Suspended Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton will not testify at a September impeachment trial in the Senate that could end with his permanent removal as the state’s top attorney, his own attorney said in a statement Tuesday, adding that he will not “dignify” the process.
Paxton has denounced a Texas House investigation that led to 20 articles of impeachment against him, with his attorney saying in the statement that Paxton was not afforded the opportunity to defend himself and that House prosecutors now “want to ambush him on the floor of the Senate .”
“They had every opportunity to have Attorney General Paxton testify during their investigation but refused to do so,” said the statement, released by attorney Tony Buzbee. “We will not bow to their evil, illegal and unprecedented weaponization of state power in the Senate chamber.”
Whether Paxton would testify in his defense has been a widely debated topic among Texas political and legal circles. He remains under a federal investigation amid the allegations that fueled the impeachment effort, raising questions about the possibility his testimony could provide information in the US Department of Justice probe.
The impeachment articles arose from a secret House investigation this spring in which lawmakers attempted to determine whether taxpayers should pay a $3.3 million tentative whistleblower settlement Paxton reached with four top aides from his office. In October 2020, the aides reported to federal investigators that they believed Paxton was taking bribes from Austin real estate investor Nate Paul, who was under federal investigation for fraud. A federal grand jury indicted Paul in May.
The House voted overwhelmingly in favor of the impeachment articles, transferring them to the Senate for a trial.
In his statement, Buzbee called Paxton “America’s most conservative and most successful attorney general” and said his work “made him a target of Democrats and the establishment Republicans who enable them.”
“This is why Attorney General Paxton was impeached by the kangaroo court in the Texas House,” the statement said.