The barely concealed contempt held for months by leading Texas Republicans exploded into public view this week when the attorney general, Ken Paxton, who is under indictment, accused the speaker of the Texas House of doing of his duties while drunk and called for the speaker’s resignation. .
Tuesday’s move sent a shockwave through Austin. Then, less than an hour later, word came that Mr. Paxton may have a personal motive for attacking the speaker, Dade Phelan: A House committee subpoenaed records from Mr. Paxton, as part of an inquiry at the request of the attorney general. for $3.3 million in state money to settle corruption allegations brought against him by his own former high-ranking aides.
The Republican-controlled House panel – the Committee on General Investigating – met on Wednesday and heard three hours of detailed public testimony from its investigators who found that Mr. Paxton may have committed crimes, including felonies, as he abused and misused his office to help a real estate developer and donor, and retaliated against those in his office who spoke against him.
The lewd accusations are reminiscent of an earlier era of bad behavior and political posturing at the State Capitol. But the tangled web of resentments and finger-pointing also underscores a simpler and more fundamental reality of Texas politics: Even though they have total control of the Legislature and every statewide office, the Republicans do not always agree on what to do with their power.
The investigators – who include former prosecutors, and a former US attorney in the Trump administration who is the son of Dan Patrick, the Texas lieutenant governor – outlined the evidence they collected against Mr. Paxton. When they met, the attorney general suggested on Twitter that he believed the Texas House was preparing a case to impeach him.
“It’s no surprise that a committee appointed by liberal Speaker Dade Phelan would seek to disenfranchise Texas voters and sabotage my work as attorney general,” Mr. .Phelan aligned with the Democrats.
Mr. Paxton did not specifically mention impeachment, but his comment about disenfranchising voters appeared to be a reference to a possible outcome of the committee’s investigation.
Internal dissent broke out in dramatic fashion on Tuesday.
“It is with deep disappointment that I call on Speaker Dade Phelan to resign at the end of this legislative session,” Mr. Paxton said in a statement Tuesday. “Texans were dismayed to witness his performance presiding over the Texas House in an apparently debilitating state of intoxication.”
mr. Paxton puts a picture in a letter he sent on Tuesday asking the general investigative committee to look into possible violations.
As the committee prepared to hold its meeting on Mr. Paxton’s case on Tuesday the attorney general made his indictment against Mr. Phelan, 47. He did so based on a video circulating online from a night that session of the Texas House on Friday. At about the 5 hour 29 minute mark in an official House video, Mr. Phelan showed his words as he spoke.
Several people inside the House chamber on Friday said they did not notice any behavioral issues with Mr. Phelan, even though his speech appeared slurred in one section of the video, which ended in an overdub. in 12 hours of hearings and votes. Mr. Phelan presided over that day.
Representative Jarvis Johnson, a Houston Democrat, addressed the House after the moment shown in the clip. He said on Wednesday that he had noticed nothing unusual about Mr. Phelan.
Mr. Phelan did not directly respond to the accusations of Mr. Paxton. Still, they underscored the degree to which his leadership in the Texas House has angered far-right lawmakers and conservative activists, a wing of the Texas Republican Party that has long been allied with Mr. Paxton. They complain that Mr. Phelan has blocked or undermined their priorities – on border law enforcement, public money for private school vouchers or showing the Ten Commandments in public schools.
The Texas House has often acted as a relatively moderate Republican bastion against the party’s most conservative right-wing instincts, to the bewilderment of some in Austin and the relief of others.
The investigation into Mr. Paxton added an unusual element to the usual feud.
Although the broad outline of the allegations presented to the committee on Wednesday was not new, the hearing was the first extensive examination of Mr. Paxton in the Republican-dominated Legislature. And it provides new details and context to Mr. Paxton’s efforts to help an Austin developer, Nate Paul, who gave Mr. Paxton a $25,000 contribution in 2018.
Investigators said Mr. Paxton also had an affair with a woman who worked in Mr. Paxton’s office. Paul, and that Mr. Paxton will punish or isolate employees who confront him about his actions.
Mark Donnelly, a former prosecutor in the Harris County District Attorney’s Office, said that those who provided information to investigators were often “good harvesters on their farms who were upset by the behavior of Mr. Paxton.”
“The feeling is shared, almost universally,” Mr. Donnelly said, “that the actions they are being asked to take, the positions they are taking, the decisions being made by the attorney general, are damaging the office and damaging their interests. commitment to their careers.”
As the committee’s meeting ended on Wednesday, the hushed discussion in the hallways of the Capitol, among lobbyists and lawmakers, began to focus on whether the events could turn into something more consequential – the removal of Mr. Paxton – and what is political. The consequences of such a move for different camps of Republicans. Few want to quote for fear of getting on the wrong side of a very unresolved situation.
The situation has an odd feel even to longtime observers of Texas politics and its scandals.
“I would say this is as damaging and important a scandal as we’ve seen in the history of Texas politics,” said Brandon Rottinghaus, a political science professor at the University of Houston who is working on a book on political scandals in Texas. Texas. “Not just because of what happened, but because of how long it went on and how Paxton survived it.”
The controversy over whether Mr. Phelan was drunk was “relatively mild” compared to the allegations against Mr. Paxton, he added. “We have people bilking veterans out of money, we have unreported large amounts of money being transferred,” said Mr. Rottinghaus about past state scandals. “We have a very bad history in Texas.”
Most of the information and accusations against Mr. Paxton has been known for years in Texas, including an extramarital affair and actions taken to benefit Mr. Paul, who also conducted floor-to-ceiling renovations at Mr. Paxton. Despite the cloud of scandal, and an indictment in state court for securities fraud dating back to 2015, Mr. Paxton won re-election to a third term last year, largely by aligning himself with President Donald J. Trump and his supporters.
A spokesman for Mr. Phelan did not immediately respond to questions about whether the committee had laid the groundwork for Mr. Phelan’s impeachment. Paxton.
On Tuesday, he said in a statement that it was recent moves in the investigation, which began earlier in the legislative session, that prompted the indictment of Mr. Paxton – specifically, new subpoenas to the office. of the attorney general and a letter to Mr. Paxton. ordered him to preserve documents on what the committee called “Matter A.”
“The committee is conducting a thorough review of the events tied to the firing of the whistle blowers, in addition to the alleged illegal conduct of Ken Paxton,” the spokeswoman, Cait Wittman, said Tuesday. “Committee minutes show that subpoenas were issued. Mr. Paxton’s statement today is little more than a last-ditch effort to save face.”
Four of the top aides of Mr. Paxton brought up concerns about his activities with the FBI and the Texas Rangers. All four were fired.
The assistants – Ryan Vassar, Mark Penley, James Blake Brickman and David Maxwell – are all former deputy attorneys general, and Mr. Maxwell is a former director of the office’s law enforcement division. They told the investigators that Mr. Paxton may have committed crimes including bribery and abuse of office. They also sued Mr. Paxton; the case is pending.
Mr. Paxton asked the state to pay $3.3 million to settle the lawsuit. Mr. Phelan said he did not believe there would be House votes needed to approve the payment; He also said that he did not support himself to do so.
“I don’t think it’s the right use of taxpayer dollars,” Mr. Phelan said in a television interview in February.
Several Republican lawmakers reached for comment Tuesday declined to discuss the subject of Mr. Paxton’s accusations. Representative Chris Turner, a Democrat from the Dallas area, said that because of the accusations against Mr. Paxton, the attorney general is the “last person” who should be calling “on anybody to resign.”
“This is a man who is under a lot of accusations, under an FBI investigation, trying to overturn a presidential election,” he said. “So Ken Paxton should mind his own business.”
