Texas AG Ken Paxton sues Harris County to block program that would give cash to poorest households

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued Harris County on Tuesday to block a new guaranteed income pilot program that would provide financial assistance to families in the county’s poorest neighborhoods.

Under the federally funded program, roughly 1,900 Harris County households would receive monthly cash payments of $500 for 18 months. The county put $20.5 million in federal COVID-19 relief funds to launch the program, known as Uplift Harris, which is intended to help households in the county’s 10 poorest ZIP codes who are living 200% below the federal poverty line with no strings attached. Those families had already been selected and payments were slated to begin this month.

Conservatives balked at the program after Harris County commissioners approved it in June and have since tried to stop it. State Sen. Paul Bettencourt, a Houston-area Republican who frequently has sought to undercut the county’s Democratic leadership, asked Paxton earlier this year to declare the law unconstitutional.

Paxton blasted the program in a legal filing Tuesday, calling it an “illegal and illegitimate government overreach” and dubbing it the “Harris Handout.” Paxton argues the pilot program violates a section of the Texas Constitution that says no local government can “lend its credit or to grant public money or thing of value” to individuals.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/texas-ag-ken-paxton-sues-harris-county-to-block-program-that-would-give-cash-to-poorest-households/ar-BB1llmH9