A junior lawyer testifying at Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s impeachment trial said Tuesday that he kept Paxton informed through encrypted communications of every step he took in launching a criminal investigation into law enforcement officials at the behest of one of the attorney general's wealthy donors.
The testimony on the sixth day of the historic proceeding addresses a central charge against Paxton: that the Republican abused his office to help a local real estate developer resist FBI investigation by hiring an outside lawyer to look into the agents, a judge and other officials involved in the probe.
That lawyer, Brandon Cammack, told the jury of state senators who could decide Paxton's political fate within days that he consulted with the attorney general about how to proceed. Cammack also said he kept Paxton apprised as he obtained a series of grand jury subpoenas with guidance from the developer's lawyer.
“I did everything at his supervision,” Cammack said of Paxton.
Paxton has pleaded not guilty in the impeachment. He is not required to be present in the Senate for testimony and was absent Tuesday, as he has been for most of the trial. It was Paxton's hiring of Cammack in 2020 that prompted eight of his top deputies to report the attorney general to law enforcement for allegedly breaking the law to help developer Nate Paul. Their allegations prompted an FBI investigation of Paxton that remains ongoing.
That year, Paul alleged wrongdoing by state and federal authorities, including a federal judge, after the FBI searched his home. Several of Paxton's former deputies have testified for the prosecution in the impeachment trial and said they found Paul's claims “ludicrous" and not worthy of investigation.
Paul was indicted in June on charges of making false statements to banks. He has pleaded not guilty.
The bipartisan group of lawmakers prosecuting Paxton's impeachment have alleged that in return for Paxton's help, Paul paid for renovations to his Austin home and employed a woman with whom the attorney general was having an extramarital affair.
Cammack testified Tuesday that he met several times with Paxton, Paul and Paul's lawyer about Cammack's investigation, and regularly forwarded Paxton information Paul's lawyer was sending him about whom to target with grand jury subpoenas. Cammack said Paxton used the encrypted email service Proton Mail for these communications and that the attorney general told him to communicate over encrypted messaging service Signal.
Cammack said he learned that Paxton had a different official email address when he saw it copied on an email from one of Paxton's deputies ordering Cammack to stop his investigation.
In 2020, Cammack was five years out of law school and had a modest criminal defense practice in Houston. He testified that Paxton hired him at the recommendation of Paul's lawyer, whom he said he knew socially. Cammack recalled that as he was being hired Paxton told him he would “need to have some guts” for the investigation Paxton had in mind. He said he was exited to be working for Texas' top lawyer and impressed after the attorney general took him to watch a news conference. “It was cool,” Cammack said.
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"Former chief of staff for AG’s office details alarm over Ken Paxton’s alleged affair" was first published by The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
The Texas Tribune is your source for in-depth reporting on the Ken Paxton impeachment trial. Readers make that possible. Support authoritative Texas journalism with a donation now.
Attorney General Ken Paxton’s alleged extramarital affair came up for the first time at length Monday in his impeachment trial.
Katherine “Missy” Cary, the former chief of staff in the attorney general’s office, testified how she came to learn about the affair and how Paxton ultimately confessed to it. But perhaps most relevant to the case, Cary testified how she warned Paxton it could make him vulnerable to bribery, an allegation central to his impeachment.
The dramatic testimony came as Paxton’s wife, Sen. Angela Paxton, listened on from the Senate floor.
“My heart broke for her,” Cary said of Angela Paxton, who is disqualified from voting in the trial but has to attend.
The alleged affair is referenced in one of the articles of impeachment that is being tried. The article accuses Paxton of bribery because he “benefited from Nate Paul’s employment of a woman with whom Paxton was having an extramarital affair.”
House impeachment managers allege that Paxton, driven by his desire to continue his affair and hide it from his wife and religious voters, went to impeachable and criminal lengths to help Paul. In exchange, they allege, Paul hired Olson at his company so that she could move from San Antonio to Austin.
While Paxton's alleged affair has increasingly taken center stage since the House impeached him in June, Cary marked the first time a witness provided firsthand knowledge of it — and in painful detail. Upon cross-examination, Paxton lawyer Tony Buzbee sought to stir doubt about the veracity of some of Cary's early observations of the alleged affair and downplayed its relevance to the case.
[Ken Paxton tried to hide his affair from his wife and voters. It may be his undoing.]
"Imagine if we impeached everybody here in Austin that had had an affair," Buzbee said. "We’d be impeaching for the next 100 years, wouldn’t we?"
Cary testified that her knowledge of the alleged affair all began in the spring of 2018 when she was eating lunch alone at Galaxy Cafe in Austin. She overheard a woman next to her having a conversation that troubled her, suggesting the woman was conveying “very personal” information about Ken Paxton. Cary said she took her concerns to the attorney general, who said the woman was the real estate agent selling his condo in Austin.
But later that spring, Cary said she saw the same woman at an official event in San Antonio and saw her name tag: Laura Olson.
Cary said she then learned about the relationship from other people in the office and felt “surprised” Paxton had lied to her about who Olson was. The relationship was impacting staff morale, Cary added, with Angela Paxton calling the office to try to track down her husband and staffers feeling “uncomfortable answering those questions.”
Cary eventually had a meeting with Paxton where they discussed the legal and “ethical implications of a secret affair,” she said. Cary said they discussed that such conduct could “open one up to bribery and misuse of office” — allegations at the center of his impeachment.
In that meeting, Cary said Paxton confirmed he was having an affair but did not say whether it was with Olson. He was “contrite and he listened to what I had to say very carefully,” Cary recalled.
In September 2018, Paxton and his wife convened a meeting with top aides where he confessed to the affair, Cary said. She described it as an awkward and emotional meeting. Angela Paxton was “sad and embarrassed” and cried, Cary said. Cary said she hugged Angela Paxton and told her she was sorry this had happened to her.
After that meeting, Cary said, she believed such behavior was “out of [Paxton’s] life for good.”
But months later in 2019, Cary said, Paxton told her the affair was continuing. Cary said Paxton expressed that he "still loved Mrs. Olson" and wanted Cary, as the chief of staff, to "be more accommodating" of it when it came to things like his security detail.
Cary said she told Paxton "quite bluntly it wasn't my business who he was sleeping with, but that when things boiled over in to the office," it became a concern to her. In Cary's telling, that comment enraged Paxton, who turned "red in the face," raised his voice and stormed out of her office.
Buzbee took an aggressive tack in cross-examining Cary. After initially trying to put her at ease, he launched into an interrogation of her account of how she first came to learn about Olson. Buzbee accused Cary of getting wrong the kind of car Olson had at Galaxy Cafe, saying Olson has "never owned a red car." Cary said she never claimed the car she saw belonged to Olson.
"I guess I'm trying to figure out how good is your memory," Buzbee said.
Buzbee did not explicitly mention Paxton's alleged adultery. But he cast such misbehavior in religious terms, first asking Cary if she attended church. She initially resisted answering, questioning whether it was an appropriate question. But Buzbee insisted it was relevant and asked her, in an allusion to God, if there was "only one person who was ever perfect." She agreed that is the case in her belief system.
"All have sinned and fallen short of the grace of God, right?" Buzbee asked, to which Cary agreed. "Sometimes people make stupid mistakes, right?"
That is when Buzbee raised the possibility of impeaching anybody in Austin who has had an affair. Cary declined to respond to the hypothetical, saying, "I don't think I should answer this question in this chamber, particularly."
"Just because somebody has an affair doesn't mean that they're a quote criminal, does it?" Buzbee asked, to which Cary said she "would not associate that directly."
This article originally appeared in The Texas Tribune.
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"Political warnings and accusations of misconduct: 6 main themes emerge in first week of Ken Paxton’s impeachment trial" was first published by The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
The first week of suspended Attorney General Ken Paxton’s history-making impeachment trial closed Friday with only four prosecution witnesses taking the stand in the first four days.
Even so, the broad strokes of the cases being presented by lawyers for the House impeachment managers and Paxton’s defense team emerged in Tuesday’s opening statements and during frequently tedious, sometimes contentious questioning of witnesses.
Among the many subplots, these themes are likely to guide a trial that could take several additional weeks — ending when senators deliberate in private and emerge to cast votes that will determine whether the three-term Republican will return to work or be permanently removed from office.
Paxton attended the opening hours of his trial on Tuesday, during which senators overwhelmingly rejected his attempts to dismiss the articles of impeachment and his lawyer entered not guilty pleas on his behalf. He was absent the rest of the week.
The trial is set to resume Monday at 9 a.m.
Defense team challenges loyalty, evidence
Under trial rules adopted by the Senate, prosecutors began presenting their case first, and they chose to lead with three former high-ranking officials of the attorney general’s office — all of whom reported Paxton to the FBI on Sept. 30, 2020 before quitting or being fired.
Three Paxton lawyers split cross examination of the opening witnesses, and all three hit on similar themes.
Lead defense lawyer Tony Buzbee equated reporting Paxton to the FBI as an act of betrayal. By going behind the attorney general’s back, he said, Paxton was deprived of the opportunity to answer questions that could have cleared matters up.
“You went to the FBI uninformed, isn’t that true?” Buzbee asked Jeff Mateer, Paxton’s former second in command and the first prosecution witness.
“I would not say that, sir,” Mateer replied Tuesday.
[Who’s who in the Ken Paxton impeachment trial, from key participants to potential witnesses]
Defense lawyer Mitch Little picked up the theme during his aggressive questioning of the third prosecution witness, Ryan Vassar, former deputy attorney general for legal counsel, on Thursday.
In an extensive back and forth, Little suggested that Paxton was due the courtesy of a warning after nurturing Vassar’s career. More importantly, Little added, failing to let Paxton address their concerns left Vassar and other whistleblowers uninformed when they met with FBI agents to accuse Paxton of criminal acts.
Little said the whistleblowers had no direct knowledge, let alone evidence such as invoices, of wrongdoing regarding allegations that Austin real estate investor Nate Paul offered bribes by paying to renovate Paxton’s home and employing the woman Paxton was dating outside of his marriage.
“You went to the FBI on Sept. 30 with your compatriots and reported the elected attorney general of this state for a crime without any evidence, yes?” Little asked.
Vassar tried to qualify his answer several times, but Little repeatedly objected, stating it was a yes or no question.
“That’s right, we took no evidence,” Vassar finally stated.
On Friday, Rusty Hardin, a lawyer for the impeachment managers, sought to clear up the impression left by Vassar.
Vassar said he believed Little was referring to “documents, documentary evidence,” adding that he intended the FBI to find the truth, not conduct his own investigation.
“Did you give the FBI evidence?” Hardin asked.
“Our experience was evidence,” Vassar replied. “But we did not conduct our own investigation to provide documentary evidence of what we had learned. … I believed that I was a witness to criminal activity that had occurred by General Paxton.”
Prosecutors focus on “egregious misconduct”
State Rep. Andrew Murr, R-Junction, gave the opening statement on behalf of the House impeachment managers. He promised senators would hear testimony portraying Paxton as obsessed with helping Paul — who was under state and federal investigation for his business dealings — despite warnings and objections from his top lieutenants at the agency.
Paxton engaged in “egregious misconduct,” he said.
“The state’s top lawyer engaged in conduct designed to advance the economic interests and legal positions of a friend and donor to the detriment of innocent Texans,” Murr said, adding that Paxton “turned the keys of the office of attorney general over to Nate Paul.”
Ryan Bangert, Paxton’s former deputy first assistant attorney general, testified Wednesday and Thursday that Paxton took an unusual interest in matters involving Paul, such as pressing to overrule two agency decisions that denied Paul access to documents related to an active investigation into Paul’s businesses.
“We were devoting far more resources to Nate Paul than we ever should have,” Bangert said.
“I was deeply concerned that the name, authority and power of our office had been, in my view, hijacked to serve the interests of an individual against the interests of the broader public,” Bangert added. “It was unconscionable.”
[“Operation Deep Sea”: How Nate Paul pulled the strings in the attorney general’s office to investigate his enemies]
On Friday, impeachment lawyers called their fourth witness, David Maxwell, Paxton’s former director of law enforcement. Maxwell was out of state when seven senior agency officials reported Paxton to the FBI in 2020. Instead, Maxwell took his concerns to other law enforcement officials and was later fired from the agency.
Maxwell said he found Paul’s complaint to be “absolutely ludicrous,” including claims that search warrants were improperly altered in a web of conspiracy that included a federal magistrate judge.
As a result, Maxwell said, he urged Paxton to drop his interest in Paul. “I told him that Nate Paul was a criminal … and that, if he didn’t get away from this individual and stop doing what he was doing, he was going to get himself indicted.”
Defense: Paxton did not exceed his authority
Defense lawyers, in opening statements and in questions to prosecution witnesses, pushed back on claims that Paxton acted illegally when he pressed his agency’s lawyers and employees to take actions that were helpful to Paul.
When Vassar testified that Paxton broke internal rules on hiring outside lawyers to appoint Houston attorney Brandon Cammack to investigate Paul’s complaint, Little pointed to state law to argue that Paxton — as the elected leader of the attorney general’s office — had the power to approve Cammack’s contract.
Defense lawyer Dan Cogdell, in opening statements Tuesday, said Paxton hired Cammack in understandable frustration because employees of the attorney general’s office “did little to nothing” to investigate Paul’s serious complaint that his home and business had been improperly searched by state and federal officials.
Similarly, several Paxton lawyers disputed allegations that Paxton improperly directed his agency’s lawyers to intervene in an Austin charity’s lawsuit against Paul, arguing that he had clear authority to run his agency.
Prosecutors push back on several fronts
Under questioning from House impeachment lawyer Dick DeGuerin, Maxwell pushed back on claims that Paul’s complaints had been brushed off without proper investigation. A forensic analysis of the search warrants found nothing to support Paul’s claim that the documents had been improperly altered, he said.
After Buzbee opened his case by stating that “nothing of significance” had been exchanged between Paxton and Paul, lawyers for the House impeachment team pressed their witnesses to explain how Paul benefited from Paxton’s repeated interventions.
A legal opinion, published with unusual speed at 1 a.m. on a Sunday in 2020, took a highly unusual position at Paxton’s insistence, Bangert testified. The attorney general’s office had led efforts to reopen Texas several months into the pandemic, yet Paxton demanded that the opinion say local COVID-19 safety rules barred property foreclosure sales.
Only later did it become known that Paul’s lawyer referred to the agency’s opinion letter to avoid foreclosure sales of several Paul properties two days later, Bangert said.
Buzbee warns of potential political consequences
In opening statements laying out Paxton’s case, Buzbee sounded a political warning.
Impeachment could become a common tactic of political retribution if Paxton — a leading conservative legal voice on abortion, immigration and other key issues — were to be convicted and removed from office, he argued.
“Let’s be clear. If this misguided effort is successful … the precedent it will set would be perilous for any elected official in the state of Texas,” Buzbee said.
Buzbee also argued that impeachment thwarted the will of Texas voters.
“Texans chose at the voting booth who they wanted to be their attorney general … but because of what this House has done, only 30 [senators] out of almost 30 million will decide if Ken Paxton is allowed to serve in the office he was voted into,” he said. “That’s not how it’s supposed to work. That’s not democratic.”
Impeachment team counters with its own political focus
Murr rejected arguments that impeachment violated democratic principles, saying the framers of the Texas Constitution did not believe elections alone could protect the public from abusive office holders.
“It’s too easy to use the powers of office to conceal the truth,” Murr said in opening statements. “The voters did not, and do not, know the whole truth” because Paxton went to great lengths to conceal his misconduct, he added.
Impeachment lawyers also focused on the ultraconservative political beliefs held by their first three witnesses — all attorneys who praised Paxton’s priorities that, as one put it, turned the Texas attorney general’s office into a beacon of the conservative legal movement.
Mateer worked on Capitol Hill for two Texas Republican stalwarts, Tom DeLay and Dick Armey, and is now chief legal officer of First Liberty Institute, a Christian legal defense organization that focuses on religious liberty issues. His nomination for federal judge by President Donald Trump was thwarted by controversy over statements critical of transgender youth.
Bangert is a senior vice president for the Alliance Defending Freedom, a legal advocacy group focused on religious freedom and limiting abortion and LGBTQ+ rights, and he had previous ties to the Christian Coalition.
Vassar worked for notable conservative judges, including Don Willett, a former Texas Supreme Court justice named to a federal appeals court by Trump. Vassar also was a summer fellow for former Republican Gov. Rick Perry.
Paxton has blamed the impeachment on political opposition to his deeply conservative principles, but Mateer, Bangert and Vassar testified that they reluctantly took their concerns to the FBI after concluding that Paxton was misusing his authority on Paul’s behalf.
This article originally appeared in The Texas Tribune
The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at texastribune.org.
By Zach Despart
The Texas Tribune
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"Ken Paxton’s top deputy, the first impeachment witness, describes an attorney general out of control" was first published by The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
The Texas Tribune is your source for in-depth reporting on the Ken Paxton impeachment trial. Readers make that possible. Support authoritative Texas journalism with a donation now.
At the end of September 2020, it finally made sense to Jeff Mateer why his boss, Attorney General Ken Paxton, was devoting so much of the agency’s attention to Paxton’s friend, Austin real estate investor Nate Paul.
In Wednesday testimony that took up most of the second day of Paxton’s impeachment trial, Mateer said that for months he could not figure out why Paxton had brushed off repeated warnings that assisting Paul in his business disputes was an improper use of state resources.
And then, as the office was erupting in crisis when senior deputies learned that Paxton had quietly hired an outside lawyer to conduct an investigation on Paul’s behalf, Mateer said he learned something else. Paul had hired the woman with whom Paxton was having an extramarital affair, allowing her to move to Austin, where the attorney general could more easily visit her.
“It answered the question, why is he engaging in all these activities … on behalf of Mr. Paul?” Mateer testified. “It seemed to be he was under undue influence. At times, I wondered: Is he being blackmailed?”
In more than six hours of testimony, Mateer — the first witness called by the House impeachment managers — detailed his growing concerns through the summer and fall of 2020 about Paxton’s relationship with Paul, culminating in Mateer’s decision to join other senior advisers in reporting the attorney general’s behavior to the FBI on Sept. 30.
“I concluded that Mr. Paxton was engaged in conduct that was immoral, unethical, and I had the good faith belief that it was illegal,” Mateer testified.
Paxton’s lawyer attempted to cast Mateer as a rogue employee and disloyal friend of Paxton, arguing that the former first assistant jumped to conclusions about impropriety based on incomplete and inaccurate information. Attorney Tony Buzbee also accused Mateer of leading an attempted coup against Paxton.
But as Paxton has cast the impeachment as a persecution led by Democrats and liberal Republicans, Mateer presented a problem. He is an evangelical Christian and champion of religious liberty whose hiring by Paxton was praised by conservatives. And unlike four other senior deputies who filed a whistleblower lawsuit and later negotiated a proposed $3.3 million settlement — prompting Paxton’s camp to suggest they had a financial motivation for their allegations — Mateer simply quit within days of meeting with FBI agents in 2020.
Paxton on Tuesday pleaded not guilty to 16 articles of impeachment. The bulk of the House’s case centers on allegations that Paxton misused the power of the attorney general’s office to harass Paul’s perceived enemies, including business rivals, judges and law enforcement officials.
As expected, the attorney general’s affair with Laura Olson, the former Senate aide Buzbee identified by name during the trial, took center stage in the trial.
Mateer exhibited a pained expression when asked about the relationship, as Paxton’s wife, Sen. Angela Paxton, sat about 30 feet away — present for the trial but barred from deliberating or voting by Senate rules. Prodded by impeachment lawyer Rusty Hardin, Mateer said the affair was the missing piece that explained the bizarre behavior Paxton had exhibited in asking his senior deputies to help Paul.
Mateer added that he was present for a 2018 meeting in which Paxton, joined by his wife, admitted to the extramarital affair but said it was over and that he had recommitted to his marriage.
“Mr. Paxton apologized and, using Christian terminology, I would say he repented,” Mateer said. “I assumed it was over because that’s what he said.”
Sen. Paxton, at her desk, took notes as Mateer spoke. She has maintained a bright disposition during the trial, chatting with colleagues during breaks and waving to supporters in the gallery.
Mateer’s appearance was widely anticipated due to his position as Paxton’s most senior deputy and because he has said little publicly in the nearly three years since he resigned his post in October 2020.
Yet it was initially unclear if Mateer’s testimony would live up to its top billing when it began late Tuesday afternoon. Hardin, a genteel lawyer for the House managers, meandered while asking Mateer about his background, leaving senators to wonder when, if ever, he would get to the point.
Wednesday offered a reset. Hardin, normally loquacious, buckled down. He led Mateer through the summer of 2020, asking him to explain his growing discomfort with Paxton’s actions.
Mateer said he first knew little about Paul but was concerned when Paxton wished to personally argue a court motion in a case involving a charity that had sued two of Paul’s businesses. He said his consternation grew when Paxton directed the office to issue a legal opinion limiting foreclosure sales during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We were at the forefront of having Texas reopen and to stop COVID restrictions. … We were the ones pushing to have Texas open up,” Mateer said. “The opinion took the complete opposite view.”
Impeachment managers allege that Paul used the opinion to delay the foreclosure sale of several properties.
Mateer also said Paxton repeatedly pressured him to approve the hiring of an outside lawyer to investigate claims made by Paul. The former top deputy recalled that Paxton called him late on Sept. 28 and was “very upset” with Mateer’s refusal to support the hiring, adding that Paxton’s demeanor led him to believe he had been drinking.
Mateer said the next day, he and other senior officials realized that the outside lawyer, Brandon Cammack, had in fact started working for the office weeks earlier, without their knowledge. They also discovered Cammack had issued subpoenas to banks that had lent money to Paul’s businesses.
“We considered it sort of a crisis moment,” Mateer said. “Everything regarding Mr. Paul was coming to a head.”
Another senior official then rushed to court and persuaded the judge to throw out the subpoenas, arguing Cammack had no power to issue them.
Buzbee attempts to discredit Mateer
For the cross-examination, Buzbee’s rapid-fire, quick-pivot questioning of Mateer was in stark contrast to Hardin’s chronological questioning that bordered on tedious. Instead of offering a counter-narrative to the House’s version of events, Buzbee sought to discredit Mateer and land punches where he could.
He homed in on a theme of Mateer as a misguided employee and friend who should have taken his concerns directly to Paxton instead of going behind his back to report him to law enforcement. He challenged Mateer’s contention that he and other senior deputies were attempting to protect the attorney general from himself.
“In order to protect Ken Paxton, what you did was you then called the FBI?” Buzbee asked. “That’s how you protected your friend?”
“That’s not correct, sir,” Mateer replied.
Buzbee suggested that if Mateer had asked Paxton about Cammack, he would have learned that the attorney general had properly hired him and that the subpoenas were a legitimate inquiry into a second Paul complaint that Mateer did not know about.
“So you went to the FBI thinking that this kid, as you called [Cammack], should not be subpoenaing banks?” Buzbee asked. “But you now know that if he was charged … to investigate bid rigging, then that might be something that he might subpoena?”
“I actually don’t know that,” Mateer replied.
What Buzbee did not mention, however, was that Paul’s second complaint alleged that he was the victim of a wide-ranging conspiracy by business rivals, a court-appointed lawyer and a federal judge to steal his properties. No evidence has emerged, in the impeachment trial or any other forum, supporting the claim, which Paul code named “Operation Tarrytown.”
And House exhibits reveal that Paul and his lawyer had directed Cammack on how to conduct the probe, including by identifying investigative targets and writing the subpoenas.
As the cross-examination entered its third hour, Buzbee tried to elicit damaging admissions from Mateer, but the seasoned lawyer was unfazed. At one point, Buzbee asked at what hourly rate would an outside counsel be too expensive for the attorney general’s office.
“What’s your rate?” Mateer quipped.
At another, Buzbee returned to the argument that Mateer was insubordinate in joining other senior advisers in reporting Paxton to law enforcement.
“You were involved in a coup, weren’t you?” Buzbee asked.
“Absolutely not,” Mateer said.
Paxton a no-show, again, for trial
Paxton was again absent for Wednesday’s impeachment proceedings.
The suspended attorney general was present Tuesday morning while Buzbee entered not guilty pleas on his behalf, but he did not return after the lunch break as lawyers for the House impeachment managers called their first witness.
Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who is the presiding officer over the impeachment trial, agreed with Paxton’s attorneys Tuesday after they argued that trial rules did not require Paxton’s presence beyond entering a plea.
This article originally appeared in The Texas Tribune.
The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at texastribune.org.
By Patrick Svitek and Zach Despart
The Texas Tribune
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"Texas Senate rejects all motions to dismiss Ken Paxton impeachment charges" was first published by The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
The Texas Tribune is your source for in-depth reporting on the Ken Paxton impeachment trial. Readers make that possible. Support authoritative Texas journalism with a donation now.
The Texas Senate on Tuesday rejected all of Attorney General Ken Paxton’s efforts to dismiss the articles of impeachment against him, moving forward with the first removal proceeding against a statewide elected official in more than a century.
The rapid-fire series of votes on 16 pretrial motions made clear that senators want to at least hear the evidence against Paxton before deciding his fate. And the vote counts provided an early gauge of how willing GOP senators may be to remove a fellow Republican from statewide office.
While the House vote to impeach Paxton was overwhelming and bipartisan, the Senate offers a different political landscape. Its Republican members are more in line with Paxton's brand of conservatism, and he has more personal connections in the chamber where he once served and his wife remains a member.
The pretrial motions required a majority vote, but the most support a motion to dismiss received was 10 out of 30 senators — all Republicans — and that motion sought to throw out a single article.
Six Republican senators supported every motion in a nod of support for Paxton: Paul Bettencourt of Houston, Donna Campbell of New Braunfels, Brandon Creighton of Conroe, Bob Hall of Edgewood, Lois Kolkhorst of Brenham and Tan Parker of Flower Mound. Half of those senators — Bettencourt, Campbell and Parker — are up for reelection next year.
Five Republicans — Brian Birdwell of Granbury, Bryan Hughes of Mineola, Charles Perry of Lubbock, Charles Schwertner of Georgetown and Kevin Sparks of Midland — voted in favor of at least one motion to dismiss.
The remaining seven Republicans voted with all 12 Democrats against each motion. Those senators were Pete Flores of Pleasanton, Kelly Hancock of North Richland Hills, Joan Huffman of Houston, Mayes Middleton of Galveston, Robert Nichols of Jacksonville and Drew Springer of Muenster.
Setting the tone, the Senate denied Paxton’s first two motions by votes of 24-6 and 22-8.
The first motion asked the Senate to throw out every article of impeachment for lack of evidence. Twelve Republicans joined all Senate Democrats in the vote to essentially move forward with a trial.
The second motion asked senators to exclude evidence from before January, when Paxton’s current four-year term began. That motion struck at the heart of one of Paxton’s main arguments — that he cannot be impeached for any actions allegedly taken before he was reelected last year. Paxton's defenders have repeatedly cited the so-called forgiveness doctrine to criticize the House impeachment as illegal.
The House impeached Paxton in May, alleging a yearslong pattern of lawbreaking and misconduct. He was immediately suspended from his job, and the Senate trial, which started at 9 a.m. Tuesday, will determine whether he is permanently removed from office.
There were two dozen pretrial motions. A simple majority was required to approve 16 of them because they sought to dismissal all or some of the articles of impeachment. The presiding officer, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, was allowed to rule on the other motions unilaterally.
Notably, Patrick granted Paxton's motion that prevents the suspended attorney general from being forced to testify in the trial. The House impeachment managers had opposed the motion, arguing that if Paxton wanted to avoid self-incrimination, he could take advantage of his Fifth Amendment right from the witness stand.
As the Senate proceeds to a trial, a two-thirds vote is required to convict Paxton. That means that if all 12 Democrats vote to convict, half the remaining 18 Republican with a vote would have to join them. Paxton's wife, Sen. Angela Paxton, is disqualified from voting but allowed to attend the trial.
Trial deliberations are private, so the process of voting on the pretrial motions followed a dry routine Tuesday morning. Senators submitted their votes in writing, the Senate secretary announced each senators' votes from the front mic, reading them off in random order, and Patrick verified each vote from the dais.
The motion to dismiss that got the most support — 10 votes‚ sought to individually dismiss Article 8. That article accuses Paxton of disregarding his official duties by pursuing a taxpayer-funded settlement with former top staffers who reported concerns about his relationship with Paul to the FBI in 2020.
This article originally appeared in The Texas Tribune.
The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at texastribune.org.
Billionaires, burner phones, alleged bribes: The impeachment trial of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is going to test the will of Republicans senators to oust not only one of their own, but a firebrand who has helped drive the state's hard turn to the right for years.
The historic proceedings set to start in the state Senate Tuesday are the most serious threat yet to one of Texas' most powerful figures after nine years engulfed by criminal charges, scandal, and accusations of corruption. If convicted, Paxton—just the third official in Texas' nearly 200-year history to be impeached—could be removed from office.
Witnesses called to testify could include Paxton and a woman with whom he has acknowledged having an extramarital affair. Members of the public hoping to watch from the gallery will have to line up for passes. And conservative activists have already bought up TV airtime and billboards, pressuring senators to acquit one of former President Donald Trump's biggest defenders.
“It's a very serious event but it's a big-time show,” said Bill Miller, a longtime Austin lobbyist and a friend of Paxton. “Any way you cut it, it's going to have the attention of anyone and everyone.”
The build-up to the trial has widened divisions among Texas Republicans that reflect the wider fissures roiling the party nationally heading into the 2024 election.
At the fore of recent Texas policies are hardline measures to stop migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border, battles over what is taught in public schools, and restrictions on LGBTQ+ rights—many of which are championed loudest in the Senate, where Republicans hold a dominant 19-12 majority and have Paxton's fate in their hands.
The Senate has long been a welcoming place for Paxton. His wife, Angela, is a state senator, although she is barred from voting in the trial. Paxton also was a state senator before becoming attorney general in 2015 and still has entanglements in the chamber, including with Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who will preside over the trial and loaned $125,000 to Paxton's reelection campaign.
If all 12 Democrats vote to convict Paxton, they would still need at least nine Republicans on their side. Or the Senate could vote by a simple majority to dismiss the charges altogether. But it was a GOP-dominated House that decided by an overwhelming majority that Paxton should be impeached.
“You’re seeing a fracture within the party right now,” said Matt Langston, a Republican political consultant in Texas. “This is going to impact the leadership and the party for a long time.”
The trial also appears to have heightened Paxton’s legal risks. The case against him largely centers on his relationship with Nate Paul, an Austin real estate developer who was indicted this summer after being accused of making false statements to banks to secure $170 million in loans.
Last month, federal prosecutors in Washington kicked a long-running investigation of Paxton into a higher gear when they began using a grand jury in San Antonio to examine his dealings with Paul, according to two people with knowledge of the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of secrecy rules around grand jury proceedings. The grand jury’s role was first reported by the Austin American-Statesman.
Chris Toth, the former executive director of the National Association of Attorneys General, said Paxton has for years weathered scandals unique among top state lawyers. He said the outcome of the trial will send a message about what is acceptable to elected officials across the country.
Impeachment managers in the GOP-controlled Texas House filed nearly 4,000 pages of exhibits ahead of the trial, including accusations that Paxton hid the use of multiple cellphones and reveled in other perks of office.
“There’s very much a vile and insidious level of influence that Ken Paxton exerts through continuing to get away with his conduct,” Toth said.
Part of Paxton's political durability is his alignment with Trump, and this was never more apparent than when Paxton joined efforts to overturn the 2020 election. Like Trump, Paxton says he is a victim of politically motivated investigations.
But James Dickey, a former chairman of the Republican Party of Texas, said the base of the GOP sees Paxton’s impeachment as different from legal troubles facing Trump.
“Exclusively, the actions against President Trump are from Democrat elected officials and so it can’t avoid having more of a partisan tone,” he said. “Therefore, Republican voters have more concern and frustration with it.”