{"id":277905,"date":"2026-05-04T07:03:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-04T07:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/277905\/"},"modified":"2026-05-04T07:03:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T07:03:08","slug":"john-cornyn-faces-the-ultimate-test","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/277905\/","title":{"rendered":"John Cornyn faces the ultimate test"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ken Paxton is unfit for the United States Senate.\u00a0The Texas\u00a0attorney general\u00a0is\u00a0ethically compromised<\/a>, legally entangled and openly opportunistic<\/a>. His rise is not about leadership. It is about loyalty \u2014 to power, not principle.<\/p>\n

With Texas Republicans now facing a choice between accommodation, scandal and integrity, this Senate race has become a test of political character.<\/p>\n

But the harder truth is this:\u00a0Sen.\u00a0John Cornyn is\u00a0not being\u00a0challenged because\u00a0he\u00a0stood up to\u00a0President\u00a0Donald Trump.\u00a0He is\u00a0being\u00a0challenged\u00a0because\u00a0he\u00a0didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

For years,\u00a0Cornyn\u2019s\u00a0brand has been competence and restraint\u00a0\u2014\u00a0the adult in the room, a steady hand\u00a0when\u00a0others\u00a0chased headlines. That image carried weight because people believed that\u00a0when\u00a0it mattered,\u00a0Cornyn\u00a0would act.<\/p>\n

When\u00a0it mattered,\u00a0he\u00a0didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

When\u00a0the Constitution was tested,\u00a0Cornyn\u00a0stayed quiet.\u00a0When\u00a0the party drifted toward grievance and personal loyalty,\u00a0Cornyn adjusted instead of confronting it. When nominees appeared before the committees he serves, who were plainly unqualified or openly partisan,\u00a0Cornyn\u00a0allowed the process to move forward as if norms still applied.<\/p>\n

I raised concerns with\u00a0Cornyn’s\u00a0staff about Kash Patel\u00a0\u2014\u00a0not casually, but repeatedly and with specificity.\u00a0Cornyn\u2019s staff acknowledged those concerns. In my view, those concerns should have raised serious questions about his qualifications, his independence and his approach to the FBI \u2014\u00a0 treating it not as an institution to protect, but as a tool to use.<\/p>\n

And yet,\u00a0when\u00a0Patel\u00a0sat before\u00a0the\u00a0Senate Intelligence Committee,\u00a0of\u00a0which Cornyn is a\u00a0member, there was no meaningful challenge. No sustained questioning. No\u00a0effort to\u00a0force clarity on the record. The hearing\u00a0proceeded\u00a0as if this were routine.<\/p>\n

It\u00a0wasn\u2019t. It was a turning point.<\/p>\n

We are now seeing the consequences. Leadership decisions that once\u00a0required\u00a0evidence and process are increasingly shaped by alignment and risk. Experienced professionals are sidelined. Institutions built on independence are being bent toward loyalty.\u00a0The\u00a0FBI director<\/a> has repeatedly reduced the bureau\u2019s credibility.<\/p>\n

This didn\u2019t happen all at once. It happened through a series of choices \u2014 moments where people who knew better decided not to act.<\/p>\n

That is what should concern Texans most.<\/p>\n

Because this\u00a0isn\u2019t\u00a0about\u00a0party.\u00a0It\u2019s\u00a0about\u00a0character.<\/p>\n

I spent my career in the Army and the FBI, serving alongside men and women \u2014 many of them Texans \u2014 who understood something fundamental: Your words and your oaths matter, and character matters most when it\u2019s tested.<\/p>\n

That standard\u00a0doesn\u2019t\u00a0change\u00a0when\u00a0you enter\u00a0public\u00a0office. If anything, it becomes more important.<\/p>\n

Texas has never been about blind loyalty or loud grievance. At its best, Texas is about independence, accountability and the quiet expectation that a person\u2019s word means something. It\u2019s about standing your ground when it matters \u2014 not shifting with the moment or chasing power at any cost.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s\u00a0the spirit that shaped the Texans I served with, and\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0the standard\u00a0I still believe this state\u00a0deserves.<\/p>\n

Measured against that standard, the contrast in this race is stark.<\/p>\n

What we are seeing from\u00a0Sen. Cornyn\u00a0is accommodation\u00a0\u2014\u00a0an adjustment to a political environment that demands loyalty over principle. What we are seeing from Paxton is something even more troubling: a pursuit of power unmoored from ethics, accountability or basic fitness for office.<\/p>\n

That is not strength. It is not leadership. And it is not consistent with the\u00a0character\u00a0Texas has always claimed as its own.<\/p>\n

There is, however, another path.<\/p>\n

There is a candidate in this race who has consistently demonstrated a commitment to integrity, service and the courage to stand on principle \u2014 even when it is not politically convenient.<\/p>\n

I will cast my vote based on\u00a0character.<\/p>\n

And for Texans who believe our leaders should reflect the best of who we are, the\u00a0clear choice\u00a0is\u00a0Democratic state Rep.\u00a0James Talarico.<\/p>\n

Matthew J. DeSarno is a retired FBI special agent in charge of the Dallas Field Office, with a career spanning the Army, the private sector and more than two decades in federal law enforcement.<\/p>\n

Have\u00a0thoughts\u00a0about this?\u00a0Send a letter to the editor\u00a0using our letters form<\/a>\u00a0or email\u00a0letters@dallasnews.com<\/a>. Letters should be no more than 200 words and include the first and last name of the writer and city of residence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ken Paxton is unfit for the United States Senate.\u00a0The Texas\u00a0attorney general\u00a0is\u00a0ethically compromised, legally entangled and openly opportunistic. His…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277906,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[27,29,28],"class_list":["post-277905","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277905","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=277905"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277905\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277905"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277905"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277905"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}