DALLAS (AP) — Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton will be in an unfamiliar setting Monday night: leading his first campaign rally since the Republican announced his candidacy for the U.S. Senate 10 months ago.
Paxton’s scheduled appearance is part of his stepped-up campaign to oust four-term Republican Sen. John Cornyn and add a MAGA devotee to the Senate, setting up one of the most contentious GOP primaries this year.
Until Monday, Paxton ran a low-wattage campaign, spending relatively little money and drawing attention primarily for pursuing conservative causes as state attorney general. But with early voting scheduled to begin Tuesday for the March 3 primary, Paxton is scheduled to make stops in Texas this week. He said Cornyn and Rep. Wesley Hunt has also started airing ads linking himself to President Donald Trump.
Despite being the target of millions of dollars in attack ads from Cornyn and his allies, and opposition from Senate Republican leaders who call Cornyn a strong candidate in the general election, Paxton is advancing in the GOP primary as his party’s front-runner.
“I want them to stop sending money from Washington, D.C.,” Paxton told “Fox News Sunday.” “They’re sending money from DC, and they’re helping John Cornyn. And it’s going to be … a lot of money spent, and he’s going to lose.”
Paxton’s political existence seems to defy convention, as does Trump’s. Paxton defeated impeachment on fraud charges in 2023, and today is overshadowed by claims of marital infidelity by his wife, state Sen. Angela Paxton.
The three-term attorney general’s defiance of his party’s leaders and aggressive litigation for conservative preferences will help him overcome moral and personal questions that voters in the Republican-leaning state have forgiven, at least so far.
With the start of voting, campaigning has been intensified
Paxton on Monday is set to kick off a four-day series put on by Lone Star Liberty PAC, a super PAC that supports him, to remind people that early voting in Texas begins Tuesday.
His previous campaign stops have been lower-profile events, including county GOP gatherings with other candidates. He traveled to five Texas college campuses in the fall to speak to Turning Point USA chapters following the assassination of Charlie Kirk, the conservative Christian group’s national founder.
But until this week, that’s essentially been Paxton’s public campaign efforts, outside of a handful of podcasts with friendly hosts.
As of Friday, a single television ad on Paxton’s behalf in Texas had cost $674,000 to air, according to ad tracking service AdImpact.
That position attacked Hunt, a two-term House member from the Houston area, not Cornyn. Like Paxton, Hunt is trying to appeal to primary voters looking for an alternative to Cornyn. By criticizing Hunt, Paxton allies are trying to alienate some of his voters in hopes of winning 50% of the primary vote — the threshold needed to win the GOP nomination outright. If no candidate gets 50%, the top two finishers will advance to a May 26 runoff.
Paxton’s campaign began airing an ad Friday featuring video clips of Trump praising Paxton and photos of them together. As of Monday, Trump had not endorsed any of the three Republicans in the race.
Paxton’s office promotes conservative goals
Paxton has relied on his office in Austin to remain at the center of conservative efforts.
Last year, he sued Texas physicians over claims they violated the state’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors, affirming a major preference for social conservatives for their opposition to gender ideology.
In October, just weeks after Trump repeatedly urged pregnant women to “don’t take Tylenol,” Paxton sued the companies behind the pain reliever, accusing them of deceptively marketing it specifically to expectant women, citing unsubstantiated claims that early exposure to its active ingredient increases the risk of autism.
In particular, Paxton led several legal challenges against the previous Joe Biden administration on immigration and border policies, often succeeding and burnishing his credentials as a conservative crusader. Attorney General Paxton, who was first elected in 2014, also prosecuted the Barack Obama administration during the last two years of the two-term Democrat administration.
“I think Ken Paxton is a fighter,” said U.S. Representative Troy Nehls of Texas. Nehls said Paxton prosecuted then-President Joe Biden more than any other U.S. attorney general.
Cornyn, allies spending more than $50 million
A steady stream of litigation has kept Paxton in the headlines in Texas, as Cornyn and his allies have spent heavily trying to bleed his image among Republican primary voters.
As of Friday, Carney’s campaign and allied super PACs had spent more than $54 million on television ads since last year, according to AdImpact. It reminded most voters of Paxton’s impeachment and his wife’s claim of a “biblical” divorce over accusations of extramarital affairs. The groups have spent millions on digital advertising, text messaging and direct mail, also attacking Paxton.
In an ad sponsored by Texans for a Conservative Majority, a narrator says at the beginning, “Ken Paxton isn’t just corrupt. He’s weird.”
Republican strategists unaffiliated with either campaign say the spending and months of warning have done little to hurt Paxton, who projects confidence. No senator in Texas political history has served more than four terms. And Paxton believes he is better known than almost any statewide elected Republican in Texas, including Cornyn.
Speaking on a December podcast hosted by Tony Buzbee, a lawyer who represented the attorney general during his impeachment trial, Paxton said the “other people with name ID” in the state are Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who are seeking re-election, and Sen. Ted Cruz.
Senate GOP leaders are worried
Republican Senate leaders in Washington warned Paxton for months. They say Paxton as the GOP candidate will need hundreds of millions more dollars to defend himself in the general election, given the expected attacks, than Cornyn. And they say that money the party shouldn’t spend in Texas, a state Trump carried by 13 percentage points.
Democrats need to pick up a total of four seats to overtake Republicans’ Senate majority in November. The minority party is showing renewed confidence in competing for Republican-held seats in Alaska, Maine, North Carolina and Ohio.
In Texas, U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett and state Rep. James Talarico are seeking the Democratic nomination. Paxton will fare worse than Cornyn against Democrats in the November election, strategists at the National Republican Senatorial Committee, a campaign group led by Senate Majority Leader John Thune, said in an early February memo obtained by The Associated Press.
“Cornyn wins general election,” the memo said. “Paxton puts seat at risk.”
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Associated Press writer Joey Cappelletti contributed from Washington.
