CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — Nueces County District Attorney Mark Gonzalez confirmed to 3NEWS Tuesday that he was resigning his office and running for the US Senate.
He informed his staff of the decision during a meeting early Tuesday morning.
"Texans deserve better than Ted Cruz -- that's why I'm proud to announce I'm running for US Senate," Gonzalez posted to his Facebook page. "I won twice in a red county as a Democrat by running on my values, not away from them. It'll take a movement to beat Ted -- let's build one, together."
Gonzalez said it was a move he said he didn't want to make, but that he has felt increasingly under attack on different levels, including by the new power state lawmakers gave Gov. Gregg Abbott that allows him to remove district attorneys from office if they refuse to prosecute people who get abortions.
"That's a real attack on democracy," he said. "I just don't want to be a pawn in that game. Whether they are they are trying to send a message to other DAs throughout Texas or anything like that. So, I'm choosing to leave on my own terms."
But, on the local level, the the driving force behind his decision to resign is an effort to have him removed from office.
"The petition impacted me, you know, in a way where it made me angry, and I was sort of done with politics," he said. "I had just lost my taste with it, but it ignited something in me where I wanted to continue to serve, and maybe at a higher level, and that's what we're going to do."
Gonzalez was set to go to trial in late September over that petition for removal, a case which accused him of a laundry list of offenses including mismanaging his office and failing to pursue indictments.
"All of the allegations against me are obviously false," he said. "The county attorney can still go forward with it and I challenge her -- if she wants to go forward with the case she still can, so they can go forward and do anything they need to do."
The petition to remove Gonzalez originally was filed in January by conservative leader Colby Wiltse, who is the executive director of the Nueces County chapter of County Citizens Defending Freedom USA.
Wiltse's original petition accused Gonzalez of blatantly disregarding the law he is sworn to uphold by mishandling cases, failing to pursue indictments, dismissing a significant number of cases -- both felony and misdemeanors -- and mismanaging his office.
The complaint was 119 pages long.
County attorney Jenny Dorsey, who was set to prosecute that case, said those proceedings are now up in the air.
"We are still waiting on guidance from the governor's office as to whether he is going to be replaced immediately, or later, before we make a decision," she said.
Gonzalez told 3NEWS he will be considered a "holdover" until Abbott appoints a replacement district attorney, and that he will continue to serve until then.
He expects Abbott to decide his replacement within two weeks.
After that, he plans to practice law privately as he runs for Senate with a focus on personal injury cases.
Gonzalez was recently featured in Rolling Stone for defending abortion rights in Texas. He told the publication that as a father of four girls, “I never want to be able to tell them what they do with their bodies,” he says. “And I don’t think that any other man — or legislator — should have that say either.”
Digital director Ana Tamez contributed to this developing story. Stay with 3NEWS as we continue to update this article.