MAGA-friendly Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is reportedly contemplating challenging incumbent establishment Republican Senator John Cornyn in the 2026 Republican primary.
Social media posts show significant support for Paxton among conservative activists and influencers, suggesting a potential shift towards more MAGA-friendly politics within the Texas GOP. Cornyn, a four-term member of the Senate, represents the old “go along, get along” Republican establishment, while Paxton has been a steadfast supporter of the Donald Trump MAGA agenda.
And the buzz around Paxton is not just internet hype.
Gromer Jeffers, Jr. writing for the Dallas Morning News explained the two politicians, titans in Texas Republican politics, have been circling each other for more than a year, setting up a potential clash that would test the power of Paxton’s appeal to MAGA conservative populists and Cornyn’s strength as a well-funded incumbent and prolific vote-getter.
The biggest wild card, observed Mr. Jeffers, could involve the influence of President-elect Donald Trump, who endorsed Paxton in prior elections, criticized last year’s impeachment proceedings and praised Paxton as a patriot fighting “Radical Left Democrats.”
Paxton has had Trump’s back as well, filing legal briefs in support of Trump policies under attack by Democratic states during his first White House term and asking the U.S. Supreme Court to examine Trump’s claims of election irregularities in four states in the 2020 election.
Mr. Jeffers reported when Cornyn announced he would run to replace Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell as Republican leader of the Senate, Paxton lashed out in a post on X, saying, “Republicans deserve better in their next leader and Texans deserve another conservative senator.”
Paxton added that Cornyn would have a tough time being “an effective leader since he is anti-Trump, anti-gun, and will be focused on his highly competitive primary campaign in 2026.”
If he runs for re-election Cornyn would not be a shoo-in, as Mr. Jeffers reported:
At various points in his career, Cornyn has been booed at state GOP conventions, where the party’s most strident activists are the most vocal. In 2022, delegates at the Houston convention booed him because of his role in a bipartisan Senate compromise on gun safety. At this year’s convention, Cornyn didn’t address the general session but mingled with delegates at the convention center and dropped in on some caucus meetings.
Paxton, an incumbent statewide office holder and hero to grassroots Republicans for filing 100 lawsuits challenging Biden administration policies, would be a formidable challenger.
The dynamic of Cornyn as the establishment candidate versus the Trump MAGA agenda was thrown into sharp focus by the recent Senate leadership election.
Cornyn, who was vying with Senators Rick Scott and John Thune for Senate Majority Leader failed to get the support of fellow Texan Ted Cruz.
The Autin American-Statesman reported Cruz posted his support for Scott, who, though he didn't receive a formal endorsement from President-elect Donald Trump, had the backing from some of Trump's most prominent allies, including Tucker Carlson, Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy.
"I’ll be voting for Rick Scott for GOP Leader, as I did two years ago," Cruz posted on the social media platform X a few hours before the vote. "In 2022, I helped lead the charge for Rick against McConnell & I’m proud to stand with him again."
Senator John Cornyn, who was then the Senate Majority Whip, started his career as a fairly conservative Texas Republican and has steadily moved to the “center” as he rose through the insider ranks of the Senate Republican Conference. “I’ve evolved,” Senator Cornyn told CQ Roll Call reporters Humberto Sanchez and Niels Lesniewski in a wide-ranging 2015 interview.
“Evolved into what?” was our question then, and it remains so to this day.
Cornyn may have begun his career as a “fairly conservative” Texas Republican, but he’s evolved into a standard run-of-the-mill DC insider who is far outside the conservative mainstream on many issues, such as support for the Second Amendment and deportation of illegal aliens. We don’t know if Ken Paxton will get in the 2026 Texas GOP Senate Primary, but if he does, he would be at the top of our list as potential replacements for the worn out establishment insider John Cornyn.
2024 Election
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2026 Senate races
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