The contentious four-way Republican primary for Texas attorney general, a powerful office used to push conservative policies into the national conversation, will head to a runoff after Tuesday’s vote failed to produce a clear winner.
Representative Chip Roy, a conservative who has butted heads with President Trump, will face State Senator Mayes Middleton, an oil and gas executive, in a head-to-head runoff on May 26. Absent a strong wave for Democrats in 2026, the runoff winner is likely to be favored in the general election in November. Democrats have not won a statewide race in Texas in decades.
In a surprise, Mr. Middleton finished ahead of Mr. Roy, the presumptive front-runner, after he spent millions from his personal fortune on the race.
The candidates were vying to replace Attorney General Ken Paxton, who helped transform an office historically focused on consumer protection and child support into a legal cudgel in local and national partisan battles.
Mr. Paxton, who is running against Senator John Cornyn in the Republican Senate primary, used the office to challenge Biden- and Obama-era regulations, worked hand-in-hand with the Trump administration on antitrust, immigration and voting policies and helped shape national conservative political trends in the process.
The contest to succeed Mr. Paxton has been a litmus test of each candidate’s closeness to President Trump and his agenda.
While the president did not endorse in the primary, Mr. Middleton sent out political mailers with photographs of him embracing Mr. Trump and promised to use the position to advance conservative causes like opposing abortion access and targeting liberal prosecutors. Branding himself “MAGA Mayes,” he criticized the congressman as disloyal to the president.
Mr. Middleton funneled millions of dollars of his own money into the race. In the last reporting period alone, his campaign spent $5.4 million, $2 million more than the amount Mr. Roy doled out during that time.
During his four terms in Congress, Mr. Roy, a small-government conservative, positioned himself as a maverick who would buck the president and his own party if he viewed their politics as insufficiently conservative, especially on fiscal issues. He voted to certify the 2020 election results and said the president deserved “universal condemnation” for saying there was widespread voter fraud.
However, Mr. Roy has also said he agrees with Mr. Trump on policy and recently praised the president’s second-term performance. Mr. Roy said the role of attorney general needs to be filled by someone who will focus on Texas first, protecting citizens and thwarting federal overreach, regardless of the party in power.
Mr. Roy has had a fraught relationship with Mr. Paxton. He has been critical of Mr. Paxton’s legal troubles and ethical scandals while in office. When a group of agency employees accused Mr. Paxton of bribery and abuse of office in 2020, Mr. Roy was the first Republican leader in Texas to call on him to resign. Mr. Paxton was impeached but later acquitted after a trial in the State Senate.
Mr. Roy goes into the runoff with the backing of Senator Ted Cruz.
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