Texas attorney general drops his suits to shut down FIEL Houston and the Annunciation House shelters
Ken Paxton's office ended both cases with prejudice, so the state cannot bring the same claims again. Appeals courts had upheld his power to ask a court to revoke each nonprofit's charter, without ruling on whether his accusations were true.
Houston. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has dropped two cases in which he asked courts to revoke the charters of immigrant-serving nonprofits: FIEL Houston, an immigrant-rights group he accused of illegal political activity, and Annunciation House, a network of migrant shelters in El Paso. Both were dropped with prejudice, so the state cannot bring the same claims again.
His office filed a notice of nonsuit in the Annunciation House case on Nov. 9, El Paso Matters reported. FIEL said the state dismissed its case the same day; the Houston Chronicle and Bloomberg Law dated the Houston filing Nov. 10. The two-page Houston notice gave no reason, according to The Texas Tribune. Mr. Paxton leaves office in mid-January after losing a bid for the U.S. Senate; his successor, Democrat Nathan Johnson, has said he intends to review cases Mr. Paxton brought, El Paso Matters reported.
What the courts had decided
The Annunciation House case began when state officials demanded the shelter's records on Feb. 7, 2024; the attorney general then accused it of harboring people in the country illegally and running a stash house. On May 30, 2025, the Supreme Court of Texas held that he had constitutional authority to seek revocation of its charter through a quo warranto action, and sent the case back to El Paso. "It is too early for us, or for any court, to express a view about the merits," Justice Evan A. Young wrote.
The state accused FIEL of urging people to vote against Donald Trump and campaigning against immigration bills, including a 2023 Texas law. A Harris County court denied the state leave to proceed in 2024. On Oct. 9, 2025, the Fifteenth Court of Appeals reversed: it held that the state may seek forfeiture of a charter when a nonprofit acts beyond its certificate of formation, which in FIEL's case barred any activity a 501(c)(3) organization may not carry on. It rejected the state's other argument, that falling outside a state tax exemption is itself a violation of law.
What comes next
Annunciation House, which sued first in 2024 to block the records demand, will drop its own claims, its lawyer, William Christian, told Bloomberg Law. The case had been set for a hearing in March, and Ruben Garcia, its founder and executive director, was to be deposed that week, El Paso Matters reported.
“This whole process of suing organizations like Annunciation House puts a blanket, a wet blanket, over the work of all of these organizations and many others that were not sued but feared they might be.”
Cesar Espinosa, FIEL's executive director, said in a statement: "This lawsuit has been very burdensome for us as an institution."
About this story
501c3.help wrote this story from the sources listed with it, not from material an organization sent. Our editors approved it on Nov. 12, 2026. Stories in The Nonprofit Herald are free, and nothing is asked in return. Editorial rules.
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