Paxton Touts Plan to Give All Missing Dems
Boot from House in Ad Abbott May Not Like

Capitol Inside
August 8, 2025

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton ran the risk of offending Governor Greg Abbott again on Friday when he released a digital ad that makes it look like he's fighting harder than the state's top leader to scare state House Democrats into ending a walkout on a congressional map and returning to Austin to watch it pass.

Paxton, who's challenging U.S. Senator John Cornyn in the GOP primary election in the race at the top of the Texas ticket in 2026, served up the advertisement the day after the incumbent scored a publicity bonanza when the FBI joined a multi-state manhunt for missing House Democrats at his request.

Paxton's 1:40 minute spot features an array of media personalities and three House Republicans gushing with praise for the state attorney general's position on the Democrats and his leadership in general.

The commercial shows commentator Chris Salcedo plugging Paxton in one frame with a news ticker item at the bottom of the screen on Abbott's attempt to have the House Democratic Caucus chairman removed from the House as retaliation for a major role he had in the quorum-crashing bolt by Democrats to stall a vote on the GOP redistricting bill.

""Ken Paxton, he's targeting all of them," Salcedo says in the Paxton advertisement.

Abbott struck first this week when he filed a petition to have the Texas Supreme Court rule that State Rep. Gene Wu of Houston forfeited the House District 137 seat when he was left the state with 53 Democratic colleagues who've been blocking a vote on the map all week. The Supreme Court has been a rubber-stamp for the governor who appointed several of its current members. The court gave Wu a deadline of 5 p.m. on Friday to respond to Abbott's allegations and unprecedented attempt to have nine Republican justices overrule the voters of HD 137 and give Wu the boot.

Paxton moved swiftly to one-up the governor when he would try to get the high court to declare that the Democrats who haven't returned by this afternoon vacated their seats by failing to report to the Legislature's lower chamber several days in a row since they left the state on Sunday.

The Republicans would apparently only need to have 65 members on the floor to achieve a quorum if the the Texas Supreme Court slashed 53 seats from the House roster. But Paxton appeared to soften the hard-line position in an interview that's featured in the ad when he implies that he won't be going after all of the Democrats who walked out on the Republicans map that was crafted to give the GOP five more seats in the U.S. House.

"If they don't show up by Friday ... we will attempt to remove some of these legislators from office," Paxton says in the ad.

Abbott, who served as AG before a promotion to governor in 2014, declined to criticize Paxton when he sought to upstage the governor on targeting Democrats for ousters from office in the judiciary. Abbott moved swiftly with a letter to the high court in an attempt to argue that he has the legal authority to seek the removal of legislators after Paxton contended that he has exclusive jurisdiction for such a move.

The new ad shows a picture of the governor at the same time it notes that Paxton "is filing a lawsuit" to punish all of the AWOL Democrats instead of singling out only one like Abbott has done up to now. The advertisement also notes that Paxton launched an investigation on Thursday into a group that's led by Texas Democrat Beto O'Rourke for allegedly funding the walkout that's had Democratic lawmakers holing up in Chicago, New York and Boston this week. Abbott claimed in a post on X on Thursday night that Texas House Democrats had flown to California instead of heading home immediately like he's demanded with no sign of success so far.

Rookie Republican State Rep. Mitch Little of Lewisville suggested that Paxton's position on the Democrats is par for the course in the AG's political career that's included stints in the Texas House and Senate. "Attorney General Ken Paxton has been facing down the democrats for his entire tenure," Little tells CNN in a scene in the new commercial.

Freshman State Rep. Nate Schatzline of Fort Worth gives Paxton the kind of review the Republicans here would normally reserve for President Donald Trump - the sole instigator of the redistricting showdown that has no end in sight barring the Democrats' unexpected return to the House when it meets at 1 p.m. today.

"We've got Attorney General Ken Paxton, who's just a hero to the state of Texas and to America," Schatzline says in a television interview that's featured in the new ad.

more to come ...

 

 
 
 

 

 

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