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Ken Paxton is dirty? NO FUCKING WAY!


Gil Bang

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6 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

It's good to know that the Texas Pastor Council sees breaking vows of marriage that were made in a church, to be a non-issue.

In fairness, they are speaking the quiet part out loud: they don't care who represents them as long as their agenda is being pushed.

The pivot of evangelicals, to discount values and morals, is one of the biggest changes over the last 40 years. I understand what occurred behind closed doors has always happened, but now they don't care what happens with open-doors as long as someone claims remorse and repentance.

Of course they don't extend those assumptions to someone on the other side of the aisle. 

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22 minutes ago, wreckatx said:

https://www.texastribune.org/2023/08/29/ken-paxton-nate-paul-brandon-cammack-impeachment/

 

This is the least salacious, but most damning part of the impeachment investigation. I hope the senate understands it. 

Thanks for the link. Crazy how Nate Paul controlled the Texas AG activities including investigating his business rivals via subpoenas. As mentioned in that article there is still a missing understanding of how Paul controlled Paxton at that level. There must be a deeper financial relationship that has never been uncovered. It's hard to believe that even Paxton would sell himself for a $25K donation.

Seems like testimony, if not immunity needs to be given to Cammack to connect more dots.

When does the US DOJ jump into this case more?

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I've seen/heard some crazy shit with this story, but Nate Paul writing up the subpoenas himself (presumably with help from some lawyer friend) is just beyond fucking weird---even for this timeline.  Curious that some of those banks held notes on some WCC properties that Nate was in financial troubles with.  I guess one way to avoid the workout division is to hold a subpoena from the fucking state Attorney General over their heads.  

And yes, as stated for years here under multiple handles---this is about way more than $15-$25k in donations.  

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2 minutes ago, YGIFS said:

And yes, as stated for years here under multiple handles---this is about way more than $15-$25k in donations.  

And Paxton is being hammered from a lot of different sides - the State Bar of Texas thing is just one little facet of that, but shows that a lot of people want him gone.

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32 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

In fairness, they are speaking the quiet part out loud: they don't care who represents them as long as their agenda is being pushed.

The pivot of evangelicals, to discount values and morals, is one of the biggest changes over the last 40 years. I understand what occurred behind closed doors has always happened, but now they don't care what happens with open-doors as long as someone claims remorse and repentance.

Of course they don't extend those assumptions to someone on the other side of the aisle. 

What? Has Paxton demonstrated any remorse or repented at all?

I think the key to keeping their support is the opposite: being a huge criminal piece of shit that draws the ire of the secular world, then claiming you're being persecuted for your faith. 

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38 minutes ago, YGIFS said:
I've seen/heard some crazy shit with this story, but Nate Paul writing up the subpoenas himself (presumably with help from some lawyer friend) is just beyond fucking weird---even for this timeline. 

 


Nate's younger sister & business partner Sheena is an attorney, FWIW. She's also pretty easy on the eye & routinely played the nice, respectful professional adult to his blustering gas bag routine. She's kept a much lower profile, however, and seems to be in the clear so far.

 

image.png.b4813b6b89e380b2a61e878ef8df0e62.png

 

Edited by GhostOfTomJoad
Rules. Followed.
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17 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

Also surprising how many defenders that Paxton has. It's not like abandoning him leads to a commie lib'rul taking over the AG office. I would have to think there are 100+ GOP lawyers that would be happy to take over and follow the same policies as Paxton.

I wonder if George P. can get back into the mix.  He did take the loss like a gentleman and seems to have no desire to move to D.C. (so House or Senate run is out). 

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1 hour ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

Thanks for the link. Crazy how Nate Paul controlled the Texas AG activities including investigating his business rivals via subpoenas. As mentioned in that article there is still a missing understanding of how Paul controlled Paxton at that level. There must be a deeper financial relationship that has never been uncovered. It's hard to believe that even Paxton would sell himself for a $25K donation.

Seems like testimony, if not immunity needs to be given to Cammack to connect more dots.

When does the US DOJ jump into this case more?

It's outrageous and (YGIFS posts aside) you're right that the extent of Paul and Paxton's relationship is still mystery to most people.  Texas Monthly just put out a tongue-in-cheek piece on this topic.

"On the surface, there’s little for the pair to bond over. Paul, the child of South Asian immigrants, was born in Victoria, Texas. He is a 36-year-old property developer and nightclub proprietor whom Forbes once estimated to own holdings worth $1.2 billion. Famously, he announced his property acquisitions by draping from his new buildings banners emblazoned with a slogan ripped from hip-hop mogul DJ Khaled: “Another One.” Paxton is a 60-year-old grandfather, evangelical, and career politician born in North Dakota who met his wife while the two were students at Baylor University, before Paul was born."

"Perhaps in the course of discussing how unfair law enforcement could be to a couple of fellas just trying to make their way in the world, the two started to bare their souls. One can imagine Paxton, feeling the warm glow of budding brotherhood, complaining about the poky size and janky countertops of his kitchen or the employment troubles of a particular lady friend who lived in Southwest Austin, and Paul, flush with oxytocin, seeing an opportunity to help out his new buddy."

I don't have any information, but I believe the DOJ is waiting until after the impeachment trial to take any more action, much like they will refrain from indicting close to an election so as not to appear to have political motives.    

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53 minutes ago, YGIFS said:

I wonder if George P. can get back into the mix.  He did take the loss like a gentleman and seems to have no desire to move to D.C. (so House or Senate run is out). 

If he can't beat Paxton I don't see how he survives a primary.  He'd have been better off running as a Dem. 

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1 hour ago, GhostOfTomJoad said:


 

 


Nate's younger sister & business partner Sheena is an attorney, FWIW. She's also pretty easy on the eye & routinely played the nice, respectful professional adult to his blustering gas bag routine. She's kept a much lower profile, however, and seems to be in the clear so far.

 

image.png.b4813b6b89e380b2a61e878ef8df0e62.png

 


 

hell, Paxton did her !

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1 hour ago, GhostOfTomJoad said:


 

 


Nate's younger sister & business partner Sheena is an attorney, FWIW. She's also pretty easy on the eye & routinely played the nice, respectful professional adult to his blustering gas bag routine. She's kept a much lower profile, however, and seems to be in the clear so far.

 

image.png.b4813b6b89e380b2a61e878ef8df0e62.png

 

Hmmmm..... a friend's wife had some business interactions with her 5 or 6 years ago (as basically a subordinate) and "played the nice respectful professional adult" was not the impression I got from her at all.  

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1 hour ago, YGIFS said:

I wonder if George P. can get back into the mix.  He did take the loss like a gentleman and seems to have no desire to move to D.C. (so House or Senate run is out). 

I have no inside information on this, though I do have some indirect professional connection to her, but I wonder if the interim AG Angela Colmenero was strategically picked by Abbott as a campaign front-runner when Paxton gets officially shitcanned or resigns.  She's an attractive Latina female who I assume would have an R next to her name.  But I have no idea if she accepted the interim gig with any desire to run for the office, or if she's willing to be batshit crazy enough for our current MAGA party in Texas.

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52 minutes ago, A-Tex Devil said:

Hmmmm..... a friend's wife had some business interactions with her 5 or 6 years ago (as basically a subordinate) and "played the nice respectful professional adult" was not the impression I got from her at all.  

It wouldn't surprise me to learn she's as much of a chameleon as her brother. My only interactions with her was when she was tagging along w/ Nate so I'd chalk her actions up to a well-rehearsed good cop/bad cop routine.

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3 hours ago, South Austin said:

I have no inside information on this, though I do have some indirect professional connection to her, but I wonder if the interim AG Angela Colmenero was strategically picked by Abbott as a campaign front-runner when Paxton gets officially shitcanned or resigns.  She's an attractive Latina female who I assume would have an R next to her name.  But I have no idea if she accepted the interim gig with any desire to run for the office, or if she's willing to be batshit crazy enough for our current MAGA party in Texas.

Don't know anything about Colmenaro except that she was one of Abbott's minions when he was turning the AGs office into the Sturm Abteilung.  But that was quite some time ago before it came into its own as a TexNazi party organ.  But I'd bet she's got a lot of BSC.

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I don't get why Eva Guzman didn't get more support from that crowd in the last election.  She literally screamed in her commercials about how her parents were murdered by illegals, she married a cop, and had bigger balls than Paxton.  I would think the GOP money base would love her

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Christians have mixed feelings about Paxton's personal failings:
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/politics/texas/article/paxton-impeachment-affair-christians-18334293.php
free: https://archive.li/ozIDG
tldr: Some Christians see Paxton's infidelities as evidence that he shouldn't be trusted. Others have problems with it but they believe that he's repenting for his sins. Finally others are just shrugging like this hypocrite:
At this point, Welch [Dave Welch, founder and executive director of the Texas Pastor Council] said, Paxton’s alleged affair is a “non-issue.”
“We have an expectation for our elected officials to behave morally and legally,” Welch said. “Unfortunately, that standard has been breached so many countless times, it's, unfortunately, almost irrelevant these days, which is tragic.”
regardless I bet >95% of them will ultimately support Paxton in terms of voting for him in future elections.

What do the Wiccans think?
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7 hours ago, Hank Scorpio said:

I’m going to assume Paxton gets acquitted or whatever you call it in the impeachment trial. But there’s still the FBI investigation with Paul, I would hope that the feds would indict Paxton too since it seems like a slam dunk case to an actual jury. 

I don't know - there's definitely a growing group of Republicans who want him out of office.  The State Bar stuff was definitely meant to send a message a week out from the shitstorm starting up, as is the fact that they are calling Nate Paul and Paxton's mistress to the witness stand. Maybe Patrick tries to protect Paxton, but the House is out to damage him regardless of the outcome. If he's not convicted, they want him knocked out in his next primary.

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4 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

I don't know - there's definitely a growing group of Republicans who want him out of office.  The State Bar stuff was definitely meant to send a message a week out from the shitstorm starting up, as is the fact that they are calling Nate Paul and Paxton's mistress to the witness stand. Maybe Patrick tries to protect Paxton, but the House is out to damage him regardless of the outcome. If he's not convicted, they want him knocked out in his next primary.

Yeah, I kind of have to think that there is some recognition on the part of portions of the GQP that, while the idiot base seems wholly unfazed by the criminality of many of its elected leaders, it's not a good trend for them over the longer term.

As stupid and performative as Abbott and Paxton and others in the Texas GQP have been, the saga of the AG/SG office and SB8 I think shows that at some level there is some more tactical/strategerical thinking than what seems to be going on at the federal level with Trump.

By getting ahead of Paxton's scandal, they can separate themselves a bit from the base obeisance that is Trumpism.

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23 hours ago, GhostOfTomJoad said:


Nate's younger sister & business partner Sheena is an attorney, FWIW. She's also pretty easy on the eye & routinely played the nice, respectful professional adult to his blustering gas bag routine. She's kept a much lower profile, however, and seems to be in the clear so far.

image.png.b4813b6b89e380b2a61e878ef8df0e62.png

 

giphy.gif?cid=ecf05e47olexx3u372bvs1lymu

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1 hour ago, That Guy said:

Gonna be quite the scene with all of the witnesses standing around outside the senate doors on 9/5. Wonder if paxton will be in the hallway with the masses? 

Really wonder what the point of that is - do they want a photo op of Paxton standing around in the same room with Nate Paul and Paxton's mistress?

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One said Paxton once told staff not to touch the cake because it was for his birthday, which is on Dec. 23. Another said Paxton once had the cake brought to a Tex-Mex restaurant for a staff lunch but never served it. The third recalled watching Paxton and an aide walk out of the office carrying the cake box.

I'm sure in Ken's mind Dec 23rd is close enough to Dec 25th for him to claim he is indeed the son of God and therefore deserving of the entire fucking cake.

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AA1g4T5x.img?w=768&h=512&m=6

Meme Lol GIF by ALL SEEING EYES

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/ken-paxton-allies-seek-to-influence-impeachment-trial-vow-retribution-if-he-s-convicted/ar-AA1g4ZWW

Paxton's allies (Lauren Davis seems to be leading the charge) are vowing to punish any Republicans who vote to convict him.

Quote

Stickland, who leads the Defend Texas Liberty PAC, was joined on that podcast by Davis, who lost a race for Dallas County judge in 2022. Davis told Bannon that she’s targeting six senators: Kelly Hancock of North Richland Hills, Bryan Hughes of Mineola, Charles Schwertner of Georgetown, Charles Perry of Lubbock, Drew Springer of Muenster and Mayes Middleton of Galveston. These lawmakers did not support Paxton’s reelection campaign last year.

She told The Dallas Morning News that these senators have ambitions for higher office and need to know that voting to convict Paxton would pit them against the Republican electorate. “The decisions they make about Paxton are going to be critical to their future political careers,” Davis said.

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Assuming that all 12 Senate Democrats vote to oust Paxton, it would take 9 of 18 Republicans to remove him from office. Sen. Angela Paxton of McKinney is recused from voting in her husband’s trial.

Also coming to the defense of Paxton is the True Texas Project, the group formerly known as the Northeast Tarrant County Tea Party. That group has produced billboards in support of Paxton. One located in Fort Worth reads on one side: “Liberal Democrats are eliminating your vote.” To the right it states: “Stand with Ken Paxton.”

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Paxton is backed by some leaders of the Texas Republican Party, such as Chairman Matt Rinaldi. He also has support from various Collin County Republicans who have vowed to find 2024 candidates to run against the five GOP House representatives from the county who voted to impeach Paxton.

Plano Republican Wayne Richard, a local organizer for former President Donald Trump, is exploring running against Rep. Matt Shaheen, also of Plano. Richard told The News that he’ll make a final decision on whether to challenge Shaheen after seeing the evidence presented in the Paxton trial.

Good to know that out-of-state groups are backing Paxton and pretending to be TExas-based.

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Last week The Texas Tribune reported that a Virginia-based group began airing TV ads on Fox News during the GOP presidential debate that targeted some state senators. The group, San Jacinto 2023, made the buys in Dallas, Austin, Abilene, Houston, Waco and San Antonio markets. Operatives also sent mailers encouraging residents to lobby their senators to end the “sham” impeachment, The Tribune reported.

Paxton's defenders can be quite the losers though.

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Paxton’s most vocal supporters are familiar faces in Texas Republican politics. It’s the same crew that’s lined up against House Speaker Dade Phelan. And in 2022, many of them unsuccessfully backed primary candidates against Gov. Greg Abbott.

“Based on their recent track record, I wouldn’t be surprised if they tried to exact some kind of revenge on people that voted against Paxton, either in the House or the Senate,” said Jim Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas. “Trying is one thing, whether they will be successful is another.”

Quote

They failed badly when they backed former Sen. Donald Huffines in the 2022 primary against Abbott, as well as the House Republicans they targeted for defeat, Henson noted.

“Their overall win-loss record is not very good,” Henson said.

Drain the Swamp, except when the bad things the Swamp did occurred before the last election.  Then it doesn't matter.

Quote

Paxton’s lawyers argue that the impeachment case should be tossed because the alleged bribery occurred before he was reelected in 2022. They contend that since voters elected Paxton to another term, what he did in prior years should not matter.

“All the things that are impeachable offenses occurred prior to the most recent election,” said Mark Jones, a political science professor at Rice University. “If I were a Republican senator and I wanted to acquit, that’s the route I would take, because that way you at least can stick with your cover story: that it had nothing to do with the facts of the case but the timing.”

 

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Ok, so we kinda know that at the federal level, at least, courts are not going to interfere with impeachment because of separation of powers and political question doctrine.

This "prior term doctrine" is embodied in Texas Govt. Code 668.02, but not anywhere I can find in the Texas Constitution (although I keep seeing reference to it being "constitutional").

Can the courts undo an impeachment carried out by the legislature based on a statute passed by the legislature?

Also an interesting article from UT that indicates that the more voters know about Paxton, the more they favor impeachment.https://texaspolitics.utexas.edu/blog/all-forgiven-texas-public-opinion-and-“prior-term-doctrine”-ken-paxtons-impeachment-trial

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I mean, there's being a dick and then there's being a motherfuckin' DICK.  Repeatedly stealing a Christmas cake from your staff?  I mean, stealing from your constituents is one thing, but stealing from your staff?  CHRISTMAS CAKES?
 
 

Well if that don’t take the cake…
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41 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

Paxton would go to prison if the senate votes to remove?  She has a much better grasp of the stakes than I do apparently. 

Biden is going to enter your home while you're at work and take your gas stove and your beer.

Marjorie and the others really don't realize this is Texas Republicans moving against one of their own.  This has happened in the past, but never out in the open like this.  Then again, given that she was kicked out of the "Freedom" Caucus, she should recognize a Republican-on-Republican conflict when she sees it.

And I'm starting to agree that Abbott picked Angela Colmenero with the idea that Paxton is going down, and she'd be hard to beat in a future election. Given that she's one of his inner circle, it'd benefit the hell out of Abbott if she continues on as AG.

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