Compared to most states, Texas has seen a very little recent change in office-holders elected statewide:
Republican John Cornyn has been a Senator since December 2, 2002.
Republican Ted Cruz has been a Senator since January 3, 2013.
Republican Greg Abbott has been Governor since January 20, 2015.
Republican Dan Patrick has likewise been Lieutenant Governor since January 20, 2015.
Republican Ken Paxton has been Attorney General since January 5, 2015.
Republican Glenn Hegar has been Comptroller of Public Accounts since January 2, 2015.
Republican Dawn Buckingham has only been Land Commissioner since January 10, 2023, since previous Land Commissioner George P. Bush unsuccessfully tried to primary Paxton for Attorney General in 2022.
Republican Sid Miller has been Agriculture Commissioner since January 2, 2015.
The Railroad Commission and statewide court races haven’t been quite as static. Republican Jim Wright managed to successfully primary Ryan Sitton for his Railroad Commission spot in 2020, and some retirements and federal appointments have resulted in a bit more change in the Texas Supreme Court and Court of Criminal Appeals, but even there reelection has been the norm.
This year, however, the logjam at the top of the ticket finally seems to be breaking up. Hegar is stepping down to become A&M system chancellor, with Railroad Commissioner Christi Craddick running to succeed him as Comptroller, along with former state senator Don Huffines. And now Paxton is saying that he might run for Cornyn’s senate seat in 2026.
Attorney General Ken Paxton is nearing a 2026 bid for U.S. Senate against Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), depending on if he can obtain $20 million in fundraising commitments in the next couple of months.
On a trip to Washington, D.C. during which he met with various parties, including the White House, Paxton interviewed with Punchbowl News to discuss the long-rumored 2026 bid.
“I think I can win if I have $20 million. I’ve run these primaries in Texas before. I honestly don’t see how [Cornyn] overcomes his numbers,” he told Punchbowl.
Public polling has been fairly scant on the matchup. The Texas Politics Project’s poll earlier this month put Paxton’s net approval rating at +51 percent among Republicans compared to Cornyn’s +28 percent.
A Hobby School of Public Affairs poll from February showed both candidates registering around 70 percent among Republicans who said they’d “definitely consider” or “might consider” voting for them in the 2026 primary; 15 percent said they’d never vote for Cornyn in the primary, while 19 percent said that about Paxton.
Paxton added, “I think it’s just time. He’s had his chance. He hasn’t performed well, and the voters know it. You can go a long time without people paying attention. And they’re paying attention now. If the numbers were the other way, I wouldn’t be sitting here.”
The coveted endorsement from President Donald Trump will be key in the race. Three years ago, Paxton eventually received Trump’s backing after the then-former president very much considered backing his primary challenger George P. Bush. Cornyn received Trump’s backing in 2020 when he dispatched Dwayne Stovall and the GOP primary field by a mile.
Paxton has long cozied up to Trump, and has been among his most active allies in legal fights across the board. But Cornyn has increasingly appealed to Trump as the 2026 election gets closer, and he’s expected to have the backing of the National Republican Senatorial Committee with its deep pockets supplementing his own.
There’s long been disgruntlement about Cornyn among movement conservatives who think he’s a squish on a wide range of issues, from the Second Amendment to limiting illegal immigration, though Cornyn seems to have repented of his previous record of playing footsie with “comprehensive immigration reform” (i.e. illegal alien amnesty). Despite those misgivings, Cornyn has consistently trounced underfunded primary challengers like Dwayne Stovall and Steve Stockman by comfortable margins.
Paxton would be a different kettle of fish.
With his record of suing both the Obama and Biden Administrations for their unconstitutional, radical left-wing policies, Paxton is much more popular with the Republican base than Cornyn. Also, with all his previous legal issues resolved and the dramatic failure of the Dade Phelan-led impeachment effort against him, Paxton is better positioned to run than ever. But, as the above list of long-tenured officials shows, successfully primarying a statewide Republican in Texas is an extremely difficult proposition. Cornyn has already said that he’s running for a fifth term, and he’ll still have all the advantages of incumbency, including juicy campaign contributions from a wide variety of business and special interest PACs.
Another potential Cornyn primary challenger is U.S. Representative Wesley Hunt. Hunt is sufficiently conservative, but I don’t see him gaining much traction against two heavyweight opponents like Cornyn and Paxton, both of whom have already run multiple successful statewide campaigns.
If Paxton runs, the 2026 senate race will be very interesting…
Mary Elise Cosgray of The Texan sent out a guide to the Texas congressional delegation via email, and I thought it was chock-full of useful information for Texas voters to know who’s serving on what, so I’m putting it up as a PSA post here.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX): Committee on Finance, Ranking Member on Subcommittee on International Trade, Customs, and Global Competitiveness, Subcommittee on Energy, Natural Resources, and Infrastructure, Subcommittee on Taxation and IRS Oversight
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX): Ranking Member on Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, Committee on Foreign Relations, Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere, Transnational Crime, Civilian Security, Democracy, Human Rights, & Global Women’s Issues, Subcommittee on Near East, South Asia, Central Asia, and Counterterrorism, Subcommittee on State Department & USAID Management, International Operations, & Bilateral International Development
Rep. Nathaniel Moran (R-TX-01): Committee on Ways and Means
Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX-02): Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Committee on Energy and Commerce
Rep. Keith Self (R-TX-03): Committee on Foreign Affairs, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, Committee on Veterans’ Affairs
Rep. Pat Fallon (R-TX-04): Committee on Armed Services, Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence
Rep. Lance Gooden (R-TX-05): Committee on Armed Services, Committee on the Judiciary
Rep. Jake Ellzey (R-TX-06): Committee on Appropriations, Committee on Small Business
Rep. Lizzie Fletcher (D-TX-07): Committee on Energy and Commerce
Rep. Morgan Luttrell (R-TX-08): Committee on Armed Services, Committee on Homeland Security, Committee on Veterans’ Affairs
Rep. Al Green (D-TX-09): Committee on Financial Services
Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX-10): Committee on Homeland Security
Rep. August Pfluger (R-TX-11): Committee on Energy and Commerce, Committee on Homeland Security
Rep. Craig Goldman (R-TX-12): Committee on Energy and Commerce
Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-TX-13): Committee on Agriculture, Committee on Armed Services, Committee on Foreign Affairs, Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence
Rep. Randy Weber (R-TX-14): Committee on Energy and Commerce, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
Rep. Monica De La Cruz (R-TX-15): Committee on Agriculture, Committee on Financial Services
Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-TX-16): Committee on Appropriations
Rep. Pete Session (R-TX-17): Committee on Financial Services, Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
Rep. Sylvester Turner (D-TX-18): Committee on Homeland Security, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
Rep. Jodey Arrington (R-TX-19): Committee on Foreign Affairs
Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-TX-20): Committee on Foreign Affairs
Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX-21): Committee on Rules, Committee on the Judiciary
Rep. Troy Nehls (R-TX-22): Committee on the Judiciary, Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure
Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-TX-23): Committee on Appropriations, Committee on Homeland Security
Rep. Beth Van Duyne (R-TX-24): Committee on Ways and Means, Committee on Small Business
Rep. Roger Williams (R-TX-25): Committee on Financial Services
Rep. Brandon Gill (R-TX-26): Committee on the Judiciary, Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
Rep. Michael Cloud (R-TX-27): Committee on Appropriations, Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX-28): Committee on Appropriations
Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-TX-29): Committee on Financial Services
Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX-30): Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Committee on the Judiciary
Rep. John Carter (R-TX-31): Committee on Appropriations
Rep. Julie Johnson (D-TX-32): Committee on Foreign Affairs, Committee on Homeland Security
Rep. Marc Veasey (D-TX-33): Committee on Energy and Commerce
Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (D-TX-34): Committee on Financial Services
Rep. Greg Casar (D-TX-35): Committee on Education and Workforce, Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
Rep. Brian Babin (R-TX-36): Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure
Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-TX-37): Committee on Ways and Means
Rep. Wesley Hunt (R-TX-38): Committee on Natural Resources, Committee on the Judiciary
Trump keeps winning, Democrats are screwed, more “questionable” Democratic vote drops, a couple of disturbing deaths (only one TDS-related), and a Disney princess dines on shoe yet again. Plus: Satan!
There is a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth among Democrats, following Donald Trump’s unexpected (by them) victory. How could this possibly have happened? is the question newspapers, television hosts, and Democratic pundits are asking.
It actually isn’t a hard question to answer. The Biden/Harris administration had an indefensible record, and Kamala Harris didn’t seriously try to defend it, absurdly presenting herself as the candidate of change, while at the same time unable to identify a single respect in which her administration would be different from Biden’s.
Voters were unhappy about inflation, about the economy in general, and about the border. The Democrats, having created these problems, had no solutions to offer. Instead, they tried to tell voters that their concerns were imaginary.
Also, Kamala herself was a lousy candidate.
But the reality is worse than that. As the dust settles, I think Democrats will realize they are in a deeper hole than they thought. It was no coincidence that Harris refused to say what her position was on a variety of issues, earning the title of the “no comment” candidate–something that must be unprecedented in presidential history. The problem wasn’t that Kamala was tongue-tied, the problem was that the Democrats no longer have a coherent policy agenda.
The one issue that Harris never refrained from talking about was abortion. That is, today, the Democrats’ signature–and arguably only–issue. Apart from a fervent devotion to abortion, up to the moment of birth and beyond, what do they stand for?
A few years ago, the energy in the Democratic Party was in its socialist wing. Several of its seemingly up-and-coming representatives were members of the Democratic Socialists of America, and Bernie Sanders is the grand old man of socialism. On one memorable occasion, Nancy Pelosi was unable to explain how a Democrat is different from a socialist.
But the bloom is off that rose. Socialism was never a serious alternative for America; it is a discredited ideology that has been rejected around the world. And socialism is not a plausible ideology for a party whose core demographic is people who earn over $200,000 a year.
The Democrats are the party of DEI and Kamala Harris was a DEI candidate, but DEI is widely unpopular. The United States has labored under affirmative action, of which DEI is the current iteration, for 50 years. But Americans don’t like race discrimination or sex discrimination, and they believe in merit. An unbroken history of polling, stretching back for decades, has found that race and sex discrimination in employment and education are unpopular. Despite the massive corporate, government and cultural pressure that has tried to force DEI on Americans, that remains true. DEI, now on its way out, can hardly be the basis for future Democratic campaigns.
Opening the borders and admitting millions of illegal immigrants has been the core policy priority of the Biden administration, as reflected in Biden’s day-one executive orders. But it was a policy prescription that Democrats were never able to openly articulate and defend. Thus, as the 2024 election approached they were reduced to making the absurd claim that “the Southern border is secure.” Open borders are deeply and correctly unpopular, and do not provide a platform on which any future Democrat can run, although no doubt we will see plenty of tearjerking stories about illegals who are being deported.
Etc. Democrats are on the loser side of pretty much every issue.
It’s confirmed that Trump won Arizona, completing his sweep of all swing states.
The most pro-Trump demographic in 2024 was…American Indians. Huh. Maybe they want jobs and oil and gas money more than “land grab statements” and changing the names of sports teams.
Just because Trump won an overwhelming victory doesn’t mean that Democratic Party vote fraud has stopped. “Bucks County Commissioners Vote to Count Illegal Ballots as Pennsylvania Senate Race Heads for Recount…”I think we all know that precedent by a court doesn’t matter anymore in this country, and people violate laws anytime they want,” Marseglia said. “So for me, if I violate this law, it’s because I want a court to pay attention to it.” I didn’t get the outcome I wanted so I’m going to break the law is quite the legal strategy.
The Texas Democrat Party Chairman, Gilberto Hinojosa, has announced his resignation after a significant statewide electoral defeat in Tuesday’s election.
Hinojosa, a South Texas lawyer first elected to the role in 2012, has overseen a period marked by Democrat losses, particularly among Hispanic voters and in border counties.
Despite ongoing claims that Texas was on the verge of “turning blue” for over a decade, Democrats have failed to secure a statewide victory in 30 years. In Tuesday’s election, President Donald Trump won Texas by more than 13 points, including victories in 12 of the state’s 14 border counties. U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz also defeated his Democrat opponent by approximately nine points.
Speaking to KUT News on Wednesday, Hinojosa attributed the party’s loss partially to its focus on radical gender ideology. For example, during the party’s convention in June, delegates were addressed by a female drag queen (a woman dressed as a man dressed as a woman). When asked about “transgender rights,” he responded, “I think what the Democratic Party has to realize is that there’s some things that we can support and some things that we cannot. And when we’re pressed upon to take votes of these kinds, we need to be mindful of the long-term consequences of these choices.”
Of course, then he had to issue a groveling apology to the alphabet people. And that’s why you continue to lose…
Republicans select John Thune as the next majority leader, beating out John Cornyn and Trump pick Rick Scott (another Floridian), who came in a distant third. Senate’s gonna Senate.
Confirms an educated guess:
I VOTED TRUMP/MAHA/UNITY. I hope others will do the same.
For some reason, many people seem to think I’m not voting. For the record, that is NEVER my move. My typical approach is: “If you don’t have a candidate in this election, vote (as if) in the next one.” That usually means…
“The mayor of Jackson, Mississippi, Antar Lumumba, has been indicted on federal bribery charges. Also indicted: Aaron Banks, who is a councilman, and Jody Owens, the county DA…another city council member, Angelique Lee, pled guilty to “conspiracy to commit bribery” charges in August. I get the impression she hasn’t been sentenced yet, and I’m wondering if she’s now a ‘cooperating witness.'” I know you’ll be shocked to learn that Lumumba is a Democrat…
The wins keep coming. “Republicans Flip 23 Texas Appeals Court Seats. GOP judicial candidates won 25 of 26 contested courts of appeals races on Tuesday’s ballot.”
“Union Member in Austin Files Lawsuit Challenging Constitutionality of National Labor Relations Board. Dallas Mudd was prevented from holding a decertification election at his workplace.” Given recent Supreme Court rulings against the administrative state, this probably has a fair chance of success.
Major Nielsen ratings plunge at MSNBC since Trump won, practically every day since. Just one example – 10/30 Wednesday vs Fri 11/8 – Morning Joe 1st hour – down 39.6% Morning Joe 2d hour – down 36.9% Andrea Mitchell – down 39.7% Ari Melber – down 49.6% Joy Reid’s Reidout – down…
Speaking of Hollywood liberals who can’t help themselves, Rachel Zegler has, yet again, opened her mouth and inserted her foot, wishing hatred on Trump voters. There’s a brilliant strategy, alienating more than half the country in a fit of pique. Seriously, has any actress in all Hollywood history ever done more damage to a film’s prospects than Zegler has to the live-action Snow White reboot? Update: Disney forced her to apologize.
Costco recalls 80,000 pounds of butter because it doesn’t say it contains milk. They can’t define a woman or butter. Now enjoy a vaguely related Family Guy clip.
The wife of a well-known transgender writer has been charged with murdering her father with an ice axe the night of Donald Trump’s election to the presidency. She then allegedly shattered the windows of the $800,000 Rainier Valley, Washington, home in which she and her father lived in what she claimed was an “act of liberation,” according to charging documents.
Corey Burke, 33, who is married to transgender writer Samantha Leigh Allen, the author of “Real Queer America: LGBT Stories from Red States,” was discovered after the death of her father, Timothy Burke, 67 — who had health issues — “smiling and clapping covered in her loved one’s blood, cops said,” according to The New York Post, which added that Burke “allegedly confessed to investigators the next day that she killed her father with the ax and also by strangling him. She also admitted to biting her father while choking him, the docs alleged.”
Yikes. I guess a lesbian who married a guy pretending to be a woman isn’t the most stable person in the world…
Another disturbing death: “Man found dead in Planet Fitness tanning bed three DAYS after entering gym.”
“Three Activists Charged with Burning-Cross KKK Hoax to Benefit Black Mayoral Candidate.” “Derrick Bernard Jr. (aka Phoenixx Ugrilla), 35; Ashley Danielle Blackcloud, 40; and Deanna Crystal West (aka Vital Sweetz and Sage West), 38, are accused of conspiring to stage the phony hate crime and then alerting the media to prop up Mobolade’s ultimately successful campaign.” All this to support candidate Yemi Mobolade…who won.
“Hollywood Braces for a Woke Backlash in the Wake of Trump’s Election.”
“Liberal users are leaving X in a huff in the wake of President Trump’s 2024 election victory over the support of its owner, Elon Musk, for the President-elect and the platform’s right-ward shift.” Why yes, when you just lost an election in which every single demographic group and region moved away from you and toward the candidate you hate, then obviously the problem is that you just came in contact with too many dissenting voices and the solution is to retreat further into your own echo chamber where non-leftwing/non-SJW thought cannot penetrate. Brilliant!
“Documentary alleges 21,000 workers have died working on Saudi Vision 2030, which includes The Line,” AKA Neom. Now the Saudis are scumbags, and I wouldn’t put shockingly poor work conditions and covering up worker deaths past them, but those numbers are absolute bullshit, since that’s around four times as many as died during the entire period building the Panama Canal, and I’m pretty sure 21st century Saudi Arabia doesn’t have as big a problem with malaria as late 19th and early 20th century Panama.
“Democrats Denounce Satan As ‘Too Moderate.'” “Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi reportedly confided in aides that Satan was being kind of a pest by continually asking Democrats to pretend to be sane just for a while so he could get some of them elected. ‘The nerve of that guy!'”
After lengthy deliberation and thought, and considering the tremendous talents of many others, I have decided that the person best suited to assume the position of Vice President of the United States is Senator J.D. Vance of the Great State of Ohio,” Trump said. The former president highlighted Mr. Vance’s record as a Marine, a graduate of Yale Law School, and a bestselling author.
Mr. Vance, at just 39 years old, will be the youngest vice presidential nominee of a major political party since President Nixon ran with President Eisenhower in 1952. The Ohio senator was elected in just 2022, making him a candidate with some of the least experience in modern history.
He has made his mark as an “anti-woke” warrior in the upper chamber, and has made it clear that American foreign policy must be geared much more toward the interests of the American middle class rather than the more obscure goals of protecting democracy and upholding international defense obligations.
Mr. Vance’s stances on foreign policy issues — including saying that America should play a small, if not nonexistent, role in helping Ukraine in their war with Russia — does not frighten some of the more establishment members of his party.
Senator Cornyn, the number two Republican in the upper chamber, tells the Sun that the GOP has been having thoughtful foreign policy debates within the party for more than 100 years.
“These discussions on how active the United States ought to be around the world have been long-standing disputes, going back to at least World War I,” Mr. Cornyn said, adding that he was happy to see “a new generation of people” taking the helm of the Republican Party.
A senior advisor to Trump who was granted anonymity to speak freely tells the Sun that choosing Mr. Vance as the veep candidate is a sign that the GOP is playing offense between now and November.
“J.D. [Vance] is going to do well with veterans. Huge veteran population in New Hampshire … Hug veteran population in Virginia,” the source says. “It’s gonna be a battle to the end. Why was Vance the best pick for that? Because he’s young, because he’s a Marine. … There are alot of people who said: ‘Leave him in the U.S. Senate’, and there are a lot of people who said that because he may have been the president’s best advocate in the Senate.”
Speaker McCarthy, who spoke briefly to the Sun after the announcement, says Mr. Vance will held the party do well in the typical “blue wall” states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin.
Of the various possibilities floated as a possible Trump VP pick, Vance is a better choice than Nikki Haley (duh), Marco Rubio (a lightweight I never understood the appeal of), better than Doug Burgum for age-balancing the ticket (though not on executive governance experience), and possibly not as electorally savvy as Tim Scott. Maybe the blue collar Hillbilly Elegy author will help Trump further crack the “blue wall,” though I think Trump scooped all the votes in rural white demographics he’s going to, especially with the Biden Recession still raging. Trump leads in Ohio by 10+ points, so winning Vance’s home state (a traditional VP pick criteria) isn’t a concern. Also, Vance himself only won the state by six points in his 2022 Senate race.
I’m enthusiastically behind Vance’s anti-woke crusade, though Trump should already have all the anti-woke votes locked up.
Once of the biggest drivers behind the Vance pick may simply be loyalty, an area Trump obviously felt previous Vice President Mike Pence was lacking in.
Trump seems to have a deeper innate understanding of the American electorate than anyone in my lifetime save Ronald Reagan, and frequently decisions that seem puzzling at first (even to me) have a way of working out. There’s an extremely high chance the Vance VP pick will work out as well.
After the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) proposed a new rule expanding federal firearm license (FFL) requirements, the Office of the Texas Attorney General and Gun Owners of America filed a joint lawsuit challenging the rule, and on Sunday secured a federal court order blocking the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) from enforcing the rule against certain plaintiffs.
The DOJ claimed the rule was to help implement the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (BSCA) authored by Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), but critics, including Cornyn, say the Biden administration violated the law and the Constitution in proposing the rule.
The rule has prompted Cornyn to file a resolution of disapproval in the U.S. Senate seeking to strike it down legislatively.
Under the rule, gun owners would be forced to obtain an FFL and perform background checks before selling firearms in a wide range of new circumstances, including if they rented a table at a local gun show.
However, the court order by Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk compares the language of the BSCA against the new rule, highlighting how FFL requirements evolved from the original statute contained in the Firearm Owners Protection Act (FOPA) of 1986 to the current statutory language in the BSCA, and finally compared that to the new rule.
The FOPA required those “engaged in the business” of dealing firearms to have an FFL. It defined such persons as one “who devotes time, attention, and labor to dealing in firearms as a regular course of trade or business with the principal objective of livelihood and profit through the repetitive purchase and resale of firearms.”
The BSCA changed the “engaged in the business” definition, broadening it by eliminating the requirement that a person’s “principal objective” of purchasing and reselling firearms must include both “livelihood and profit,” by shortening the requirement to just someone who predominantly earns a profit, Kacsmaryk explained.
He also noted the BSCA did not alter an existing exemption for a person who “makes occasional sales, exchanges, or purchases of firearms for the enhancement of a personal collection or for a hobby, or who sells all or part of his personal collection of firearms.”
Kacsmaryk wrote the new rule likely violated statutory laws in several ways, beginning with the requirement that a person who sells a single firearm or discusses selling a firearm could be subjected to licensure requirements under the rule conflicts.
Another provision he said likely runs afoul of the BSCA is the prohibition of firearms obtained for personal protection from being counted among the guns a firearm owner may sell from their personal collection.
“Nothing in the foregoing text suggests that the term “personal collection” does not include firearms accumulated primarily for personal protection — yet that is exactly what the Final Rule asserts,” Kacsmaryk wrote, adding the DOJ’s defense of that provision is “untenable.”
“I am relieved that we were able to secure a restraining order that will prevent this illegal rule from taking effect,” Paxton said in a statement on the order. “The Biden Administration cannot unilaterally overturn Americans’ constitutional rights and nullify the Second Amendment.”
en. John Cornyn (R-Texas) took up two pieces of Second Amendment-related legislation last week, filing a resolution of disapproval aiming to shoot down a proposed rule by the Biden administration to require federal firearms licenses (FFL) for most private gun sales, and a separate bill seeking to relax taxes imposed on firearms regulated under the National Firearms Act (NFA).
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) proposed a rule that greatly expands the circumstances in which someone is required to hold an FFL in order to sell a firearm, and when someone must conduct a background check on a potential buyer.
In proposing the rule, the Department of Justice (DOJ) said its purpose was to finalize the implementation of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (BSCA), legislation authored by Cornyn that passed in 2022. However, Cornyn says the rule violates congressional intent.
The rule would greatly expand upon the circumstances in which someone is required to obtain an FFL, including if they rent a table at a gun show, make firearm purchases in an amount that exceeds their reportable income for a specific period of time, create records that track profits and losses from firearm sales, or any combination of a litany of details that could result in requiring a license.
According to Cornyn, the BSCA was motivated after the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde that killed 19 children and two teachers. He also provided the mass shooting in Odessa as an example of what the bill was intended to prevent.
Addressing media questions regarding the resolution, Cornyn pointed out that the Odessa gunman was known to suffer from mental illness. He obtained the rifle used in the city-wide shooting spree from a Lubbock man who was purchasing bulk rifle parts from the internet, which he would assemble into functional rifles and sell as part of a regular business.
The man who sold the AR-15-style rifle to the Odessa gunman, Marcus Braziel, was convicted of acting as an unlicensed firearm dealer and failing to conduct a background check that would have prevented the sale of the rifle.
“Those making a living or profit for a business motive was the focus of the law, not those casually buying or selling their personal guns,” Cornyn told reporters.
“This rule is proof that the Biden administration is a dishonest broker, and Congress must hold it accountable for its actions in favor of its gun-grabbing liberal base over the Constitutional rights of law-abiding Americans,” Cornyn added in a statement on the resolution.
The resolution currently has 45 co-sponsors in the Senate.
The NRA has some new officers, and there are a few surprises.
Bob Barr representing the Old Guard did win the Presidency. The vote was 37-30. Then the surprises began. Bill Bachenberg from the reform slate went head to head with Blaine Wade for 1st VP and won 36-31. Following that, reformer Mark Vaughan, president of the Oklahoma Rifle Association, beat Tom King 35-31. King really represented the Old Guard and his defeat was a sea change in attitude on the Board.
Second, and what I consider the biggest surprise, Doug Hamlin, Executive Director of Publications and the reformer’s choice for EVP, beat Ronnie Barrett for EVP/CEO. There is some talk that Hamlin is intended as an interim choice while a nationwide search is conducted.
The excessive power that Wayne LaPierre gathered to the Executive Vice President position is part of the problem with the office, and is what let LaPierre turn the NRA into his own personal fiefdom. A lot of that should be stripped away and returned to the board.
More NRA news: The move to Texas resolution failed. Short term, there’s no question that move to Texas was planned as a Hail Mary to extract LaPierre from the legal troubles his corruption had ensnared the NRA in, and in that it failed. Long term, it probably is in the best interest of the NRA to move to Texas, as the state is a lot more friendly to gun rights, both politically and culturally, than either New York or Virginia.
And speaking of NRA news, I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that Dwight covered his trip to the convention, so if you’re interested in that, head over there and just keep scrolling.
Now that Ken Paxton has been acquitted of all charges, Paxton can talk about the forces that conspired to push his bogus impeachment, which he does in this interview with Texas Scorecard’s M.Q. Sullivan.
MQS: “We had a secret investigation take place in the Texas House, with unsworn witnesses offering uh what John Smithy described as triple hearsay as evidence [and] no public hearings.”
MQS: “It’s been said that the Republicans were told this is a loyalty vote to the speaker of the House [Dade Phelan], and if it’s taking out Ken Paxton is what it takes to show loyalty, you have to do it.”
KP: “Democrats have figured out they can block vote. There’s 65 of them. Right now they block vote. They go to the Republicans and they say ‘We’ll get you elected as as speaker if you do what we say. We want to negotiate this deal.’ And so then that speaker who’s really controlled by the Democrats only needs 10 Republicans votes and then the Democrats effectively control [the House].”
KP: “I don’t think it’s any accident that the Biden Administration’s Department of Justice had two lawyers involved with the House investigating committee.”
KP: “I think the Biden Administration was tired of being sued. We’d sued him 48 times in two and a half years, and have been relatively successful with those cases, and I think that was a directive to the Democrats.”
KP: “[Phelan] was directed by the Democrats.” House Republicans need to be as united as Democrats.
KP: “They never had any evidence, and they obviously didn’t when they got to the Senate floor. But I think the message was ‘Do what we tell you to do or else.'”
MQS: “It seemed apparent to a lot of observers that the old Bush machine was ratcheted up against you. Johnny Sutton, Karl Rove, folks like that, who had not had much to say about Texas politics, their fingerprints were all over this from from very early on.” Sutton held several roles at the state and national level under George W. Bush, and was eventually appointed U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Texas.
KP: “This whole Coincidence of George P., after, what, 10 years of not having his license, on October 1st he asked the State Bar to get his license back. That just so happened to be that later that day that the these employees of mine told me that they’d turn me into the FBI. So somehow on that same day, before I knew about it, George P. is applying for his license.”
KP: “I think that that was the first sign that the Bush people were involved in this. And I think you can see from Johnny Sutton representing every one of these employees, that he was he’s doing this for free for the last three years, without ever sending a bill or even having a fee arrangement, that doesn’t make any sense either.”
KP: “Karl Rove wrote the editorial and he was directed, and I think given, that editorial by Texans for Lawsuit Reform. So you have all of these Bush connections that sought to get rid of me.”
MQS: TLR “is a group that has been kind of the de facto business lobby for more than two decades.”
KR: “They have definitely changed. They become a lobby group. They’re beholden to large, either corporate interests or individual interests, that don’t necessarily reflect the views of the Republican party.”
Sullivan suggests Paxtons problems may have started when he started targeting big tech and big pharma.
KP: “There’s a reason that we we’re looking at Big Tech, because they control the marketplace and they’re trying to control speech and control entire market activity on on advertising. There are issues related to them being deceptive in how they advertise, and also in what they tell consumers about what they’re doing with their information.”
KP: “Big Pharma obviously involved in this vaccine mandate, and potentially getting away with not actually testing their their vaccine, and telling us it does one thing when it does another.”
Paxton also brings up the role of banking as an industry that may not have been happy with him.
In another interview with Tucker Carlson, Paxton said he considers Texas Senator John Cornyn “a puppet of the Bush family” and will consider running against him in 2026.
Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell has been out of the public eye for weeks, following a serious fall that hospitalized him. Now multiple sources confirm that Senators John Barrasso of Wyoming, John Cornyn of Texas and John Thune of South Dakota are actively reaching out to fellow Republican senators in efforts to prepare for an anticipated leadership vote — a vote that would occur upon announcement that McConnell would be retiring from his duties as leader, and presumably the Senate itself.
One source says that Cornyn has been particularly active in his preparations, taking fellow senators with whom he has little in common to lunch in attempts to court them.
Requests are being targeted at a plethora of conservative senators, including the sixteen who voted to delay the leadership election earlier this year, a proxy for opposition to McConnell’s leadership. Rick Scott, the Florida senator and former NRSC head who challenged McConnell, ultimately received ten protest votes. These members could prove key to determining the next Republican leader. Queries are also being made internally about the rules regarding replacement, and how the contest would be structured given the lack of an obvious heir apparent.
McConnell fell at a dinner event for the Senate Leadership Fund on March 8 at the Waldorf Astoria, formerly the Trump Hotel, in Washington, DC. He suffered a concussion, and only after being treated at a hospital and at his home did murmurs begin that he might be unable to return to the Senate. These discussions increased in volume based on the inability of other senators to do their jobs — with California’s Dianne Feinstein missing votes due to a shingles diagnosis and John Fetterman of Pennsylvania’s hospitalization for depression.
McConnell has guided the Republican Senate since 2007, and his role at the top of the party has been enormously significant.
Indeed.
This link comes from Ace of Spades, who is quite enthusiastic about McConnell being shown the door. “You need to spend some more time with your Chinese donors and corporate bagmen, Mitch.”
I’m a bit more sanguine.
The job of the Senate Majority/Minority leader is to be the hated asshole. (Lyndon Baines Johnson is widely regarded as the most effective Senate leader of the 20th century, and he was an absolute fucking tool.) Herding cats in the Senate requires the leader to be the heavy, and the balancing act means that partisans will always be disappointed in a leader’s actions. After all, disappointment is steeped into the Senate by design, as the cold saucer to cool the hot tea of the House.
Cornyn is one of my senators, and I’m not enthused about him taking office. Scott would be better. Thune used to be solid but has turned squishy. I don’t know much about Barrasso, but his Heritage Action rating (a quick-and-dirty rating, but better than nothing) is 85%, which seems low for Wyoming.
Whoever does replace McConnell as GOP leader in the Senate, it’s almost a certainty that we’ll be comparing him unfavorably to McConnell within a year.
I’ve extensively covered Hunter Biden’s extensive illegal activities, some of which involve his father Joe. With interference from the FBI, DOJ, and the entirety of the Democratic Media Complex, any real investigation into Hunter’s misdeeds and influence peddling was pushed back until after the 2020 presidential election.
U.S Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) and 32 other Senate Republicans, including Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), wrote a letter to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland asking him to grant special counsel protections and authority to U.S Attorney David C. Weiss for his investigation into Hunter Biden.
Biden, son of President Joe Biden, is being investigated over his previous involvement with a Ukrainian gas company while his father was vice president; he’s facing allegations of tax code violations and unregistered lobbying.
Weiss is a Trump-appointed prosecutor who was kept on by the Biden administration. He is already leading the investigation into Hunter Biden, but these GOP Senators state that authority is not enough to limit political influence from the Department of Justice (DOJ).
The senators criticize Garland for “politicizing” the DOJ, stating that he promised to do the opposite.
“On October 4, 2021, you unleashed [the] DOJ’s National Security Division and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, among other criminal components, on millions of concerned parents across the country, who were exercising their First Amendment rights to be involved in decisions about their children’s education,” they wrote.
“We have received hundreds of pieces of correspondence detailing how your memorandum chilled constitutionally protected speech.”
The letter highlights the FBI’s raid of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home and criticizes the lack of “measurable efforts” to prevent violence against Supreme Court Justices in the wake of the Dobbs decision.
Some of the Hunter Biden controversy stems from his role as a board member of Ukrainian gas company Burisma from 2014 to 2018.
A joint report released by the U.S. Senate Homeland Security and Finance Committees allege that a significant conflict of interest arose as a result of Hunter Biden’s position and that of his father
At the time, the U.S. government was pursuing an anti-corruption investigation into Ukraine and Burisma owner Mykola Zlochevsky.
Hunter Biden is accused of lobbying U.S. officials for Burisma interests while then-Vice President Joe Biden was the “public face of the administration’s handling of Ukraine.” This was at the height of the anti-corruption investigation pursued by the U.S. government.
The report also states, “Hunter Biden was serving on Burisma’s board when Zlochevsky allegedly paid a $7 million bribe to officials serving under Ukraine’s prosecutor general, Vitaly Yarema, to ‘shut the case against Zlochevsky.’”
Hunter Biden is also accused of taking millions from a Chinese energy firm with connections to the Chinese Communist Party. President Joe Biden said on Sunday evening that the United States would directly engage China militarily if it invades Taiwan — a contrast from the administration’s previous position.
The senators’ letter states, “Given that the investigation involves the President’s son, we believe it is important to provide U.S Attorney Weiss with special counsel authorities and protections to allow him to investigate an appropriate scope of potentially criminal conduct, avoid the appearance of impropriety, and provide the additional assurances to the American people…that the investigation is free from political influence.”
“As detailed by Senator Grassley, ‘highly credible’ whistleblowers have come forward to detail a ‘widespread effort within the FBI to downplay or discredit negative information about’ Hunter Biden.”
“Instead of encouraging FBI and DOJ whistleblowers to report crimes and promote government transparency,” the senators wrote to Garland, “you took the inexplicable step of chilling lawful whistleblower activity.”
Actually, it’s super-duper explicable, if you assume that Garland’s number one priority is protecting members of the Democratic Party. Indeed, this seems to be the Prime Directive of the current DOJ, a few honest holdouts notwithstanding.
For that reason, I expect zero serious examination of Hunter Biden’s shady deals.
Unless, that is, the Obama Administration powers behind the throne (Ron Klane, Valerie Jarrett, Susan Rice, etc.) decide Biden must be eased out well before 2024.
Given that, it’s no surprise that Cornyn was booed at last week’s Texas GOP convention.
Before he could get a word out, the boos descended upon Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) during his speech at the Texas GOP convention.
After getting up to the podium, about a minute and a half went by before Cornyn could even begin his speech. The crowd’s objections were a direct response to the role Cornyn is playing in the U.S. Senate in bartering a gun reform bill pushed in the wake of the Uvalde shooting.
Cornyn knew full well he was walking into the lion’s den, stating, “I will not approve any restrictions for law-abiding gun owners, and that’s my red line. And despite what some of you may have heard, that’s what our plan does.”
Citing conservative lodestar William F. Buckley, the founder of National Review, Cornyn added, “Someone needs to stand athwart history, yelling stop.”
Each time he repeated this formula, the crowd returned fire, yelling “Stop!” at Cornyn.
The senior Texas senator did receive some applause when touting Trump-appointed judges and pro-life legislation, and when criticizing critical race theory and rising crime rates.
Right after Cornyn left the stage, Attorney General Ken Paxton took the stage and delivered a tacit shot at the senator — with whom he has sparred before.
“We have some Republicans who are trying to run from the fight (to preserve gun rights), and we need to remember their names next time they’re on the ballot,” Paxton warned. Earlier this month, Paxton said Texas “will be the first to sue” if the federal government passes a gun bill that “infringes on our Second Amendment Rights.”
Here’s some video to judge for yourself:
If it’s just a matter of “enforcing existing laws” as Cornyn states, why isn’t he holding hearings on why the Biden Administration refuses to enforce those laws? Why cooperate with the party that seeks complete civilian disarmament rather than actually stopping criminals?
Says Michael Quinn Sullivan: “The senator seemed stunned by the response, clearly not expecting grassroots activists to understand what he had been pushing in Washington with the Democrats.”
The longer Cornyn has been in office the squishier he’s gotten (a sadly familiar pattern), not only on gun control but also illegal alien amnesty. He’s gone from “pretty reliable conservative” to someone whose feet you have to hold to the fire to keep from drifting left on the latest burst of media hot air, and the latest chorus of boos shows that Republican activists know it.
The imperfect status quo in gun laws is vastly preferable to any “reform” the current congress is likely to cook up.
The “infrastructure” bill was already a dog’s breakfast of hard-left graft wish lists. But Democrats also want to use it as a Trojan horse for illegal alien amnesty as well:
What better time to push through amnesty for potentially millions of illegal immigrants than during the Biden border crisis? As tone-deaf as the plan is, that is exactly what Senate Democrats are planning to do in the $3.5T infrastructure bill. A decision has not been made on the numbers yet but Senator Dick Durbin, the Senate Democratic Whip, confirmed this week that it will happen. Democrats will try to push through immigration reform in the budget process.
With the news being reported today that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer wants to bring a trial vote on infrastructure to the floor of the Senate by Wednesday of next week, this is an interesting turn of events. Add that to the ruling by the federal judge who determined that DACA is “an illegally implemented program”, and immigration reform has come to the forefront of political discourse once again. In the past, it has been an issue that a bipartisan group gets together and comes up with a plan to move immigration reform through Congress but at the last minute it always falls apart and the issue gets kicked down the road. This plan will likely include those people designated as Dreamers, farmworkers, and possibly essential workers like those who worked as health care workers during the pandemic.
Politico reports that this plan is being hatched by leaders of the Progressive Caucus, the Hispanic Caucus, and the Black Caucus. The biggest cheerleaders for this move are Senators Durbin, Bob Menendez, and Bernie Sanders. Rep. Raul Ruiz of California is chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and he says, “This is currently our best effort.” Democrats privately admit that this is likely their only chance to ram through immigration reform.
So far, the idea is attracting little resistance from Democrats, even with their threadbare margins in both chambers. House Democrats, which have struggled on broader immigration bills, have already unanimously backed a pathway to citizenship for those Dreamers, farmworkers and immigrants previously granted Temporary Protected Status, known as TPS. Another option is extending a path to citizenship for all TPS recipients.
The possibility of success with this scheme is in question. It would have to survive the Senate’s budget rules in order to pass without Republican support. The Senate parliamentarian is a former immigration lawyer, by the way. Democrats say they will work with the parliamentarian to get as far as they can. Will the parliamentarian rule against including a pathway to citizenship in the budget process? That is the question. She ruled against Democrats including the minimum wage increase in a coronavirus aid bill earlier this year.
You would think that Republicans would have learned from their past mistakes not to give an inch on any amnesty until Democrats are willing to fully fund and enforce border security. However, Texas Senator John Cornyn, who has flirted with amnesty proposals in the past, is doing it again, pushing for an amnesty for DACA recipients (AKA “Dreamers”) that Obama changed the status of by executive order, and which somehow courts ruled President Trump was unable to rescind via executive order.
Any illegal alien amnesty, no matter how tiny, should be completely off the table until the border is secure.
