Texas is more than a thousand miles away from Capitol Hill, but the race between Sen. John Cornyn and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton for the state’s Senate seat Wednesday centered on a D.C.-centric topic: the filibuster.
The fight is the latest chapter in both men’s quest to earn an ever-coveted endorsement from President Donald Trump, who has yet to put his thumb on the scale for the May 26 runoff between the two Republicans.
Republicans in the Senate have struggled over whether to unite behind a talking filibuster to pass the party’s voter identification legislation, the SAVE America Act, with Senate Republican leadership saying there aren’t enough votes to support one. But attention from the online MAGA world and a push from Trump himself has forced the issue into some battleground races, including in Texas.
Cornyn, who previously opposed Democratic efforts to end the filibuster, flipped on the issue on Wednesday, writing in an op-ed in the New York Post, “My fellow conservatives and I have proudly used the 60-vote threshold to protect the country from all sorts of bad ideas and dangerous policies. But when the reality on the ground changes, leaders must take stock and adapt.”
“For many years, I believed that if the US Senate scrapped the filibuster, Texas and our nation would stand to lose more than we would gain,” Cornyn wrote. “After careful consideration, I support whatever changes to Senate rules that may prove necessary for us to get the SAVE America Act and homeland security funding past the Democrats’ obstruction, through the Senate, and on the president’s desk for his signature.”
“This could be a ‘talking filibuster’ that removes the obstructionists’ free pass and makes them defend their indefensible views on the Senate floor, or it could be a different reform,” Cornyn said, placing the blame on the Democrats for previously threatening to reform the filibuster already.
Cornyn’s piece came about a week after Paxton said he would “consider dropping out of this race if Senate Leadership agrees to lift the filibuster” on the voter ID measure, and called Cornyn out for not openly backing the talking filibuster.
“This is [Cornyn] effectively countering the Paxton move to say that he would drop out if the Senate passed the SAVE Act,” said Mark Jones, a professor of political science at Rice University. “This is to probably try to reduce the benefits that Paxton was obtaining from that gambit,” like drawing up more support within the Republican base.
He said a Trump endorsement, particularly for Cornyn, would be “pivotal,” adding that Trump’s decision not to endorse has helped Paxton become the “prohibitive favorite” while his backing the attorney general would help “seal the deal.”
After Cornyn published his op-ed Wednesday, Paxton said, “In one week, I’ve made him more conservative than in the past 24 years.”
Cornyn has been a fixture in Texas Republican politics for decades, usually winning reelection by comfortable margins, and has also built deep relationships throughout the top ranks in the Senate, having served as the chamber’s No. 2 GOP leader and as National Republican Senatorial Committee chairman during his time in the Senate.
But he has had a hot-and-cold relationship with Trump that is coming back to haunt him.
Recent polling shows Cornyn and Paxton running neck-and-neck, often with the AG running ahead of the incumbent despite being embroiled in a series of political and personal controversies. Texas Public Opinion Research released a survey March 9 showing Paxton leading Cornyn 49 percent to 41 percent.
“What Cornyn is trying to do is win over some of the MAGA supporters who are on the fence in the sense that they prefer Paxton on policy, but they’re horrified or disgusted by his personal behavior,” Jones said.
“This is just another way that Cornyn can try to diminish any difference between him and Paxton on issues that are important to Donald Trump,” Jones said, while also allowing Cornyn “to simultaneously, essentially say, ‘You get the same pro-Trump vote and pro-Trump senator with me and Paxton but I give you near a 100 percent chance of ensuring that I’ll be in office in January of 2027 and Republicans will have a majority.’”
Leadership and its campaign arms, like the NRSC, have maintained their backing of Cornyn, privately expressing concerns of Paxton not competing as well against the Democratic candidate, State Rep. James Talarico. Members of Trump’s campaign team remain in Texas to help Cornyn as well.
Cornyn told reporters he gave Senate Majority Leader John Thune a heads up before his op-ed was published and said he didn’t think “he was surprised.”
“I didn’t anticipate we would find ourselves in a position where Democrats reflexively oppose anything and everything that the administration wants to do,” Cornyn continued. “I’m unwilling to sit by and watch President Trump’s agenda wither on the vine for the next two years.”
Cornyn, Thune told reporters Wednesday, “is one of 53 Republican senators … and the opposition to nuking the filibuster runs very, very deep in our conference.”
The Senate is planning to vote next week on the SAVE America Act in some capacity, though details of how that will play out procedurally on the floor is yet to be determined.
Asked if the issue will impact the midterm elections, Thune said, “The midterms, as you know, especially in the second term of a presidential administration, are always a little dicey to start with. I think the midterms are gonna be about the economy and that’s why I think we’re focused on that.”
“Great to have the SAVE Act if we could do it, but as has been made very clear … we don’t have the votes,” he said.
Jones said Cornyn is “fighting fire with fire.”
“Initially, Paxton was able to get a modest advantage by being disingenuous” about actually dropping out, he said.
“Now Cornyn is narrowing that advantage by being equally disingenuous … knowing full well that they are not going to get rid of the filibuster.”
