Trump Endorses Ken Paxton Over John Cornyn in Texas GOP Senate Runoff

Texas voters are set to decide a Republican U.S. Senate runoff on Tuesday between incumbent Sen. John Cornyn and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, after a bitter campaign that included President Trump’s endorsement of Paxton over Cornyn.

“Texas voters head to the polls on Tuesday for the Republican runoff in the U”

Al Jazeera

As of Sunday afternoon, Kalshi put Paxton’s chance of winning the runoff at 95.6 percent, while Cornyn had a 4.4 percent chance, and the prediction market had shown Paxton at 63.7 percent on Monday morning.

Al Jazeera

The Hill reported that Trump said Paxton was a “true MAGA warrior,” while Cornyn was “not supportive of me when times were tough,” and it said Paxton filed litigation supporting the president’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

CBS News said Cornyn told supporters, “I refuse to lose and I'm going to fight to win this,” as the runoff campaign entered its final stretch with Cornyn arguing “character is on the ballot.”

Early voting ended Friday across Texas, and The Dallas News described a divided turnout map that raised a question of whether Cornyn’s strength in major metro areas could offset Paxton’s dominance in smaller conservative counties.

Based on a near-final count from the secretary of state’s office, The Dallas News said about 820,000 Texans cast Republican ballots by mail and in person versus 1.3 million in the primary, with the runoff featuring only a five-day early voting window and no weekend voting.

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The Dallas News reported that in Dallas County, where Cornyn beat Paxton by 18 percentage points in March, 45,974 Republicans voted early in the runoff compared with 64,948 in the March primary, while in Travis County Cornyn kept nearly 80% of its GOP early vote from the primary.

In Austin, KXAN Austin said the Texas Secretary of State’s office reported over 575,000 Republican ballots had been cast across the Lone Star State an hour-and-a-half before polls closed at 7 p.m. central, and it contrasted that with nearly 1.343 million votes cast in the first round’s two-week early voting window.

The Texas Tribune framed the runoff as the biggest test of whether Texas Republican voters will support an “elder statesman” like Cornyn over a “MAGA warrior,” in Trump’s words, and it said the winner will advance to face Democratic nominee James Talarico in November.

“At a campaign barbecue in The Colony one week ago, Senator John Cornyn brought the heat against runoff rival Ken Paxton”

CBS News

It reported that the March 3 primary ended with Cornyn finishing first at 42% to Paxton’s 40.5%, and it said U.S. Rep. Wesley Hunt pulled 13.5% of the vote, sending Cornyn and Paxton to an overtime round.

Al Jazeera said the winner will face Democrat James Talarico, and it described Trump’s endorsement as coming after Cornyn was “not supportive of him when times were tough,” while also saying Paxton is considered less likely to fare well against Talarico in the general election.

Al Jazeera also quoted a Texas Republican state representative, Matt Shaheen, warning that Paxton could be “the Democrats' best path to turning Texas blue,” tying the runoff outcome to the possibility of a historic Democrat win and a shift in Senate control.