{"id":163500,"date":"2026-02-13T18:16:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-13T18:16:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/163500\/"},"modified":"2026-02-13T18:16:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-13T18:16:07","slug":"ken-paxton-on-course-for-john-cornyn-runoff-in-texas-senate-republican-primary-internal-poll","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/163500\/","title":{"rendered":"Ken Paxton on course for John Cornyn runoff in Texas Senate Republican primary: internal poll"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014 Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton<\/a> has a clear lead in the Lone Star State\u2019s Senate Republican primary over incumbent John Cornyn<\/a> \u2014 putting the two on a collision course for a May runoff, according to a new poll commissioned by Paxton\u2019s principal campaign committee.<\/p>\n

The Pulse Decision Science survey found that 36% of likely GOP primary voters support Paxton, 27% back Cornyn and 15% prefer Rep. Wesley Hunt (R-Texas). Another 22% said they were undecided about who to support.<\/p>\n

Early voting for the March 3 primary starts next week, with a runoff between the top two candidates set for May 26 if no contender gets above 50%.<\/p>\n

A separate independent poll from the University of Houston\u2019s Hobby School of Public Affairs<\/a> also found Paxton ahead of Cornyn, 38%-31%, while Hunt registered just 17%.<\/p>\n

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton holds a clear lead over incumbent Sen. John Cornyn in the Texas GOP primary. REUTERS<\/p>\n

A JL Partners poll first reported by The Post<\/a> last week showed Hunt ahead of Cornyn, 25.7% to 21.7%, with Paxton again in the lead at 27% among likely Republican primary voters.<\/p>\n

The RealClearPolitics polling aggregator<\/a> shows Paxton in front with 29.8% of the potential primary vote, Cornyn close behind with 27.8% and Hunt in third place at 19.5%.<\/p>\n

President Trump has not endorsed any of the three Republicans, though all have sought to claim the mantle of his Make America Great Again movement.<\/p>\n

Both Paxton and Hunt have attacked Cornyn as a Washington insider \u2014 with the Texas AG\u2019s campaign releasing an AI-generated digital ad last month showing the four-term Republican senator doing \u201cthe Washington waltz\u201d with potential Democratic challenger Rep. Jasmine Crockett.<\/p>\n

About 27 percent of likely primary voters prefer Cornyn. REUTERS<\/p>\n

But Paxton has also battled negative press over his impeachment by the Texas House in May 2023.<\/p>\n

The state Senate acquitted the state AG on 16 articles stemming from his intervening in a lawsuit to aid a political donor \u2014 who was also employing Paxton\u2019s alleged mistress.<\/p>\n

His wife, state Sen. Angela Paxton \u2014 who recused herself from voting \u2014\u00a0filed for divorce<\/a> this past July.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe people of Texas know Ken Paxton, and they know John Cornyn. That\u2019s why, despite being outspent by over $70 million by his opponents where they\u2019ve tried to peddle lies about the Attorney General and hide their own records, Paxton remains in a strong position headed into early voting.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFurthermore, AG Paxton will now tell his story and make his case to the people of Texas through paid media beginning on Friday,\u201d Paxton adviser Nick Maddux stated in a memo accompanying the internal poll.<\/p>\n

Some 15 percent currently back Rep. Wesley Hunt. CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Hunt has also received negative coverage for his history of missing House votes \u2014 including last month when GOP leaders held a vote open to await the congressman\u2019s return to tank a Democrat-backed resolution.<\/p>\n

The measure, if successful, would have blocked Trump from taking further military actions in Venezuela following the US arrest of dictator Nicolas Maduro on Jan. 3.<\/p>\n

The Paxton campaign paid for 800 likely Republican primary voters in Texas to be surveyed Feb. 8-11.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON \u2014 Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has a clear lead in the Lone Star State\u2019s Senate Republican…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":163501,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[2489,61240,287,59873,2424,13164,27,29,28,734],"class_list":{"0":"post-163500","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-texas","8":"tag-exclusive","9":"tag-midterm-elections-2026","10":"tag-politics","11":"tag-primaries","12":"tag-republicans","13":"tag-senate","14":"tag-texas","15":"tag-texas-headlines","16":"tag-texas-news","17":"tag-us-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=163500"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163500\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/163501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=163500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=163500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=163500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}