Texas Attorney General challenges liberal county's guaranteed income program, calls it a 'welfare scheme'

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced last week that he is suing Harris County over their revised guaranteed income program. 

In a press release, Paxton slammed the "welfare scheme" and called the program "unlawful." 

"Harris County acts as though the Texas Constitution does not apply to them and as though they do not have to abide by the Texas Supreme Court’s rulings," Paxton said. "Using public funds in this way directly violates the law. Harris County is willing to undermine the legal process out of apparent desperation to push this money into certain hands as quickly as possible."

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Last month, Harris County Commissioners approved changes to the program after the original version faced legal challenges from Paxton and was later struck down by the Texas Supreme Court. 

The Harris County Commissioners is an elected body of four commissioners and the county judge that meets bi-weekly. Notable progressive, Judge Lina Hidalgo, serves as the county's chief executive officer. The government body created a guaranteed income program for the county called Uplift Harris. The original program would have distributed $500 per month for 18 months to selected participants. Participants would be selected from the 10 poorest ZIP codes in the county, who are living below 200% of the federal poverty line. 

Due to the legal challenges and the Texas Supreme Court ruling, the Harris County Commissioners placed restrictions on participants' spending.

The revised version of Uplift Harris will now serve approximately 1,600 families that will receive a monthly debit card that is loaded with $500. The debit card is limited to essential needs like grocery shopping and medicine. 

Harris County attorney Christian Menefee pushed back against Paxton’s latest legal effort, saying the revisions that were made addressed the state's concerns. 

"After a lawsuit from Ken Paxton regarding the Uplift Harris program, Harris County created a new initiative that addresses the state’s concerns while still offering financial stability to our neighbors who need it most," Menefee said. "If it wasn’t clear before, it should be clear now that the opposition to this program is not about concern for the law; it’s about using people living in poverty as a means to score political points." 

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Menefee previously told Fox News Digital that the original version of the Uplift Harris was "legal" and that county officials were able to "create a new program with spending restrictions to address politically charged challenges brought by Republican officials."

When the changes to the program were approved last month, Hidalgo called out "political posturing" of Texas state leaders. 

"They were extremely late and inconsistent in fighting against it. As we’ve discussed, the program had run in Austin and San Antonio without issues," Hidalgo said.

While a majority of the county's commissioners voted to approve the Uplift Harris program, there was one commissioner who opposed it. 

Commissioner Tom Ramsey was the only person on the commission to vote against the program.

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"The Texas Supreme Court already ruled this program as unconstitutional, so this lawsuit is no surprise," Ramsey told Fox News Digital in response to Paxton's lawsuit.

"I warned my fellow colleagues about the potential issues of circumventing the ruling, and now we’ll have to waste more taxpayer dollars on fighting this. I’ve consistently voted no against this program because not only does it fall outside of the county’s purview of responsibilities," he added. "It’s disappointing that taxpayer dollars will continue to be wasted on this illegal initiative."

The program was funded with $20.5 million from the federal American Rescue Plan Act. Houston, the largest city in Texas, makes up most of Harris County's population.