Harris County judge hopeful Letitia Plummer attempted Saturday to win over a crowd of heavily engaged Latino voters, which some might consider a tough sell since her opponent, Orlando Sanchez, was born in Cuba and speaks fluent Spanish.
But judging by the crowd’s response, Plummer, an African American Muslim, didn’t have to do much convincing.
“It’s not about race,” said John Perez, a retiree who attended a breakfast meeting hosted by Greater Houston LULAC on Saturday. “Like, it’s really and truly not about race. It’s about who we want to be our leader in times of crisis, whether that be a hurricane, a budget deficit or ICE taking over our streets. Orlando Sanchez has never done anything for our community. You can’t just get our vote because you have a Spanish surname.”
Greater Houston LULAC president Sergio Lira expressed a similar sentiment, although he was speaking in generic terms, not necessarily about Sanchez. “No one owns our vote. You have to earn it,” he said.
About a month ago, Sanchez addressed the same crowd and told the group to forget the “R” next to his name when it comes time to vote for county judge in the November 3 election. He asked attendees to instead focus on his record as a former Houston City Council member and Harris County treasurer who has never supported extreme MAGA ideologies.
He also emphasized that only Congress, not the Harris County Commissioners Court or Houston City Council, can do anything about federal immigration enforcement. Plummer, the Democratic nominee for county judge, said Saturday that local government bodies can, in fact, create policies that reduce harm to immigrant populations.
Houston’s Hispanic community — and, frankly, residents of all races from across the United States — still want answers about the July 7 shooting death of longtime Houston resident and Mexican immigrant Lorenzo Salgado Araujo at the hands of an ICE agent.
Araujo was not the intended target of an attempted immigration enforcement sting, was not armed and, according to witnesses who were in his van at the time of the shooting, did nothing to provoke the attack. Federal authorities have alleged that Araujo was uncooperative and “weaponized” his vehicle, trying to run over ICE agents.
Several advocacy groups have reported on social media that Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare began presenting evidence to a grand jury last week regarding the shooting incident. A spokesman in Teare’s office told the Houston Press he could not discuss grand jury proceedings or even confirm whether that’s true.
Araujo’s son Ronaldo Salgado attended Saturday’s LULAC breakfast with immigration attorney Ruby Powers and was invited to share remarks with the crowd.
“Elections are around the corner, and for the last two months, I’ve been telling people to pay attention to these elections, to check their voter registration, to actually make a plan to go out and vote, and to vote for candidates who are unafraid and very much on the side of immigrants and immigrants’ rights, who will do anything in their power to protect the rights — and the lives — of immigrants,” he said.
Salgado said he goes daily to visit the memorial site on Canal Street where his father was killed. “It’s not so much where my dad died, but where a movement began and hope that change comes out of this tragedy,” he said. “I will do everything in my power to make that possible, not just for my dad, not just for my family, but for everyone else’s families. I just want [immigrants] to be safe and have a clear path to citizenship. I hope you guys are on the right side of history.”
Plummer told LULAC members she is the daughter of an immigrant. Her father met her mother in East Africa while he was serving in the Peace Corps and they moved to Houston so he could start a dental practice.
Plummer, also a dentist, proposed the first Houston City Council ordinance limiting how HPD interacts with ICE. Lira said Plummer shared her ordinance with him and other Hispanic leaders to gather their feedback, but they weren’t able to get the document across the finish line before Plummer stepped down to run for county judge.
It was eventually adopted in April after Plummer’s successor Alejandra Salinas moved it forward. But it was later amended after Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who has endorsed Sanchez in the county judge’s race, threatened to withdraw $114 million in public safety grants.
“I’ve never seen this before, but they brought it back to council and had a re-vote on a watered-down version of the HPD-ICE ordinance,” Plummer said. “The governor is making sure he has a level of oversight that in my mind harms immigrant communities.”
Plummer said similar public pressure is coming from the state toward counties and how they structure 287(g) agreements, formal partnerships that deputize law enforcement officers to perform federal immigration enforcement duties.
“We have until December 1 to sign an agreement and that is being pushed by [Senate Bill] 8,” she said. “You have to make sure whoever you vote for is not supporting that item. I am telling you that, in this race, I’m the only one who’s not supporting it. Our Sheriff Ed Gonzalez is going to do everything in his power to limit that as much as he can. He’s being pushed by the governor. The [attorney general] has decided this is going to happen. As your county judge, my responsibility is accountability.”
“The governor is making us pay for it,” she added. “It’s on the commissioners court to pass the budget to pay for it. My oversight will be to see what’s happening, who’s taking care of these folks, how quickly we’re moving them, are they nonviolent offenders, is there anything we can do to assist them? Can we support indigent care? We need to make sure everyone in our community has legal support.”
Plummer acknowledged that changing public policy can take time but told the crowd it’s imperative to elect leaders who share their values and beliefs.
Harris County Commissioner Adrian Garcia, who is also on the November ballot facing Republican Richard Vega, also spoke at the LULAC event. The nonpartisan League of United Latin American Citizens does not endorse candidates but rather invites them to gatherings so their members can hear their platforms directly and ask questions.
Garcia, a former county sheriff and city councilman who described himself as the only American-born member of his family, spent much of his time talking about federal immigration enforcement.
“When you are a kid like me who lived every summer in Mexico, you see the poverty. You see how the cartels run those communities. You see how there is no middle class in other parts of the world,” he said. “When you see that there is no promise for a future unless you are among the wealthiest, you understand why they want to seek out something else not just for themselves but for their families.”
The immigration process can take up to 20 years and “thousands and thousands of American dollars that those families do not have,” he said. “Yet we have businesses on this side of the border that will happily employ anyone willing to work hard and work in the sun and work in the winter. Our economy is putting a call out to other parts of the world saying, ‘Come to this country,’ yet the federal immigration policy is in conflict.”
He said Congress members should bring forward legislation that will create a fluid system “so people can come here the right way and have the opportunity to support their families.”
Republicans have made the issue their “favorite piñata,” he added. “Policies are being pushed down on local law enforcement whose primary job is to keep the community safe regardless of where the resident comes from or what language they speak.”
“Our job is to protect the community. And yet the governor and the President want to penalize local law enforcement and local leadership. They want to take all of our authority away. If we do not do their bidding, then they will punish the community by taking away our rights. All that does is hurt our ability to better serve the community.”
Garcia has endorsed Plummer for the county judge position, as have Teare, Commissioners Rodney Ellis and Lesley Briones, and County Judge Lina Hidalgo, who is not seeking a third term. Plummer recently released an internal poll conducted by HIT Strategies citing a 16 percentage-point lead over Sanchez.
Residents at the LULAC event also expressed interest in learning more about a 7.6 percent tax hike approved by the Harris County Commissioners Court on September 8. The new rate is expected to increase the average homeowner’s bill by about $200. Sanchez and Plummer both said they would have voted against it.
Sanchez claimed there “is plenty of fat to cut” in the county budget and said that if elected, he’ll never ask for a tax increase.
Garcia, who voted for the tax increase, explained that he offered a tax cut at last week’s meeting but got no support from his fellow commissioners, even the lone Republican Tom Ramsey.
A $181 million budget gap was created in Harris County by the withdrawal of state and federal funding and unfunded mandates from President Donald Trump and Abbott, Garcia said.
“We worked to close that gap but it left us with some tough decisions. Do we aggressively disrupt county services?” he said. “I’m not ready to close clinics and libraries. I’m not ready to shut down my senior programs. I’m not ready to balance the budget, as was done during the previous Republican-controlled commissioners court, on the back of the Harris Health system. They kept a flat tax rate but look what they did to Harris Health. They gutted it.”
Both Plummer and Sanchez served on the Houston City Council but not at the same time. Plummer served from 2019 to 2025.
Sanchez has run for office 14 times since 1992 and won eight of those elections. He had failed bids for Texas House of Representatives, Houston mayor and controller, but he won a city council seat in 1995 and was re-elected twice before becoming county treasurer in 2006, a seat he held for three terms.
The candidates were supposed to debate on September 7, but due to technical difficulties, the livestream was cut short a few minutes after it started. Both Plummer and Sanchez — and their supporters — took to social media to blame each other for not wanting to finish the discussion.
“Unfortunately, Letitia Plummer’s campaign failed to ensure the necessary technical arrangements were in place for her participation, resulting in repeated disconnections that disrupted the debate. Harris County voters deserve better,” Sanchez wrote on Facebook.
Plummer attended what was supposed to be a “debate watch party” with her supporters on the night of the event and said, “We followed every rule. We stayed ready to debate the entire evening. Orlando chose to leave. Harris County deserves a debate between the two county judge candidates: live, in person, for all voters to see.”
KPRC, which organized the livestream event, said it would be rescheduled.
