Back in March on primary night in Texas, a relative of mine texted me, “Al Green is GOING DOWN!” I checked the election results and discovered they were right. Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) was losing to his opponent, Harris County Attorney Christian Menefee, in the race for the 18th Congressional District, a seat Menefee had won in a special election held after the death of Rep. Sylvester Turner (D-Texas). While Green managed to squeeze out enough votes to make it into a runoff with Menefee, his time in office was drawing to a close. When the votes were counted after the runoff election, Menefee had won in a landslide, 69.4% to 30.6%. To say that the people of Houston were happy to be rid of Al Green would definitely be an understatement.
Green made the same bad decision as Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) in that he chose to run for another office for which he thought he would have a better chance. Redistricting in Texas made the district he represented, the 9th Congressional District, more friendly to Republicans and less friendly to him. After looking at his election record, I can see why. First elected in 2004, Green faced very little opposition in the 9th Congressional District. In the 10 elections since 2004, Green either had no opposition (twice, in 2006 and 2024) or only token opposition. He regularly secured between 72% and 90% of the vote.
Why did Green run for a completely different district? In a word, redistricting. When Texas decided to redistrict the state in July 2025, everything got turned around. The 9th Congressional District moved from southwest Houston, with a population split roughly equally between blacks and Hispanics, to the other side of Houston, much closer to the Louisiana border and with a higher white population. He didn’t want the competition. He didn’t want to actually work for the job, so he tried to get elected in another majority-minority district and failed, utterly and completely.
GOOD!
Typical liberal Democrat. He wants the accolades, the praise, and the money, but he doesn’t actually want to do the work to earn them. He is a charlatan, a race hustler, a con artist, and a grifter of the first order. Unfortunately, he was also my congressman from 2014 to 2020, when my part of the city was shifted to the west and became part of the 7th Congressional District, with another Democrat, Rep. Lizzie Fletcher, a liberal white woman who came from money.
In 2014, after being in office for 10 years, Green decided to make a total fool of himself. After the shooting in Ferguson, Mo., with the rallying cry of “Hands up, don’t shoot!” Green took to the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives on Dec. 2, 2014, along with Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-N.Y.), and Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) to protest the shooting. The four representatives stood there with their hands up for several minutes. Houston was doubly embarrassed because Jackson Lee was another representative from Houston. In fact, it was her old district that Green tried to get elected to.
This was one of the few times I’ve called my representative. I was so embarrassed, I had to say something. Whoever answered the phone was very polite and took all my information down. I’m certain that my comments and any other comments criticizing Green wound up in the circular file but that is my opinion.
In his 21 years in office, he sponsored 368 bills, and in this Congress, the 119th, he has cast 190 votes: 100 nay votes and 90 yea votes. He voted against the creation of a Smithsonian Women’s History Museum because there wasn’t going to be a section for trans women in it, and that’s only the latest example. I’m just happy he is no longer my representative. To his credit, his congressional website shows that he worked to have June 19, 1865 (Juneteenth), when slavery ended in the U.S., made into a national holiday. Unfortunately, many of his bills aren’t really bills; they’re resolutions for such noble causes as awarding a Congressional Gold Medal, collectively, to Africans and their descendants enslaved in the U.S., and recognizing the “courageous” actions of Nat Turner.
What he will be remembered for is his constant filing of impeachment articles against President Trump. He has filed articles of impeachment against the president during both of Trump's terms and did so three times in 2025 alone. He was censured in March 2025 for repeatedly interrupting the president during a joint session of Congress and was removed from the chamber during the 2026 State of the Union address after waving a sign that said, “Black people aren’t apes!”
In his world, Green probably thinks he is doing a wonderful job. He is standing up for the people. He is working to keep them from being discriminated against. Unfortunately, for him anyway, his world is not the real world. That is a fact he will finally realize when the 120th Congress convenes without him.
Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright,
The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light;
And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout,
There is plenty of joy in Houston—Al Green is out.
(With apologies to Ernest L. Thayer, author of "Casey at the Bat")
Join the conversation as a VIP Member