Speaking to Republican Party members in Denton County Monday night, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a longtime ally of President Donald Trump, listed several Republicans he plans to purge from the Texas GOP for being insufficiently conservative.
Among those on Paxton's list was Texas' senior U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, one of the most powerful members of the Senate GOP.
The crowd erupted into loud applause as Paxton said, "The second thing we need to do, and I might play a role in this, is replace John Cornyn in the U.S. Senate."
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The attorney general, who worked with the Trump team to file a lawsuit in December that successfully secured a court order stopping the Biden administration from continuing sales of border wall materials, has long hinted at a potential run to replace Cornyn.
"I can't think of a single thing he's accomplished for our state or even for the country," Paxton said in a September 2023 interview on the Fox News Channel. And pointing to a possible Senate run in 2026, Paxton said, "Somebody needs to step up and run against this guy," adding, "everything's on the table for me."
In an interview with Fox News Digital, Paxton gave more credence to the rumors, saying despite "loving what I'm doing … I'm looking potentially at the U.S. Senate."
He shared that he is in talks with groups in Texas about a possible 2026 Senate run and will likely decide in the "next couple of months."
Paxton claimed Cornyn does not represent the conservative values of Texans and accused him of not being an ally of Trump.
He has also regularly labeled Cornyn a "RINO," a "Republican in name only" and an insult MAGA and "America First" Republicans have regularly used to criticize more mainstream or establishment members of the GOP.
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Another source close to Paxton told Fox News Digital the attorney general "plans to spend the next few months meeting with voters, donors and grassroots activists across the state to gauge interest and decide how he can serve Texas best."
The attorney general has faced his own set of challenges. In 2022, he defeated a primary effort by former Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush amid charges of bribery and corruption. In 2023, the Texas House of Representatives voted to impeach Paxton, but he was eventually acquitted of all charges by the state senate.
For his part, Cornyn, who has served in the Senate since 2002, has no intention of leaving the Senate. After serving in key GOP leadership positions, including chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, from 2009-2013, and Senate majority whip, from 2015-2019, he threw his hat in the ring to become the Senate majority leader in 2024, though he ultimately lost to South Dakota Sen. John Thune.
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Cornyn, meanwhile, has said he will "absolutely" run again in 2026.
In recent months, he has also been a vocal supporter of Trump's Cabinet picks and has slammed Democrats for delaying confirmations for key positions. In a speech on the Senate floor earlier this month, he said, "Our first and most urgent task is to confirm President Trump's nominees for his Cabinet."
With both considered leading Republicans and both holding significant support, any potential primary race between the two in the Lone Star State promises to be a dramatic - perhaps messy - showdown.
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One of the primary questions that remains is whether the president would support his longtime ally Paxton or if he would, in the interest of preserving party unity, support a GOP establishment that has previously been criticized as "weak" and "ineffective."
"The big question is whether Trump would support Paxton over Cornyn in a primary challenge," Matt Mackowiak, a veteran Republican strategist and communications consultant based in Texas and Washington, D.C., told Fox News Digital.
"Cornyn's never lost a race. Cornyn has a lot of support around the state. He's traveled all corners of the state for a long time and is very well known and very well liked," said Mackowiak. "We haven't had a Republican senator lose a primary since Richard Lugar in 2004.
"As much as people sometimes think it's doable, think it's easy, think it's inevitable, it really just doesn't happen. But I'm not saying it can't happen. I'm not saying that Paxton can't win. I think he certainly has a decent chance."
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Mackowiak added that if Paxton runs, it "would be a massive race with national consequences."
"You'd have national activists and money involved on both sides," he said. "It could end up being one of the biggest primaries of the cycle and probably the most significant statewide primary in Texas since Dewhurst-Cruz [when former Texas Solicitor General Ted Cruz defeated Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst for the GOP Senate nomination in 2012 en route to winning his first U.S. Senate election] or it may not materialize at all. And I think it's going to be several months before we know."
