A bitter primary contest between the four-term Republican US senator John Cornyn and the Texas attorney general, Ken Paxton, ended in a runoff on Tuesday.
In Texas, a primary runoff is declared if neither candidate are able to capture 50% of the vote. Paxton and Cornyn will now face that election on 26 May.
Speaking to reporters in Austin, Cornyn said he had “worked for decades to build the Republican party, both here in Texas and nationally” and refused to allow a “flawed, self centered and shameless candidate” like the scandal-scarred Paxton to “risk everything we’ve worked so hard to build over these many years”.
“Judgment day is coming for Ken Paxton,” Cornyn said.
With just over two-thirds of the ballots counted, Cornyn led Paxton by less than two percentage points, with a third candidate, the rightwing congressman Wesley Hunt capturing about 13% of the vote.
“We just sent a message loud and clear to Washington,” Paxton said, at his election night party in Dallas. “We are not going to go quietly and we are not going to let you buy this seat.”
Emphasizing the amount of money Cornyn’s campaign and allied groups spent to force a runoff, Paxton declared: “Texas is not for sale.”
As polls closed across the Lone Star state on Tuesday evening, national Republicans were openly fretting that a victory by Paxton, a scandal-plagued conservative culture warrior who is a darling of Donald Trump’s Maga movement, would give Democrats a rare opening in a solidly red state.
Republicans, including the National Republican Senatorial Committee, spent tens of millions of dollars rallying to Cornyn’s defense. Donors will probably be pressed to spend millions more now the race has stretched into a 10-week runoff.
Trump has so far not weighed in, heaping praise on all candidates during a visit to Texas last week. All have touted their closeness to the president, with Cornyn highlighting his record of voting for the president’s agenda. In the last few weeks, he’s also touted his electability, warning that his rival would jeopardize Republicans’ chances of holding the seat in November.
But Paxton has survived years of legal, political and ethics scandals, including being impeached by the Republican-controlled Texas House on charges of bribery, abuse of public trust and obstruction of justice. In the Senate, the vote fell short of the two-thirds majority needed for conviction.
Paxton had led in most polls and appeared poised to end Cornyn’s 24-year Senate career. But in a race further divided by a third candidate, Cornyn had suggested that a runoff would be a possibility.
“If you all will please just get out and tell your friends, drag them to the polls and let’s get this over with on Tuesday,” Paxton told supporters in Waco on Tuesday. “Let’s do this without a runoff.”
Even as Trump’s approval ratings falter, and voters sour on his handling of the economy and immigration, Texas Republicans have remained fiercely loyal to the president. In 2024, Trump won the state by nearly 14 percentage points, improving his margins with a boost from Latino voters.
In an interview with CBS, Cornyn conceded that it would be “a challenge” if “only the most radical people” vote in the Texas Republican primary.
Washington Republicans have warned that Paxton would force the party to divert resources away from other key Senate contests to protect a seat long viewed as safely red.
“Honestly, if you look at the polling in a general election setting, I don’t think it’s outside the realm of possibility that the seat [flips]depending on who the Democrats nominate,” the Senate majority leader John Thune told Politico in a recent interview.
