Cornyn, who previously opposed Democratic efforts to end<\/a> the filibuster, flipped on the issue on Wednesday, writing in an op-ed in the New York Post, \u201cMy fellow conservatives and I have proudly used the 60-vote threshold to protect the country from all sorts of bad ideas and dangerous policies. But when the reality on the ground changes, leaders must take stock and adapt.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFor many years, I believed that if the US Senate scrapped the filibuster, Texas and our nation would stand to lose more than we would gain,\u201d Cornyn wrote.<\/a> \u201cAfter careful consideration, I support whatever changes to Senate rules that may prove necessary for us to get the SAVE America Act and homeland security funding past the Democrats\u2019 obstruction, through the Senate, and on the president\u2019s desk for his signature.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThis could be a \u2018talking filibuster\u2019 that removes the obstructionists\u2019 free pass and makes them defend their indefensible views on the Senate floor, or it could be a different reform,\u201d Cornyn said, placing the blame on the Democrats for previously threatening to reform the filibuster already.\u00a0<\/p>\n Cornyn\u2019s piece came about a week after Paxton said<\/a> he would \u201cconsider dropping out of this race if Senate Leadership agrees to lift the filibuster\u201d on the voter ID measure, and called Cornyn out for not openly backing the talking filibuster.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is [Cornyn] effectively countering the Paxton move to say that he would drop out if the Senate passed the SAVE Act,\u201d said Mark Jones, a professor of political science at Rice University. \u201cThis is to probably try to reduce the benefits that Paxton was obtaining from that gambit,\u201d like drawing up more support within the Republican base.\u00a0<\/p>\n He said a Trump endorsement, particularly for Cornyn, would be \u201cpivotal,\u201d adding that Trump\u2019s decision not to endorse has helped Paxton become the \u201cprohibitive favorite\u201d while his backing the attorney general would help \u201cseal the deal.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n After Cornyn published his op-ed Wednesday, Paxton said<\/a>, \u201cIn one week, I\u2019ve made him more conservative than in the past 24 years.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Cornyn has been a fixture in Texas Republican politics for decades, usually winning reelection by comfortable margins, and has also built deep relationships throughout the top ranks in the Senate, having served as the chamber\u2019s No. 2 GOP leader and as National Republican Senatorial Committee chairman during his time in the Senate.\u00a0<\/p>\n But he has had a hot-and-cold relationship with Trump that is coming back to haunt him.<\/p>\n Recent polling shows Cornyn and Paxton running neck-and-neck, often with the AG running ahead of the incumbent despite being embroiled in a series of political and personal controversies<\/a>. Texas Public Opinion Research released a survey <\/a>March 9 showing Paxton leading Cornyn 49 percent to 41 percent.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhat Cornyn is trying to do is win over some of the MAGA supporters who are on the fence in the sense that they prefer Paxton on policy, but they\u2019re horrified or disgusted by his personal behavior,\u201d Jones said.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis is just another way that Cornyn can try to diminish any difference between him and Paxton on issues that are important to Donald Trump,\u201d Jones said, while also allowing Cornyn \u201cto simultaneously, essentially say, \u2018You get the same pro-Trump vote and pro-Trump senator with me and Paxton but I give you near a 100 percent chance of ensuring that I\u2019ll be in office in January of 2027 and Republicans will have a majority.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Leadership and its campaign arms, like the NRSC, have maintained their backing of Cornyn, privately expressing concerns of Paxton not competing as well against the Democratic candidate, State Rep. James Talarico. Members of Trump\u2019s campaign team remain in Texas to help Cornyn as well.<\/p>\n Cornyn told reporters he gave Senate Majority Leader John Thune a heads up before his op-ed was published and said he didn\u2019t think \u201che was surprised.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t anticipate we would find ourselves in a position where Democrats reflexively oppose anything and everything that the administration wants to do,\u201d Cornyn continued. \u201cI\u2019m unwilling to sit by and watch President Trump\u2019s agenda wither on the vine for the next two years.\u201d<\/p>\n Cornyn, Thune told reporters Wednesday, \u201cis one of 53 Republican senators \u2026 and the opposition to nuking the filibuster runs very, very deep in our conference.\u201d<\/p>\n The Senate is planning to vote next week on the SAVE America Act in some capacity, though details of how that will play out procedurally on the floor is yet to be determined.\u00a0<\/p>\n Asked if the issue will impact the midterm elections, Thune said, \u201cThe midterms, as you know, especially in the second term of a presidential administration, are always a little dicey to start with. I think the midterms are gonna be about the economy and that\u2019s why I think we\u2019re focused on that.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cGreat to have the SAVE Act if we could do it, but as has been made very clear \u2026 we don\u2019t have the votes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Jones said Cornyn is \u201cfighting fire with fire.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cInitially, Paxton was able to get a modest advantage by being disingenuous\u201d about actually dropping out, he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cNow Cornyn is narrowing that advantage by being equally disingenuous \u2026 knowing full well that they are not going to get rid of the filibuster.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Texas is more than a thousand miles away from Capitol Hill, but the race between Sen. John Cornyn…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":200490,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[10738,38281,2133,7810,145,918,288,10740,79107,2946,3309,25785,1910,4491,188,71567,79108,1631,8002,287,7398,2424,2220,13164,11317,27,29,28],"class_list":{"0":"post-200489","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-texas","8":"tag-campaigns","9":"tag-conservatives","10":"tag-democrats","11":"tag-donald-j-trump","12":"tag-donald-trump","13":"tag-economy","14":"tag-elections","15":"tag-executive-branch","16":"tag-filibuster","17":"tag-homeland-security","18":"tag-john-cornyn","19":"tag-john-thune","20":"tag-leadership","21":"tag-national","22":"tag-new-york","23":"tag-nrsc","24":"tag-oped","25":"tag-opinion","26":"tag-policy","27":"tag-politics","28":"tag-polling","29":"tag-republicans","30":"tag-science","31":"tag-senate","32":"tag-stock-market","33":"tag-texas","34":"tag-texas-headlines","35":"tag-texas-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200489","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=200489"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200489\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/200490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/sotu_TW_273_022426-1-1024x683.jpeg\")
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton talks with reporters in the U.S. Capitol\u2019s Statuary Hall before President Donald Trump\u2019s State of the Union address on Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2026. (Tom Williams\/CQ Roll Call)<\/p>\n