Texas AG Ken Paxton officially joins U.S. Senate race challenging John Cornyn [View all]
Source: Texas Tribune
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced Tuesday he will challenge U.S. Sen. John Cornyn in next year’s midterm elections, setting up a barnburner clash of two Republican titans that is sure to reverberate across state and national politics.
The contest, teased by Paxton for months, promises to be among the most heated and expensive Republican primaries in the country and in recent Texas history. It also marks the latest flashpoint in a power struggle between the Texas GOP’s hardline, socially conservative wing — which views Paxton as a standard-bearer — and the Cornyn-aligned, business-minded Republican old guard.
Appearing on Fox News host Laura Ingraham’s show, Paxton said it was “time for a change in Texas” as he announced his Senate bid and blasted Cornyn’s “lack of production” over his 22 years in the upper chamber.
“We have another great U.S. senator, Ted Cruz, and it's time we have another great senator that will actually stand up and fight for Republican values, fight for the values of the people of Texas, and also support Donald Trump in the areas that he's focused on in a very significant way,” Paxton said. “And that's what I plan on doing.”
Paxton’s candidacy poses the most serious threat to Cornyn’s political career in decades. It would mark a watershed moment in the Texas GOP’s factional struggle if Paxton — not long removed from an array of career-threatening legal battles and impeachment by his own party — managed to topple Cornyn, a mainstay of Texas politics who had an early hand in the state’s Republican takeover and reached the upper rungs of Senate GOP leadership.
Read more: https://www.texastribune.org/2025/04/08/ken-paxton-john-cornyn-us-senate-texas-republican-primary/
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