Houston officials have canceled next week’s Republican state convention, which was to be held at the George R. Brown Convention Center.

Mayor Sylvester Turner asked Houston First, the nonprofit manager of the convention center, to cancel the convention after David Pearse, the city’s top medical authority, said the convention was a “clear and present danger” to public health.

“After allowing tens of thousands of protestors to peaceably assemble in the same city, in the same area, without any of the safety precautions and measures we have taken, [Turner] is seeking to deny a political party’s critical electoral function that should be equally protected under the Constitution,” said State Chairman James Dickey in a statement. “Our legal team is assessing the ability of the city to act at this time in this manner and weighing our legal options. We are prepared to take all necessary steps to proceed in the peaceable exercise of our constitutionally protected rights.”

Early voting continues through Friday for the July 14 primary runoff and special elections.

Through yesterday (Tuesday), more than 426K people had voted early in person (59%) or by mail (41%) in the Democratic runoff and nearly 286K had voted early in person (68%) or by mail (32%) in the Republican runoff election. Statewide turnout so far was 2.6% and 1.75% of registered voters, respectively.

Because of a statewide race, voters in all 254 counties can participate in the Democratic runoff. Fewer than 10 votes have been cast so far in 32 counties, and between 10 and 20 votes have been cast in another 26 counties.

SEN: Women Vote!, a campaign arm of EMILY’s List, disclosed $893K in new independent expenditures in support of Democratic runoff candidate M.J. Hegar, all of it for a Houston-area media buy, in an FEC filing today (Wednesday).

CD13 open: Club for Growth Action disclosed an additional $58K in independent expenditures opposing Republican runoff candidate Josh Winegarner, bringing their total for the race to $359K.

The group released a new ad, “Selfish,” criticizing Winegarner for being a lobbyist and accusing him of attacking opponent Ronny Jackson’s military record.

CD22 open: Kathaleen Wall contributed another $500K to her campaign according to her latest Form 6 filing, bringing her total self-funding for the cycle to $8.3M, including $1.5M she loaned to her campaign. Wall contributed more than $6M to her unsuccessful race for CD2 in 2018.

Census Data: On a conference call today (Wednesday), a U.S. Census Bureau representative said the office “want[s] to push reporting of redistricting data to July 31, 2021” because of complications arising from COVID-19, tweeted USA Today Network’s John C. Moritz. That would put redistricting data in the hands of a Texas Legislature in a special session just 135 days before December 13, 2021, the statutory deadline to file for a spot on the 2022 ballot.

Corpus Christi: Joe Michael Perez, who is facing a lawsuit from the family of the late singer Selena Quintanilla for placing a hat supportive of President Trump on her statue’s head, announced he would run for mayor.

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