President Trump endorsed Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) over Sen. John Cornyn (R) in the Texas Senate primary runoff Tuesday after months of waffling.
“Ken is a true MAGA Warrior who has ALWAYS delivered for Texas, and will continue to do so in the United States Senate,” Trump wrote in a lengthy Truth Social post, adding: “John Cornyn is a good man, and I worked well with him, but he was not supportive of me when times were tough…”
“Ken Paxton has gone through a lot, in many cases, very unfairly, but he is a Fighter, and knows how to WIN,” he wrote, alluding to Paxton’s indictment, impeachment and messy divorce.
The endorsement, a week before the primary election and a day into early voting, seems to have come as a surprise to at least one of the candidates. Cornyn said Monday that he thinks “that ship has finally sailed” when asked about the president weighing in.
The senator will stay in the race, though, tweeting: “It is now time for Texas Republican voters to decide if they want a strong nominee to help our GOP candidates down ballot and defeat Talarico in November, or a weak nominee who jeopardizes everything we care about.”
“There are those that say whoever I endorse is going to win,” Trump told reporters over the sounds of construction at the White House on Tuesday. “I don’t know if that’s true. Historically that’s absolutely true. I just don’t like to say it because I don’t like to brag.”
He added that he’s “had my mind made up for a long time.”
The race went to a runoff between Cornyn and Paxton in early March, after both spent months trying to win Trump’s favor. Establishment Republicans pushed hard on Cornyn’s behalf, fearing that Paxton — with his prodigious personal baggage — would be vulnerable to a strong general election challenge. State Rep. James Talarico (D) won the Democratic primary, deepening the fears of many Republicans who saw him as a formidable opponent. Cornyn backers also worried that a runoff, historically drawing a smaller pool of hardcore partisans, would naturally favor Paxton.
Cornyn finished stronger than expected in the primary, and Trump soon announced on Truth Social that he’d finally endorse a candidate, and that he expected the other one to drop out. The political jockeying intensified from there.
Paxton first said that nothing could compel him to drop out of the race before naming a condition: that Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-TX) drop the filibuster to pass the SAVE Act, a Republican voter suppression bill. The move seemed less earnest and more an effort to redirect Trump’s ire toward Thune, who, fearing a weakened Senate majority, has been among Cornyn’s loudest backers. Thune and Cornyn have strongly resisted touching the filibuster, even to pass the SAVE Act, which they support.
Trump expressed vexation at Paxton’s defiance but backed down, becoming briefly fixated on the filibuster and letting the endorsement threat evaporate into the ether. Trump traditionally dislikes endorsing in races that his preferred candidate might lose, and the sporadic runoff polling has been all over the place. A poll released this week from Texas Southern University’s Barbara Jordan Public Policy Research and Survey Center showed both Cornyn and Paxton in a statistical tie with Talarico.
because I don’t like to brag.”
GOP: " You’re the Greatest Sir. The most Humble, Smartest ever."
Thank you, President Trump!
This appears to be good news for Talarico. However, Texas voters can never be underestimated. Sending a lowlife such as Paxton to the Senate isn’t entirely out of the realm for that state.
I think Rtump is feeling emboldened by getting rid of Bill Cassidy, without paying any heed to the fact that Texas is a different environment from Louisiana.
I hope Paxton wins the nomination because it gives Talarico a better shot at winning. Not much of a shot, but at least a possibility. And if Paxton become a senator, so what? He’ll be like all the rest of the GOP senators, corrupt and out to touch. One exception of course is Susan Collins. She remains concerned.