The News
President Donald Trump could end the Texas Republican Senate primary at any moment, and the party’s top lawmakers are loudly encouraging him to back John Cornyn.
Republican leaders are sweating the prospect of 12 weeks of brutal intraparty attacks in a runoff between the incumbent Cornyn and state attorney general Ken Paxton. Trump said Wednesday that he will soon move to end the drama — without hinting which way he will come down.
The stakes are huge because Texas Democrats nominated state Rep. James Talarico over Rep. Jasmine Crockett, setting up a potential Paxton-Talarico race that Republicans worry could cost them what’s been a red Senate seat for more than three decades. Some even speculate that a Talarico victory this fall could make it that much harder to hang onto the Senate.
If it’s Talarico vs. Paxton, it “becomes more expensive, and it’s at-risk,” said Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., a former chairman of the party’s campaign arm. “I’ve chatted with some significant donors that have great pause getting behind Ken Paxton. These are strong Republicans.”
As such, Republicans are pulling out all the stops to try to get Trump to push Paxton out of the way. Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Majority Whip John Barrasso both reiterated Wednesday that Cornyn is the better choice for a general election and urged Trump to endorse him.
Trump’s ambivalence in a three-way primary made sense to Republicans: Alienating Rep. Wesley Hunt, R-Texas, could have hurt the fragile House majority and created different headaches. But now — with hundreds of millions of dollars and control of the Senate hanging in the balance — there are “a lot of friends and advisers of the president that are making that case for Sen. Cornyn,” Daines said.
GOP leaders believe Trump could be convinced to back Cornyn with a pragmatic argument. Cornyn questioned Trump’s electability in the past but has since said he was wrong. Paxton has far more baggage: He’s been indicted as well as impeached by his statehouse; his wife filed for divorce “on biblical grounds.”
“John Cornyn makes the general election much easier,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. Paxton “has more problems. You can see it in the polling. He has more exposure.”
Two top Trump advisers are involved in Cornyn’s campaign, with pollster Tony Fabrizio working for the Texas senator and former campaign adviser Chris LaCivita working for a pro-Cornyn super PAC that has dropped more than $20 million on Paxton. LaCivita said there’s more coming and that “the second wave is going to be a bitch.”
Cornyn is “positioned to win the runoff. And if the president endorses early, it saves everybody a lot of money, and 10 weeks of a spirited campaign on our side that keeps us from spending time focusing on the Democrats,” Thune said.
The ongoing primary is “not helpful, which is why the president could weigh in and it would be enormously helpful,” he added.
Cornyn narrowly leads Paxton in the first round of voting, a welcome surprise for Republicans who had seen him trailing Paxton in plenty of polls. Of course, that doesn’t guarantee a lead in the runoff; establishment favorite David Dewhurst lost to Ted Cruz in a 2012 runoff despite Dewhurst leading the first round of voting.
In this article:
Know More
When Republicans fret, Chuck Schumer is happy. And though Schumer hadn’t waded into the primary between Talarico and Crockett, it’s clear Talarico’s win has made his party more bullish about Texas.
“Talarico is a great candidate, and we can win Texas. It’s tough, but if anyone can do it, it’s him,” Schumer told Semafor. He called the results a “step forward in our quest to win the Senate.”
It’s rare for Republicans to agree with Schumer on anything. But they see something to worry about in the Democratic turnout numbers on Tuesday evening, which showed their opponents with well over 100,000 more total voters than Republicans.
“In spite of what I thought would be a heavyweight fight on the Republican side, the turnout was greater for Democrats than Republicans,” Barrasso said. “The energy and enthusiasm is there on the Democrat side. We need to nominate somebody who attracts voters all across the state of Texas, and that’s John Cornyn.”
The bitter nature of the primary will make it difficult to reconcile the fractured Texas GOP no matter who wins. Allies of Cornyn have dropped tens of millions hitting Paxton, and Cornyn dinged Paxton when he first started flirting with a challenge two years ago: “Hard to run from prison, Ken.”
Now Talarico has months to define himself as Paxton and Cornyn duke it out. Unless Trump can, as he vowed Wednesday, get whichever man he doesn’t pick to drop out “immediately.”
Room for Disagreement
Minutes before Trump’s social media post, Cruz told Semafor he would remain neutral and called both candidates “good friends.”
He said he understood the electability argument that leaders were making to Trump, but argued that both Cornyn and Paxton “have won the general repeatedly” and could “absolutely” beat Talarico in November.
“I trust the voters of Texas to make that decision,” Cruz said. “And that’s the same decision to-date President Trump has made, it’s the same decision Gov. Abbott’s made.”
Burgess’s view
Republicans’ battle for Senate control is getting more real as Trump’s approval ratings stay low, and Talarico puts more pressure on the GOP to nominate a candidate who can win.
Yes, Paxton has won general elections in the past, but Cornyn has at least some experience defeating a statewide candidate Democrats were hyping, in 2020’s MJ Hegar. Talarico will be an even tougher foe.
And if Trump for some reason endorses Paxton, it’s going to be a long eight months for his party.
Notable
- I reported last month that, inside the Senate Democratic caucus, there was a subtle but clear Talarico preference.