Ken Paxton is State Convention King Due
to Remarkable Similarities with President
Capitol Inside
June 11, 2026
HOUSTON - Attorney General Ken Paxton may be the perfect choice to lead the GOP ticket as the U.S. nominee who has more in common with President Donald Trump than all of the elected officials and delegates at the Texas Republican Convention this week in Houston combined. Most of the worst things that people say about Paxton have been said about President Donald Trump in some form or fashion. Like Trump, Paxton has found the road to high-level power strewn with self-induced obstacles and roadblocks that very few in the political life would have any chance to overcome.
Paxton's similarities with the president seem evident more than ever as he prepares to accept a nomination that he's already won before a sea of activists decked in red as the marquee act at the state GOP convention where he's the leading draw for the first time in a long career in politics. The top Texas lawyer is the big dog at the George R. Brown Convention Center where the GOP's biennial gathering opened officially for business on Thursday with the first of four general sessions. Paxton has relegated Governor Greg Abbott and Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick to the supporting cast in the Bayou City where he's the new king of the ruling party after ousting U.S. Senator John Cornyn in a primary runoff election late last month.
But Paxton may have been history by now without an endorsement that Trump cloaked in superlatives the week before the overtime vote. The prediction here had been that Paxton would win as long as the president didn't throw his massive muscle behind Cornyn instead. If the Senate runoff had been a boxing match, the refs would have stopped the fight the moment Trump set foot inside the ring. Paxton coasted to a victory with 64 percent of the runoff vote with Trump leading the parade. Cornyn thought he had a chance in the early going to get a plug from Trump. That was never going to happen, however, because of all the amazing common threads that the president and Paxton. The state AG and Trump give new meaning to the word symbiotic. Two peas in a pod would be an understatement.
Paxton and Trump both have been charged felony crimes related to shady business dealings. Neither Trump or Paxton did time behind bars for the alleged transgressions - which both attributed to acts of political retribution from enemies.
The American president and state AG have both been impeached in house chambers. Both have been acquitted in Senate trials with some Republican votes to convict. Paxton and Trump have both been linked to women outside their marriages in court fights. Trump was convicted in 2024 of falsifying official records in a connection with hush money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels. Paxton was sued for divorce by his wife - State Senator Angela Paxton of McKinney - on biblical grounds in a case reportedly linked to a woman who's a married Christian influencer with seven children.
Whatever Paxton's critics want to say about the unprecedented baggage that he brings to the Senate race, it's nothing that the president hasn't heard about himself in some variation.
Paxton captured Trump's love, devotion and loyalty when he tried to overturn the democratic American election in 2020 in the U.S. Supreme Court. Trump was impeached a second time amid charges that he incited the riot at the Capitol in January 6. Paxton spoke at the rally that triggered the attack while Congress was in the process of certifying Trump's loss to Joe Biden in 2020. Paxton already had attempted to overturn the election in the U.S.Supreme Court. The only major difference in the Trump and Paxton impeachments was the fact that the attorney general's orderal came courtesy of five dozen Republicans in the state House.
The Texans for Lawsuit Reform PAC tried to beat Paxton in the primary election in 2022 when the group poured a ton into the campaign of an Abbott ally who'd served on the state Supreme Court. Paxton's foes built a case against him based on some of the same basic accusations that he would face the following year in the impeachment saga. The TLR candidate faied to make - and George P. Bush was no match for Paxton the incumbent in a runoff that he won going away.
Paxton's love life wasn't a factor when he was indicted on felony securities fraud charges during his first year ion the job as the state lawyer in 2015. Paxton - like Trump - steadfastly denied the charges in the criminal case and impeachment ordeal. The state's top lawyer agreed to community service and an ethics course but never confessed to anything.
Trump's second impeachment was impeached twice in the U.S. House during his first term that ended with the riot at the Capitol on January 6. Paxton, who delivered a fiery speech at the rally that triggered the attack, was impeached in the Texas House in 2023 on corruption charges before acquitted in a Senate trial several months later. Angela Paxton the state senator stood by her husband's side while he fired up Trump supporters that day in Washington D.C.
Paxton will take the stage at some point this weekend in the Bayou City. But he's the big dog this time around.
more to come ...
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