Cogito Ergo Non Serviam
Texas Senate Acquits Attorney-General Paxton
Ken Paxton, the Attorney-General of the State of Texas, was impeached by the state House of Representatives a while ago. The charges covered about 20 specific claims, and the witness list was around 100. At issue was bribery and abuse of power. Over the weekend, the state senate held his trial and acquitted him. The state senate has 31 members, and 21 votes were required to convict him. The vote was 17 to 13 to acquit. Two Republicans joined all the Democrats in voting to oust him. There was one senator who did not vote; Mrs. Paxton was recused from voting on the charges. The political story here is done, but there are still legal problems ahead for Mr. Paxton.
The Associated Press reported, "The impeachment charges centered on allegations that Paxton improperly used the powers of his office to protect Austin real estate developer Nate Paul, who was indicted in June on federal charges of making false statements to banks .. . .
"I witnessed Attorney General Ken Paxton do brazen things on behalf of Nate Paul. He abused the entire office of the attorney general of Texas to benefit Nate Paul," former Deputy Attorney General Blake Brickman said, "and it got worse and worse and worse."
Mr. Paxton and his allies made it clear that they would take revenge on any senator who voted to convict. The trial has also opened up the rifts within the Texas GOP to public view. The fact is that not all Republican Texan are hard right yahoos. The Bush family is alive and well in influencing the partyand the state. That offends the Trumpist faction. This is almost inevitable when a governing party has a majority that borders on super-majority status. The intra-party politics become the driving force.
"Today the campaign to completely rid Texas of RINOs [Republicans in Name Only] begins," Jonathan Stickland, the leader of Defend Texas Liberty, a strongly pro-Paxton group that lobbied hard for his acquittal, said on X. “Those behind this sham Ken Paxton impeachment must be held accountable," he said.
Purges tend to get messy, and they tend to get out of hand. One anticipates a great deal of horse-trading, back-scratching and threat unveiling between now and the March primaries. The GOP senators who voted to convict all certainly face primary challengers, but they may well prevail. In Georgia, leading politicians who refused to let Donald Trump steal their state\'s electoral votes were primaried. They carried the day in landslides. Mr. Paxton and Co. should be careful.
Mr. Paxton won his political trial, but the criminal charges he faces and could face in the future will not be so easy to overcome. ABC News reported, "In 2015, Paxton was indicted on charges of defrauding investors in a Dallas-area tech startup by not disclosing he was being paid by the company, called Servergy, to recruit them. He faces five to 99 years in prison if convicted and has pleaded not guilty."
Also, the network observed, "In 2020, Paxton asked the U.S. Supreme Court to, effectively, overturn then-President Donald Trump\'s electoral defeat by Joe Biden based on bogus claims of fraud. The high court threw out the request.
"Afterward, the State Bar of Texas received a series of complaints alleging that Paxton and a deputy had committed professional misconduct with the suit. The bar didn\'t initially take up the complaints but later launched an investigation."
\One expects Mr. Paxton to lose his law license and his freedom before this is over. The evidence is overwhelming. And that will bode ill for the state GOP. Having acquitted him on these charges, the party is going to look even more corrupt and foolish when he is jailed.
\There is a reason people in Colorado tell Texan jokes.
© Copyright 2023 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.
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