This Texas Republican congressman endorses Paxton over Cornyn in Senate main brawl

[ad_1] FIRST ON FOX - Republican Rep. Lance Gooden of Texas is taking sides within the Lone Star State's burgeoning GOP Senate main battle between longtime Sen. John Cornyn and state Legal professional Common Ken Paxton.

Gooden, a four-term lawmaker who represents a congressional district which incorporates elements of japanese Dallas in addition to giant swaths of suburban, exurban, and rural areas east of the town, endorsed Paxton on Thursday. He is named a MAGA firebrand and ally of President Donald Trump.

"Legal professional Common Paxton is the conservative champion we want within the U.S. Senate," Gooden wrote in an announcement shared first with Fox Information.

He predicted that Paxton "will take a sledgehammer to the institution, safe the border, and struggle onerous for President Trump’s agenda. Ken Paxton has my full and whole endorsement."

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Rep. Lance Gooden endorsed Texas Legal professional Common Ken Paxton within the 2026 U.S. Senate race in Texas. Paxton is main difficult longtime GOP Sen. John Cornyn. (Invoice Clark/CQ-Roll Name, Inc through Getty Photos)

Gooden, who's a member of the Home Armed Companies and Judiciary committees, is the second member of the Texas congressional delegation to again Paxton, following Republican Rep. Troy Nehls, who endorsed the lawyer basic on Wednesday.

As he gears up for what is going to most actually be his roughest re-election of his decades-long profession, Cornyn has the backing of the highest Republican within the Senate, Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota, in addition to the Nationwide Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC).

And Republican sources confirmed to Fox Information that Thune, in addition to Sen. Tim Scott, R–S.C., the NRSC chair, have personally requested Trump to again Cornyn.

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The president's grip on the GOP is stronger than ever and any endorsement Trump might make within the rising Republican Senate main in Texas could be extraordinarily influential.

Paxton introduced his candidacy Tuesday night time in an look on Fox Information' "The Ingraham Angle."

"It is time for a change in Texas," Paxton, who first gained election as state lawyer basic in 2014, stated as he launched his marketing campaign.

Legal professional Common Ken Paxton speaks at an occasion exterior the Texas Statehouse, on Feb. 28, 2022, in Austin. (Fox Information - Paul Steinhauser)

And pointing to conservative Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, Paxton argued that "it is time that we've got one other nice senator that may really arise and struggle for Republican values, struggle for the values of the folks of Texas and in addition help Donald Trump within the areas that he is targeted on in a really vital manner."

Paxton has flirted for a few years with launching a 2026 main problem in opposition to Cornyn, a former state senator, former Texas Supreme Court docket justice, and former state lawyer basic, who first gained election to the U.S. Senate in 2002.

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Paxton has lengthy claimed Cornyn doesn't symbolize the conservative values of Texans , and has accused the senator of not being an ally of Trump. He has additionally usually labeled Cornyn a "RINO," a "Republican in title solely" – an insult MAGA and "America First" Republicans have usually used to criticize extra mainstream or institution members of the GOP.

Cornyn, in the course of the early phases of the 2024 Republican presidential nomination race, had stated he would favor that the GOP take a brand new route, which angered Trump. However the senator endorsed Trump in late January of final yr, after the then-former president gained each the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire main, the primary two contests within the Republican presidential nomination calendar.

Sen. John Cornyn speaks throughout a Senate Finance Committee listening to, on Capitol Hill, March 14, 2025. (AP Picture/Ben Curtis)

Since Trump returned to the White Home three months in the past, Cornyn has been supportive of the president's Cupboard nominees and agenda.

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Within the senator's marketing campaign launch video final month, the announcer highlighted that in Trump's first time period in workplace, "Texas Sen. John Cornyn had his again."

And Cornyn instructed reporters on Capitol Hill on Wednesday that he had "a 92% voting file with President Trump."

"It is unclear to me precisely what's motivating Mr. Paxton, aside from vainness and private ambition, actually it isn't going to make quite a lot of distinction by way of the voting file, as a result of I have been a supporter of President Trump and his agenda," the senator argued.

Paxton grabbed nationwide consideration in 2020 for submitting the unsuccessful Texas vs. Pennsylvania case within the Supreme Court docket that attempted to overturn former President Joe Biden’s razor-thin win over Trump within the Keystone State, and for talking on the Trump rally close to the White Home that instantly preceded the lethal Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol by right-wing extremists aiming to disrupt congressional certification of Biden’s Electoral Faculty victory.

Throughout Biden's 4 years within the White Home, Paxton took the administration to court docket quite a few occasions.

Whereas Paxton, who's in his third four-year time period as Texas lawyer basic, has lengthy been a authorized warrior within the MAGA motion, he additionally has loads of private political baggage.

<source media="(min-width: 768px) and (max-width: 1023px)" srcset="https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2025/04/672/378/ken-paxton-primary-night-mckinney-tx-march-1-2022-scaled.jpg?ve=1&tl=1, https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2025/04/1344/756/ken-paxton-primary-night-mckinney-tx-march-1-2022-scaled.jpg?ve=1&tl=1 2x" height="378" width="672"><source media="(min-width: 1024px) and (max-width: 1279px)" srcset="https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2025/04/931/523/ken-paxton-primary-night-mckinney-tx-march-1-2022-scaled.jpg?ve=1&tl=1, https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2025/04/1862/1046/ken-paxton-primary-night-mckinney-tx-march-1-2022-scaled.jpg?ve=1&tl=1 2x" height="523" width="931"> Republican Legal professional Common Ken Paxton at his main night time celebration, on March 1, 2022, in McKinney, Texas. (Fox Information - Paul Steinhauser)

Paxton was indicted on securities fraud expenses quickly after taking workplace in 2015, and in addition got here underneath investigation by the FBI over bribery and corruption allegations from former prime staffers. In 2022, he survived a bruising main amid his many authorized difficulties.

In 2023, Paxton was impeached by the Texas Home of Representatives, however he was later acquitted of all expenses by the state Senate.

The fees within the long-running federal corruption probe have been dropped in the course of the remaining weeks of the Biden administration.

Whereas Paxton for years has denied any wrongdoing and has survived his authorized fights, he would seemingly proceed to face robust optics and loads of incoming fireplace over his previous predicaments throughout a Senate showdown.

"Paxton has a checkered background. He's a con man and a fraud and I feel the folks of Texas know that," Cornyn charged on Wednesday.

And the senator added: "That is what will likely be litigated in the course of the course of this marketing campaign."

Matt Mackowiak, a veteran Republican strategist and communications marketing consultant based mostly in Texas and Washington, D.C., pointed to the bruising intra-party battle forward as he instructed Fox Information that "that is going to be the most costly, nastiest, most aggressive, most private U.S. Senate main in Texas historical past."

"You could have two candidates who're going to lift vital funds, who're in vital positions, who don't like one another and haven't preferred one another, whose groups don't like one another and the stakes couldn't be greater," Mackowiak stated.

GOP Rep. Wesley Hunt of Texas headlines the opening of the primary Trump marketing campaign workplace in Pennsylvania, on June 4, 2024, in Philadelphia. (Fox Information - Paul Steinhauser)

Probably complicating the first battle is a attainable Senate bid by conservative Rep. Wesley Hunt, who represents a Houston-area district.

The third-term 43-year-old Texas Republican and rising MAGA star has made his case to the president's political group, sources affirm to Fox Information. Hunt's argument is that he is the one one who can win each a GOP main and a basic election, a supply accustomed to the discussions confirmed to Fox Information.

An outdoor group supportive of Hunt is at present spending seven figures to run advertisements throughout the Lone Star State to extend the lawmaker's title recognition.

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The eventual winner of subsequent yr's GOP main will likely be thought-about the favourite within the basic election in opposition to whomever the Democrats nominate.

Former Democratic Rep. Colin Allred has stated he'll determine by this summer time if he'll mount a 2026 Senate marketing campaign.

Allred, a former Baylor College soccer participant and NFL linebacker who later represented Texas' thirty second Congressional District (which incorporates elements of Dallas and surrounding suburbs), was final yr's Democratic challenger within the race in opposition to Cruz.