Republicans face “biblical” infighting if Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton loses a Senate race in which he has not led a single public poll since mid-August.
A veteran Texas GOP operative made that prediction to Politico’s Playbook newsletter this week, as Paxton, the Republican nominee, trails state Rep. James Talarico (D-TX) ahead of the November election.
Playbook described the unnamed operative as “bracing for a Talarico victory.”
“It’s going to take a Herculean effort to hold the seat,” the operative told Playbook.
Paxton won the nomination in a May runoff against Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), a week after President Donald Trump endorsed Paxton despite objections from Senate Republican leaders, CNBC reported.
“The Monday morning quarterbacking is going to be biblical,” the operative said. “The hand-wringing and the blaming. Paxton will blame Cornyn. Trump will blame Paxton.”
“Trump should blame himself,” the Republican insider added.
Cornyn is using the opportunity to remind Republicans that they could have chosen him.
“I was trying to warn people that if they actually wanted to hold the seat, that I would be a safer bet,” Cornyn said, according to Punchbowl News.
Talarico led in each of the last 10 public polls, which a moderator read aloud Thursday during his appearance at the Texas Tribune Festival in Austin, Playbook reported.
The most recent public poll, a Marist University survey released last week, showed Talarico ahead by six points, Punchbowl pointed out.
“And here’s the scary part for Republicans: private GOP polling mirrors the public surveys,” the outlet said.
According to Texas Democrats, Talarico’s success cannot be attributed only to Paxton’s weakness as a candidate.
“What Talarico is representing is a Texas Democrat, not a national Democrat. And that’s how you win Texas,” Ashley Etienne, a Democratic strategist from Texas, told Playbook.
“Playbook watched Talarico tackle 15 interviews over the course of hours,” the newsletter reported, describing a grocery drive Talarico held earlier this month in Dallas while Republicans met there for their state convention.
Paxton, by contrast, “banked just a few minutes during rush hour on stage,” Playbook reported, along with what it called “a two-night ribbing by Trump.”
Even if Talarico doesn’t win, the damage to Republican Senate chances may have already been done. Millions have been diverted to Texas in an attempt to keep Paxton afloat.
A super PAC backed by Senate Republican leaders has booked $117 million in ads to help Paxton and could spend as much as $200 million before Election Day, Punchbowl reported. The group, Texas PAC, is run and partly funded by the Senate Leadership Fund.
Republican spending in the race has reached $160 million, according to Playbook.
Senate Republicans spent tens of millions of dollars backing Cornyn in the primary, hoping to avoid spending hundreds of millions to carry Paxton through a general election, the report said. Meanwhile, Cornyn allies spent $90 million in the primary and runoff reminding voters of Paxton’s ethical issues, from a messy divorce to a federal corruption probe.
Paxton emerged from the primary “deeply battered and broke,” Punchbown observed, and Republicans now need the same voters to back him.
Cornyn and his allies, including Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD), had warned Trump before the runoff that Paxton’s legal and personal baggage would cost Republicans millions of dollars that could be spent in more competitive states, the Texas Tribune reported in March.
“The money that is being spent there means it can’t be spent in New Hampshire or Michigan or Alaska or Maine or Ohio,” Cornyn said in the Punchbowl report.
Texas, one of the most expensive states for advertising, is consuming a large share of Senate Republicans’ midterm money as the political environment worsens and the map expands, Punchbowl reported.
The Senate Leadership Fund has said it is raising money specifically for Texas and will not pull from other states.
Talarico has booked $50 million in ads since July, and his money goes further because candidates get cheaper ad rates than outside groups, according to AdImpact figures Punchbowl cited.
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