Lee Merritt, civil rights attorney, running for Texas attorney general

Dallas civil rights attorney Lee Merritt, who has represented families of Black people killed by police, announced he is officially in the 2022 race for Texas attorney general.

Merritt will run as a Democrat against embattled Republican incumbent Ken Paxton.

Merritt, who said in March that he was planning to pursue the job, will have at least one other Democratic primary challenger, former Galveston Mayor Joe Jaworski.

On the Republican side, Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush and former Texas Supreme Court Justice Eva Guzman are also running to unseat Paxton.

“Texas Republicans have launched an all-out assault on voter rights and civil liberties,” Merritt said in a statement.

Lee Merritt became a who’s who of civil rights attorneys after representing and advocating for people of color killed in interactions with law enforcement, including Botham Jean, a Dallas accountant fatally shot by an off-duty police officer in his own apartment, and Atatiana Jefferson, a Fort Worth woman who died after an officer shot her through a window in her home.

“The decision to run for AG was a decision about going further up the proverbial river and in looking more toward the source of some of the problems I’ve had to deal with as a civil rights attorney, and as a Texan,” Lee Merritt told The Associated Press on Tuesday.