PrairiePundit

  Trending Politics: U.S. Senate Republicans, already in cruise control for 2026, may keep a seat while losing an incumbent in the process, if polling holds showing his conservative primary challenger keeping a sizable lead. Members of the MAGA faithful are at odds with Texas Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), a top ally to former Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) who has drawn a primary challenge from the state’s attorney general, Ken Paxton. Cornyn, who started the year off running to replace McConnell as Senate leader, now finds himself under fire as he seeks to keep a seat he’s held for more than two decades. An ebullition of animosity toward establishment Republicans has crystalized in the Cornyn-Paxton showdown, which shows the senator trailing his rival 37% to 42% in a new poll of 515 likely Republican voters. Echelon Insights reported that 21% of likely primary voters remain undecided in the contest. President Donald Trump, who has gone underwater even in deep red states since r...

  DC Daily Journal: ... Texas Senator John Cornyn, a Republican, is urging Attorney General Pam Bondi to launch a federal investigation into organizations connected to Beto O’Rourke and the influential billionaire George Soros, accusing them of potentially violating laws by financing the flight of Texas Democrats during a critical redistricting session. This push adds validity to the concerns over how such deep-pocketed donors, particularly Soros with his history of funding progressive causes, might be exerting outsized sway on state politics. In a letter obtained by Fox News Digital, Cornyn pressed for scrutiny of O’Rourke’s Powered by People PAC and the Soros-affiliated Texas Majority PAC, questioning if their support for the lawmakers’ exodus breached federal corruption and election statutes. “I write today to encourage an investigation of the entities funding this charade,” Cornyn wrote. “News reports make clear that PACs tied to Beto O’Rourke and megadonors such as George Soro...

 Washington Examiner: Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton beat incumbent Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) by nine points in a poll released Wednesday, previewing the 2026 Senate race. Paxton has attempted to portray himself as more in line with President Donald Trump, which could help him win the Republican primary in a state where Trump won 56.2% of the vote in the 2024 election. Polling conducted by Barbara Jordan Public Policy Research and Survey Center at Texas Southern University shows Paxton getting 43% of the vote and Cornyn getting 34%. Paxton also scored a 68% favorability rating among voters, compared to 58% for Cornyn. ... With both candidates having majority favorability ratings it maybe hard to predict the winner in this race although Paxton is looking pretty strong.  I suspect Cornyn maybe behind in this race becasues of his tenure and his working with Democrats. 

 DC Daily Journal: ... Conservatives across Texas and everyday Americans nationwide are fed up with empty promises from politicians who claim to champion their values but falter when it’s time to deliver. The Republican Party stands at a crossroads, and nowhere is this more evident than in the brewing battle for Texas’ U.S. Senate seat. With Attorney General Ken Paxton throwing his hat into the ring against incumbent Sen. John Cornyn, the Lone Star State is poised for a primary that could redefine the GOP’s future. The question isn’t about loyalty to a name or a faction—it’s about who can produce results for a base that’s hungry for action. On Tuesday night, Paxton took to Fox News’ The Ingraham Angle to announce his Senate candidacy, igniting what promises to be a fierce contest. “It’s time for a change in Texas,” Paxton declared, tipping his hat to Sen. Ted Cruz while taking aim at Cornyn. “It’s time that we have another great senator that will actually stand up and fight for Rep...

 Newsmax: Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, an ally of President Donald Trump, told Newsmax on Tuesday why he will challenge Sen. John Cornyn in next year's Republican primary. "Texans have not gotten the same type of representation from him as we have [Sen.] Ted Cruz," Paxton told " Finnerty ." "He's pushed gun restrictions. He was not supportive of Trump building the border wall. He's criticized it many times, although he's been very supportive of sending that same money to Ukraine. "And he's generally not been supportive of Trump, either in 2016, when he said he was an albatross around our neck, or in 2024, when he said he shouldn't run, that we should have another choice." Paxton's candidacy poses the most serious threat to Cornyn, 73, since the four-term senator and former Texas attorney general was first elected in 2002. In the four previous Republican primaries, he gained below 77% of the vote only once, in 2014, w...

 DailyWire: ... The Supreme Court articulated substantive due process from a confluence of the 5th amendment and the 14th amendment to the Constitution, but “historically it’s been applied in ways that seem to sanction explicit policy-making by the courts,” Cornyn argued, asking whether “substantive due process” was just a tool used by the court to “hide their policy-making under the guise of interpreting the Constitution.” “The Justices have interpreted the due process clause of the 14th amendment to include a substantive provision, that the rights to due process, they have interpreted that to mean not just procedural rights relative to government action, but also the protection of certain personal rights related to intimacy and autonomy,” Jackson responded, adding that among those rights are the rights to marriage, abortion, and contraception. “Well the fact is, is it not, that you can use substantive due process to justify basically any result?” Cornyn interjected. “It’s a mode ...

 Washington Free Beacon: A Texas state senator will not back Democratic Senate candidate M.J. Hegar, saying she has a "problem" with African Americans, the Austin American-Statesman reported Friday. "[Hegar has] had a problem all along with black folks, I mean realistically, a real problem," said state senator Royce West. "She has never reached out … I'm not voting for her; I'm not voting in that race." West challenged Hegar during the Democratic primary and lost by a narrow margin during a July runoff election. Hegar had the support of prominent national Democrats, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.), which some say may have been the deciding factor in the race. In the final stretch of the primary, Hegar accused West, who vied to be the first black senator from Texas, of corruption and questioned his commitment to the Democratic Party.  Hegar's opponent, Sen. John Cornyn (R., Texas),...

Washington Examiner: Democrats had big hopes for Texas, but the party's Senate candidate lags behind longtime Republican incumbent John Cornyn six weeks before Election Day. MJ Hegar, a U.S. Air Force veteran and teacher, has closed the double-digit gap between her and Cornyn. Yet she continues to trail the senator, first elected in 2002, by an average of 8.3 percentage points,  according to  RealClearPolitics . Democrats were optimistic early in the cycle that demographic shifts and a hard-fought presidential race in Texas would help their picks up and down the ballot, particularly after then-Rep. Beto O'Rourke's surprisingly strong Senate bid in 2018. While those factors may still influence House contests on the ticket this fall, they don't seem to be elevating Hegar. For Republican strategist Derek Ryan, Hegar is struggling given her low name recognition. In comparison, Cornyn was the state's attorney general and a judge. That wasn't all Hegar'...

Houston Chronicle: U.S. Sen. John Cornyn had November’s election on his mind when he explained his vote to join most of the Republican-controlled Senate in acquitting President Donald Trump. “To say that timing was a coincidence would be laughable,” Cornyn said on the Senate floor Wednesday, just hours before the chamber dismissed Democrats’ charges against Trump, bringing to a close the third impeachment in American history. “We are only nine months away from an election — nine months away from the American people voting on the direction of our country,” Cornyn said. “But our Democratic colleagues don’t trust the American people, so they’ve taken matters into their own hands.” ... The Chronicle reporter seems to have supported the coup attempt against the President and the story seems to suggest that the Cornyn position might cost him his seat.  I doubt it.  Probably over 90 percent of Texans could not tell you who will be running against Sen. Cornyn.

Sen. Cornyn has it right when it comes to Democrats' bad faith strategy.

KLIF/AP: Beto O’Rourke isn’t running for Senate again, and Democrats who have unusually high hopes for Texas in 2020 are facing an unsettled landscape. There’s no clear frontrunner among a dozen Democrats challenging Republican incumbent John Cornyn. None have raised big money and most candidates remain widely unknown. ... I doubt O'Rourke could raise the same amount of money he raised to take on Ted Cruz.  He pretty well shot his wad in his failed attempt to run for the Democrat nomination for President.

Washington Examiner: Weeks of leaked witness testimony from the House impeachment investigation may have painted an unflattering picture of President Trump in the media, but it has failed to weaken his GOP wall in the Senate, where lawmakers have shrugged off the proceedings. “Unless there is something else that shows up somewhere, we don’t see this as an impeachable offense,” Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota said Wednesday. Democrats running the impeachment proceedings staggered the release of deposition transcripts this week for maximum effect — unmasking the testimony most damaging to Trump. On Tuesday, they publicized the transcripts of U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gary Sondland. The transcript showed Sondland revised his earlier testimony to acknowledge that he told Ukraine government officials they must publicly agree to investigate Hunter Biden, son of former Vice President Joe Biden, in order to receive critical security aid. The admission, Democrats said, co...

The Epoch Times: There was no “quid pro quo” in President Donald Trump’s phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, a senator said. Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said he reviewed the transcript of the call and didn’t “see the quid pro quo.” “Even if there was, I don’t think it would be impeachable or illegal for the president to do so. So this is just an excuse, I think, to continue this campaign that’s existed since the president was sworn in to remove him from office,” Cornyn said during an interview with KFYO. He said there was a double standard being used for the impeachment inquiry. “What never fails to amaze me is the double standard that is applied to this president as opposed to other presidents. It’s always been the case that presidents have been able to leverage aid to other countries in order to advance U.S. policy. And here there was a corruption problem in Ukraine,” Cornyn said. The current information available to him indicates there’s no “reasonable...

The Hill: Texas Sen. John Cornyn (R) is facing the toughest election fight of his political career as he seeks a fourth term in a once deep-red state that Democrats view as a competitive battleground. Bolstered by record fundraising, the Texas Democratic Party is going all out to win the party’s first statewide election in 25 years, launching a multi-million dollar war room to deliver data and messaging to define Cornyn as beholden to President Trump . The Democrats have high hopes for their deep field of potential challengers, led at the moment by Mary Jennings Hegar, the 43-year-old motorcycle-riding mother and Air Force veteran with a penchant for viral ads. When Cornyn won reelection during the 2014 midterms, he did so with 2.8 million votes. He’ll have to blow past that this year after former Rep. Beto O’Rourke turned out more than 4 million Texas Democrats in the 2018 midterms. Cornyn will have to chip away at the broader political forces that are reshaping Texas, as well as P...

Hot Air: It appears Texas Democrats are hoping the 2018 Beto-mania (which failed – but gave them hope) transitions into Joaquin-mania in 2020. There’s a lot of tea leaf reading going on – but  Texas Monthly  is  pretty sure  San Antonio Congressman Joaquin Castro is going to challenge U.S. Senator John Cornyn. “We’ll be making an announcement in the very near future,” said Matthew Jones, Castro’s campaign adviser. “This instantly makes the race very competitive,” Bill Miller, an Austin lobbyist and longtime political observer, said of Joaquin’s potential entry into the race. Running in tandem with his brother, who announced his candidacy for president on January 12 in San Antonio, would only benefit both candidates, Miller said, and “doubles up on all the positives.” When asked if Cornyn was vulnerable, Miller said, “Every Republican senator up for election next year is vulnerable.” “This is quite an important development,” said Larry Sabato, a political ...

The Hill: Former Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D-Texas) said Tuesday that he is considering another Senate bid in Texas in addition to mulling a possible presidential bid. "I'm trying to figure out how I can best serve this country — where I can do the greatest good for the United States of America. So, yeah, I'm thinking through that and it, you know, may involve running for the presidency. It may involve something else," O'Rourke said, according to CNN , after being asked if he's considering challenging Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) in 2020. O'Rourke was narrowly defeated by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) in his 2018 bid for the Senate. He has been courted by some Democrats to run again for the Senate. O'Rourke also met recently with Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) to discuss a possible Senate bid in 2020, according to Politico. ... Some have also encouraged O'Rourke to run for President.  I think he would have a difficult time defeat...

Fuel Fix: Texas Sen. John Cornyn introduced legislation Thursday that would extend authority over the cybersecurity of oil and natural gas pipelines, as well as liquefied natural gas facilities, to the Secretary of Energy. Under the bill, the Department of Energy would coordinate recovery efforts from physical and cyber attacks against the U.S. energy sector, as well aiding companies in improving their in-house security. "Foreign adversaries are trying to infiltrate our critical energy infrastructure, and it's imperative that we're prepared for potential attacks on our energy systems," Cornyn, a Republican and one of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's top lieutenants, said in a statement. "This legislation will enhance the Department of Energy's ability to ensure our country's oil and natural gas pipelines are secure in more ways than one." Authority over pipeline security now largely resides with the Transportation Security Adminis...

Politico: Cornyn braces for brutal Texas reelection battle The Republican senator is preparing to run a battleground campaign in Texas next year after watching Ted Cruz's close call in 2018. While it is smart to be prepared, I would be surprised if the Democrats can find another charismatic candidate who can raise that kind of money in a Presidential election year when Democrats main target will be President Trump who is already massing a big war chest. While there was some movement against Republicans like Cruz and a few House members in 2018, the Democrats still have a weak bench when it comes to statewide races. Gov. Abbott won handily over a weak candidate. It looks to me like the Democrats mainly targeted Cruz a few House seats and still fell short of their goal.

Houston Chronicle: After years of rancor over ethanol, Cruz, Cornyn go head to head on reform Cornyn is taking a softer approach with the Agribusiness rent seekers.  I am not connected to either the refineries or the Big Corn.  I am a consumer who despises what ethanol does to my equipment.  Unfortunately, no consumers are brought into the debate over the mandates that are enriching some and providing no benefit to consumers.  I would like to see the mandate disappear and let ethanol and other biofuels compete in the marketplace.  If that happened they would have some incentive to create a product that doesn't screws up small engines and is less efficient for larger engines on vehicles.  The current policy also forces refineries to buy crap they do not need instead of spending that money on converting their facilities to use US light crude from shale wells which would actually reduce dependency on imported oil which was the stated...

streiff: John Cornyn: Time For An Impartial Investigation Of Justice And The FBI While Cornyn is right, the issue has become so polarized that it will be difficult to find someone who is impartial at this point.  Anyone who takes the job will be attacked by probably both sides.