hotline that connects people to these providers. Disbursements are scheduled to start on January 1, 2026, via contracts managed by the Harris County Housing and Community Development Department under Costis.
The ILSF supports private attorneys and nonprofits representing clients in federal immigration courts, which handle civil proceedings where no constitutional or statutory right to government-funded counsel exists.
