The Republican-led effort to impeach Ken Paxton is a shattering political shift

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For nearly a decade, Texas Republicans have largely looked the other way as Attorney General Ken Paxton’s legal troubles piled up.

That suddenly changed this week.

In revealing that it had been secretly investigating Paxton since March — and then recommended his impeachment Thursday — a Republican-led House committee sought to hold Paxton to account in a way no GOP has come close to doing. It was a political earthquake, and while it remains to be seen whether Paxton’s ouster will be the outcome, it is an astonishing act of restraint.

“We’re used to seeing partisans protect themselves, and in this case, the Republicans turned on the attorney general,” said Brandon Routinghouse, a political science professor at the University of Houston. “It’s really amazing.”

The House Public Inquiry Committee voted unanimously Thursday to recommend Paxton’s removal, citing a years-long pattern of alleged misconduct and lawbreaking. The vote included all three Republicans in the majority on the committee — setting in motion a process likely to force all other Republicans in the legislature to register. The Texas House of Representatives is expected to debate the impeachment resolution starting at 1 p.m. on Saturday.

This is something most Texas Republicans have avoided since Paxton was first elected as the state’s top legal official in 2014. Months into his first term, he was indicted on state securities fraud, a criminal case he fights to this day. And in 2020, top officials in his office asked the FBI to investigate allegations that he abused his power to help a wealthy friend and donor. The allegations led to a whistleblower lawsuit alleging that Paxton retaliated against his former deputies.

Along the way, there have been other scandals, such as the revelation that he cheated on his wife, Sen. Angela Paxton, R-McKinney.

For the most part, Republican state leaders and lawmakers have stayed quiet the entire time. If they do speak, it is usually to object and say they want to see legal action done.

For example, when the whistleblower allegations first came to light, both Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Dan Patrick expressed concern, but said they would not comment further until any investigation was complete. They never weighed again.

After a securities fraud indictment, Paxton was re-elected in 2018 without being challenged by a fellow Republican. That changed four years later, following the whistleblower allegations, when he fielded a lineup of high-profile primary challengers, including then-land commissioner George P. Bush.

However, first-round voters seemed unfazed by Paxton’s scandals and rearranged him over Bush by a large margin. He supported Patrick Paxton in the run-off.

There were some exceptions to the silence on Paxton among Texas Republicans. Rep. Chip Roy, an Austin Republican who once worked for Paxton, called on him to resign after the whistleblower allegations came to light in 2020.

U.S. Senator John Cornyn, a former Texas attorney general, has also shown more willingness to scrutinize Paxton than most members of the Texas Republican Party. Cornyn told reporters in Dallas Thursday that he watched some of the House committee hearings and found them “very disturbing.”

“The fact that this has come this far with Republicans controlling the House and Senate and a Republican attorney general tells you that this is serious enough that people are looking at past party designations to try to figure out what we need to do to preserve the public’s trust and the integrity of the institution,” he said. Cornyn.

The big question: why now?

Paxton’s years of alleged misconduct raise the question: Why now?

House leaders said the committee’s investigation was prompted by a $3.3 million settlement Paxton reached with the whistleblowers in February. Paxton needed the legislature to approve the use of state funds to settle the lawsuit—and he soon encountered resistance.

Speaker of the House Dade Phelan, R. Beaumont, was the first Republican in the legislature to oppose using taxpayer money to pay for the settlement. A spokesman for Phelan said in a statement Wednesday that Paxton “made this request of the legislature without providing sufficient information or evidence.”

“As a result, Speaker Phelan asserted that it would be irresponsible for the Legislature to appropriate such an extraordinary amount of taxpayer money without a full and thorough investigation of the matter,” Phelan’s spokesman, Kate Whitman, said.

To be clear, the 20 articles of impeachment are broader than the whistleblower allegations at the settlement center. Some of them focus on securities fraud charges.

Phelan’s critics within the party say the settlement is a smokescreen for impeachment efforts. Paxton comes from a wing of the Texas Republican Party that frequently criticizes the House of Representatives as too moderate, and his supporters say the chamber’s leaders are now attacking in an extreme way.

“The attorney general’s impeachment proceedings are just the latest front in the Texas House’s war against Republicans to stop the conservative direction of our state,” Matt Rinaldi, chairman of the Texas Republican Party, said in a statement Friday.

For Paxton’s Democratic critics, the prospect of his impeachment stirs feelings of gratitude and vindication. Justin Nelson, the 2018 Democratic nominee who was the closest to beating Paxton, said in a statement that it was “a long time since Mr. Paxton was gone.”

Galveston attorney Joe Jaworski, who ran in the Democratic primary for attorney general last year, called the House investigation “better late than never.”

“Texas is a Republican state,” Algorky said in an interview Wednesday before the House committee recommended impeachment. “If anyone is going to hold him responsible for conduct unbecoming a public official, it should be the Republican power structure.”

As for the timing of the House proceedings, Jaworski added, “Well, you can’t say Ken Paxton didn’t bring this investigation to him when asking the Texas Legislature to pay $3.3 million to settle a disputed whistleblower who claims he snubbed every opportunity.” He had it.”

His fellow Republicans are starting to get involved

With the House impeachment vote looming, Paxton is about to find out how many Republican friends he already has, both inside and outside the Capitol.

Paxton has aligned closely with Donald Trump over the years, but the former president has yet to come to the attorney general’s defense. And in an interview Thursday with WFAA, Patrick declined to stick with Paxton, suggesting he might have to preside over a Senate trial.

“We will all be as responsible as any juror, if it turns out, and I think the members will do their part,” said Patrick.

While Patrick ultimately endorsed Paxton in 2022, it came after The Texas Tribune reported that the governor was interfering with the primaries and running against Paxton.

A few Republicans in the legislature have already sided against Paxton by backing his primary rivals in 2022. Sen. Mayes Middleton of Galveston has bankrolled two of Paxton’s challengers as many as six figures. But for the rest, it will be the first time they have to make a public judgment against a scandal-plagued prosecutor.

To send the matter to trial in the Texas Senate, a majority of the 149 members of the House of Representatives must approve a resolution containing articles of impeachment. While all 64 House Democrats are expected to vote to impeach Paxton, early reactions among House Republicans were mixed Thursday night and Friday morning.

During a Facebook Live broadcast from the House floor Thursday night, Rep. Steve Toth, a Republican from The Woodlands, opposed impeachment, echoing Paxton’s argument that it would be an “illegal” measure. Toth predicted that impeachment would lead to a protracted court battle that would cause “attorney general paralysis at a time when we must be fighting the Biden administration.”

Rep. Matt Schaefer, a Tyler Republican who endorsed one of Paxton’s primary challengers for 2022, questioned Phelan on the floor about the extent of lawmakers’ access to evidence supporting the articles of impeachment. He repeatedly referred Phelan to the chairman of the House Public Investigation Committee, Rep. Andrew Elmer, R-Junction. Schaefer seemed dissatisfied.

He tweeted afterwards: “The process is important.”

Another Republican in the House, freshman Rep. Carl Tepper of Lubbock, said late Friday night that he watched the committee hearing and “the witnesses appeared absolutely credible and damning.”

“Of course AG deserves a defense but that doesn’t happen until trial,” Tepper said on Twitter. In that case it would be in the Senate if the impeachment resolution prevailed. We will take this very seriously.”

On Friday morning, Republican Rep. Brian Harrison (R-Midlothian) called a radio show in Dallas and said he hadn’t decided how he would vote. But he raised multiple questions about the process so far and said that while the allegations against Paxton are “deeply troubling,” he may be more concerned that the House is fueling the perception that it is trying to “criminalize political dissent.”

Asked if there were enough House Republicans willing to join the Democrats in impeaching Paxton, Harrison declined to speculate.

However, he said, “I think it is fair to say that there are a good number of my colleagues who do not hold the current Attorney General in high esteem.”

Disclosure: The University of Houston has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization funded in part by donations from members, foundations, and corporate sponsors. Financial backers play no role in the Tribune press. Find a full list of them here.

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