New polling shows impeachment drama points to a summer of sweating for Ken Paxton
AUSTIN — As the drama surrounding suspended Attorney General Ken Paxton moves to the Texas Senate court of impeachment, the court of public opinion appears to be lining up against him.
A new poll by the Texas Politics Project shows that fully one-half of Texans believe the House was correct in bringing the 20-count indictment while only 17% disagreed. Those numbers add to what is likely to be a very hot and sweaty summer for the three-term Republican who will remain in political and legal limbo until his Senate trial begins the day after Labor Day.
Paxton can take little solace in the poll numbers even if the Democratic and independent respondents were factored out. Just over 3 in 10 Republicans said impeachment was the right course. That's just a tick higher than the Republicans who thought impeachment was wrongheaded.
Nearly 40% of Republicans said they had no opinion on the matter.
The articles of impeachment approved by the House include two counts of constitutional bribery, two counts of obstruction of justice and numerous other allegations of wrongdoing by Paxton dating back several years.
The Senate will not consider articles related to his indictment on felony security fraud charges.
Paxton, both at a late May news conference before the House acted and then through the private lawyers he hired to defend him, insists he is innocent and that the charges can be chalked up to crass political maneuvering.
More: Infighting among top Texas Republicans looks bad, but will it bring lasting damage?
But his ability to sell that argument to voters who as recently as November reelected him by a solid 10-point margin might be hamstrung in the weeks leading up to the Sept. 5 start of the Senate trial. The rules adopted by the Senate after three days of closed-door wrangling impose a gag order on all parties.
But the day the Senate's rulemaking process began, Paxton used his personal social media platform to rally potential donors to his cause.
"RINOS and far-left radicals have established a kangaroo court in the TX Lege to eliminate America’s most conservative Attorney General," he said on his personal Twitter page, using the "Republicans in Name Only" acronym. "Help me fight back!"
Paxton, who has been tight with former President Donald Trump and embraced by Texas conservatives, has been something of a weak link among statewide Republican officeholders over the past two election cycles. He ran 5 percentage points behind Gov. Greg Abbott in 2018 and a point and a half behind him four years later.
The Politics Project poll, which is affiliated with the University of Texas and was in the field June 2-12, showed Paxton slipping well behind nearly all of the top statewide Republicans. Paxton's job approval rate fell from 39% in April to just 30%. That's double-digits behind the likes of Abbott and U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz.
But perhaps more embarrassing for the embattled Republican AG, it's 8 points behind that of Democratic President Joe Biden, a favorite Paxton punching bag, but never a favorite among Texas voters writ large.
It will take a two-thirds vote of the Senate, dominated 19-12 by Republicans, on any of the impeachment articles to remove Paxton from office. One of the GOP senators is his wife, Angela Paxton, but under the rules she will have no vote in the matter because of the obvious conflict of interest.
What little heart the attorney general might take in the polling numbers is that Texans do not appear to hold the Legislature that stands in judgment of him in anything resembling high regard.
Asked if lawmakers took actions during the five-month session that ended on Memorial Day that made their lives better, the answer was sort of "meh?" Only 5% said their lives would get "a lot better" and less than a quarter said things might get "somewhat better" for them.
More: The runup to Paxton impeachment vote could have been a circus; to Texas' credit, it wasn't
On the other hand, 30% said lawmakers made life in Texas worse during their five months in office, and 26% said whatever the Legislature might have done, it made no difference whatsoever.
Back-of-the-envelope math: 56% of the people believe that the action under the Capitol dome this year either gummed up Texas or was completely irrelevant.
John C. Moritz covers Texas government and politics for the USA Today Network in Austin. Contact him at jmoritz@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter @JohnnieMo.
This article originally appeared on Corpus Christi Caller Times: AG Ken Paxton facing a summer of sweating as poll numbers plummet
