By Gabby Birenbaum, Kayla Guo and Alejandra Martinez
PLANO, Texas (The Texas Tribune) – Attorney General Ken Paxton won the Republican primary runoff for U.S. Senate Tuesday, ending over three decades of Sen. John Cornyn’s electoral dominance in what amounts to a watershed moment for GOP politics in Texas.
The Associated Press called the race for Paxton shortly after 8 p.m., about an hour after most polls closed in Texas.
Paxton’s win, coming on the heels of an eleventh-hour endorsement from President Donald Trump, will reverberate nationally. The result is a triumph for Paxton and his wing of the GOP, which prioritizes politicians’ zeal for destroying the left over traditional values like statesmanship and dealmaking. And it’s a massive blow to the Republican old guard in Texas and the political establishment in Washington, who were firmly behind Cornyn amid concerns about Paxton’s electability in November.
The outcome sets up a general election matchup between Paxton and Austin state Rep. James Talarico. Democrats have made no secret of their preference for Paxton, who they believe can be beaten due to the baggage he carries from a line of political and personal scandals. Paxton has run and won three times statewide, but Talarico will be by far his best-funded and most prominent opponent, and the first he will face running atop the ticket.
The attorney general received Trump’s backing a week before election day, providing him with a significant boost after both candidates spent a year lobbying for it. Paxton’s victory further demonstrates Trump’s iron grip on his party and the consequences Republicans can face for even mild criticism of a president who demands loyalty. And it sends a chilling message to the Republican establishment, which has now lost one of its most powerful senators and best fundraisers.
In a cycle that has already seen notable incumbents in both parties go down nationally, Cornyn’s loss is a political earthquake.
Cornyn has been an elected official for over 40 years, rising from district judge to Texas Supreme Court justice to Texas attorney general to the U.S. Senate. His election as attorney general put the office under GOP control for the first time since Reconstruction, setting the agency on its path to becoming a laboratory of right-wing legal activism.
First elected to the Senate in 2002, Cornyn ascended the GOP ranks, serving as Senate Republican whip — the number two position in the conference — from 2013 to 2019.
The senior senator had never lost a race in his career. He successfully navigated the transition from the Bush era, when he was first federally elected, to the tea party to the first Trump era of Republican politics, which felled many of his Senate contemporaries around the country.
But the staid, even-keeled senator, a mainstay in Washington who reached the upper echelons of Senate power, could not survive a challenge from Paxton, a MAGA darling who led the unsuccessful legal effort to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
In a concession speech early Tuesday evening, Cornyn did not mention Paxton by name but reiterated his pledge to support “the Republican ticket.” He also quoted Teddy Roosevelt — “It's not the critic that counts … The credit belongs to the man who's actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and blood and sweat” — and the Apostle Paul: “I fought the good fight. I finished the race, I kept the faith.”
Cornyn also ticked through his accomplishments in office, from contributing to the passage of “historic tax reform bills” to removing red tape to “helping put hundreds of conservative judges on the federal bench.”
Paxton has racked up his own share of legal accomplishments thwarting the Biden administration’s policies. At the same time, he is known for his checkered history of personal ethics and legal troubles: He was once indicted for felony securities fraud (charges that were later dropped) and impeached by the GOP-controlled Texas House for corruption and abuse of office (and acquitted by the Republican majority in the Senate). And he has come under fire for alleged infidelity and an accumulation of assets during his time in office.
But Paxton, after his acquittal in 2023, has inspired fervent support from a MAGA base that sees him as a victim of political persecution in much the same light as Trump. He wielded that clout to target GOP lawmakers who voted for his impeachment, backing numerous primary challengers in 2024 who took out Republican incumbents in the Legislature.
Tonight, he defeated one of the most successful politicians in Texas GOP history and a key figure in the Republican establishment in Washington. Had Cornyn won the primary and gone on to serve a fifth term, he would have set a Texas senatorial record for longevity. Instead, he becomes the first senator in Texas history to lose to a member of his own party since Ralph Yarbrough in 1970.
Onstage at his victory party in Plano, Paxton took the stage to cheers from supporters and elected officials in his camp. He praised Trump for endorsing him against the advice of Republicans in Washington. And he soaked in the gravity of the moment.
“Tonight, we just sent a Texas-sized message to Washington,” Paxton said.
Cornyn is the second sitting U.S. senator to lose a primary this month, following Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, who failed to qualify for a Republican runoff earlier this month. Prior to this year, only two senators had lost primaries in the past 15 years — Sens. Richard Lugar of Indiana and Luther Strange of Alabama. Their successful primary challengers both went on to lose the general election.
Many of the Republicans who have been chased out of Congress in the past few cycles were either moderates or members who had crossed Trump, especially those who voted to impeach or convict him in the wake of January 6, such as Cassidy. But Cornyn does not fall into that category. He has been a reliable conservative vote throughout his career. His two biggest strays from MAGA orthodoxy recently were supporting aid to Ukraine and voting in favor of a bipartisan gun safety bill in the wake of the 2022 Uvalde school shooting.
And as Trump’s endorsement post made clear, Cornyn irked the president when he cast doubts on Trump’s electability in 2023 — far from a unique position. As Trump put it, “He was not supportive of me when times were tough.”
Paxton, by contrast, was one of two elected officials to attend Trump’s presidential campaign launch announcement in 2022, a demonstration of the ironclad loyalty he has shown the president.
The result is also a massive defeat for the Republican establishment in Washington, including Majority Leader John Thune, which has spent tens of millions on Cornyn’s behalf. For months, Cornyn, Thune and allies have made the case, both to voters and to the White House, that a Paxton candidacy would endanger Republicans’ chances in both the Senate race and down-ballot contests, especially the U.S. House races in Texas that could decide the balance of the lower chamber.
Minutes after the race was called for Paxton, the Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan elections forecaster, shifted its Texas Senate race rating one tick to the left, from “likely” to “lean” Republican.
Tuesday’s runoff also demonstrates the limits of money in politics. Cornyn significantly outraised Paxton throughout the race, and pro-Cornyn forces outspent the pro-Paxton side by a factor of close to nine to one overall, and over three to one during the runoff.
The deluge of spending certainly helped, erasing Paxton’s double-digit polling lead from early in the race and powering Cornyn to a narrow first-place finish in the March primary. But Cornyn’s money machine ran up against the realities of runoffs, which have smaller electorates where hardened partisans make up a larger share of the vote, and the fact that Paxton — and his ethical baggage — was already well-known to voters. Trump’s last-second endorsement helped seal the deal.
As part of their case that Paxton is a risky bet in November, Cornyn and his allies in Washington have argued that Paxton’s scandals and weak fundraising will force the GOP to spend potentially over $100 million in Texas to bail him out — money Republican leaders would rather deploy to swing states like Georgia, Michigan and North Carolina. Groups like the National Republican Senatorial Committee — the Senate GOP’s campaign arm — have attacked Paxton in intense personal terms, funding ads going after his divorce and calling his behavior “repulsive and disgusting.”
As Paxton’s victory appeared imminent, the NRSC put out a statement bashing Talarico, but making no mention of the nominee the group has been deeply opposed to.
"A state President Trump won by nearly 14 points isn’t going to elect James Talarico — a radical leftist who thinks God is nonbinary and that Texas should be a welcome mat for illegals,” NRSC regional press secretary Samantha Cantrell said. “He is the most dangerous flank of the far left. Texas isn’t swapping brisket for open borders.”
Daniel Hayworth, Paxton’s son-in-law and a pastor at a non-denominational church in Central Texas, led a prayer at Paxton’s watch party in which he said, “We ask that your hand of blessing would be upon the campaign as they continue on to fight against James Talarico, who twists your word and spits upon your name.”
Cornyn and his allies, including Thune, routinely made the electability case to Trump, encouraging him to endorse Cornyn to avoid a costly runoff. After Cornyn finished 1.5 percentage points ahead of Paxton in the primary, the senior senator seemed to be on the precipice of achieving it. The next day, the president pledged to endorse one of the candidates in short order, accompanied by a call for the one he did not pick to drop out.
But Trump’s endorsement, when it finally came more than two months later, was for Paxton. Paxton previously offered to consider dropping out if the Senate passed the SAVE America Act, a voting restrictions bill that Trump has called his top legislative priority but is doomed in the Senate because it requires 60 votes for passage. Cornyn, already a cosponsor of the bill, indicated openness to ditching the legislative filibuster in order to pass it. But Paxton pushed the idea more aggressively, and Trump, who said in his endorsement that he appreciated Paxton’s commitment to terminating the filibuster, chose to back Paxton.
Texas’ top statewide elected officials, including Sen. Ted Cruz, Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, stayed mum on the race.
Paxton’s win will compel an awkward reconciliation between the now-GOP nominee and the party organizations that have spent months trying to keep him off the November ballot and criticized him in sharply personal terms. And if Paxton wins the general election, he’ll be part of a Senate Republican Conference that’s been loyal to Cornyn and hostile to Paxton’s candidacy.
Paxton told CNN last week that he wanted to “cooperate” with Washington Republicans and that he is “ready to unite.”
Talarico, meanwhile, issued a statement welcoming Cornyn’s supporters into the Democratic tent, foreshadowing the skirmish in the coming months to win over the highly coveted voting bloc.
“I want to thank Senator John Cornyn for his years representing our state,” Talarico said. “ We don’t agree on everything, but we both still believe in public service. To Senator Cornyn’s supporters: you have a place in our campaign.”
Paxton, too, made overtures to Cornyn’s voters, thanking the senator for his years of service to the state.
“Tonight is not the end of the campaign,” Paxton said. “Tonight is the beginning of the fight to preserve every value we hold dear. The future of Texas and the future of America is on the line. And I intend to do everything I can to expand our movement.”
While Paxton spent ample time in his victory speech taking shots at Talarico, he also nodded at his vision if he’s elected, pledging to support Trump’s agenda, pass the SAVE America Act and continue his populist streak by taking on large industries, including “Big Food,” “Big Pharma” and tech companies.
“I'm not just running against the Democrats — I'm running to deliver to you, just as I have as attorney general,” Paxton said. “I'm running to lower your cost of living, because you deserve to be able to buy a home, afford groceries, and have a high quality of healthcare without being forced to stay up at night worried about” paying for it.
Club for Growth, a deep-pocketed GOP group, endorsed Paxton as the first results trickled in Tuesday night, accompanying it with a two-minute ad bashing Talarico.
“Ken Paxton has consistently stood up against Democrats and the establishment in Austin to defend the rule of law and freedoms for every Texan,” said Club for Growth PAC President David McIntosh. “Meanwhile, James Talarico has spent his career promoting woke gender ideology, fighting against meat consumption, and opposing the values Texans cherish.”
While Cornyn will not be on the ballot in November, he’ll continue to serve in the Senate through early January. He will return next week to a Republican conference at odds with the White House over ballroom funding and the Department of Justice’s $1.8 billion anti-weaponization fund. Trump’s Paxton endorsement, which went over like a lead balloon in the upper chamber, recently heightened the tension.
Retiring senators and those running for reelection in swing states have hamstrung some of Trump’s priorities in recent months. On his podcast last week, Cruz speculated that Cornyn might join the renegade caucus.
“If Cornyn loses, I can imagine he's going to be pissed as well,” Cruz said. “If you've got a three-vote majority, and you have four or five [GOP] senators who are pissed at the president, that ain't easy."
After a year of bitter infighting, the party will need to come together to defeat Talarico — and Paxton will need to attract Cornyn voters, some of whom have indicated in polling that they’d sit out the contest or even vote for Talarico if Paxton is the nominee.
Texas Republicans said in interviews that they expect the party will be able to unite over their opposition to the Austin Democrat in time for the general election.
“It’s a bruising primary, it’s a bruising runoff,” Rep. Jake Ellzey, R-Midlothian, said in an interview in mid-May. “There’s going to be some hard feelings for awhile, and then we got four months to get it back together. Texans generally do rally around in a very strong way once it’s over.”
But even with the runoff over, the ugliness of it — including the tens of millions the Cornyn camp spent attacking Paxton — could resonate into the fall.
“The fact that John Cornyn will have spent tens of millions of dollars on his own, plus tens of millions of dollars from outside groups, questioning the morality and the ethics of Ken Paxton is a huge down payment on the Democrats' November campaigns,” said Josh Blank, the research director of the Texas Politics Project.
Talarico has exponentially outraised Paxton, creating an open question about whether Republican money — much of which was behind Cornyn — will come through for the attorney general.
MAGA Inc., the main Trump-aligned super PAC which is sitting on a nearly $350 million war chest, could be tapped to fill the fundraising gap.
After Trump’s endorsement came down last week, Paxton began pivoting to the general election, asking a crowd in Katy what nickname he should call Talarico. General election polling has shown a tight contest between the two, with Talarico ahead in numerous surveys.
On Tuesday night, he went after Talarico for a variety of past statements on social issues.
“No matter what he says, or how much he raises, the reality is that James Talarico is going to be nothing more than a Texas-based puppet for Chuck Schumer and the national Democrats,” Paxton said.
Talarico’s message throughout the campaign has urged voters to reject a corrupt political system that he says benefits corporations and the ultra-wealthy — a message that dovetails somewhat with Cornyn’s attacks on Paxton’s rising net worth while in office.
In a video, Talarico began sharpening the lines of attack he’ll use for the next five months, bringing Paxton’s past into his anti-corruption message for the first time in earnest.
“The most corrupt politician in America just became the Republican nominee for the United States Senate,” Talarico said. “Three years ago, Ken Paxton was impeached by his own party for using his public office to enrich himself and his donors at the expense of the people. That kind of corruption is the rot at the core of this broken system.”
But in an interview on Fox last week, Paxton noted that he had won three general elections before and said he planned to ensure Talarico is thoroughly scrutinized for the electorate. The Austin Democrat’s politics, especially his social views, are far outside the norm for Texas, Paxton argued, adding, “Once Talarico’s been vetted, I am convinced that Texans will reject what he’s pushing.”
— Kayla Guo and Alejandra Martinez contributed to this report.
This article first appeared on The Texas Tribune.