{"id":667684,"date":"2026-05-27T08:20:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T08:20:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/667684\/"},"modified":"2026-05-27T08:20:16","modified_gmt":"2026-05-27T08:20:16","slug":"mayes-middleton-defeats-chip-roy-for-texas-attorney-general-gop-nomination","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/667684\/","title":{"rendered":"Mayes Middleton defeats Chip Roy for Texas attorney general GOP nomination"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mayes Middleton defeats Chip Roy for Texas attorney general GOP nomination<\/p>\n

Published 9:55 pm Tuesday, May 26, 2026<\/p>\n

\n By Eleanor Klibanoff, The Texas Tribune\n <\/p>\n

Galveston state Sen. Mayes Middleton is the GOP nominee for attorney general, after defeating U.S. Rep. Chip Roy. Middleton, one of the most conservative state legislators and an oil and gas executive, put almost $17 million of his own money into the race.<\/p>\n

The race, like others in recent weeks, proved the GOP\u2019s continued loyalty to President Donald Trump, as \u201cMAGA Mayes\u201d pummeled Roy for saying Trump engaged in \u201cclearly impeachable conduct\u201d on Jan. 6, 2021, and supporting Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis\u2019 failed 2024 presidential bid.<\/p>\n

This is the first open race for attorney general in more than a decade, after Attorney General Ken Paxton decided to challenge U.S. Sen. John Cornyn. Under Paxton, the agency has become the linchpin of a national effort to push conservative causes through the courts, an effort Middleton and Roy both vowed to continue.<\/p>\n

Middleton came from behind to beat Roy\u2019s name ID lead during the primary, thanks in large part to the millions he put into television ads and mailers, promoting his loyalty to the president. While Trump didn\u2019t endorse in the race, Middleton touted the president\u2019s previous positive comments about him, promising to work hand-in-hand with the Trump administration on conservative goals.<\/p>\n

He also ran on his record of passing hard-right legislation, including limiting what bathrooms trans people can use, barring trans people from sports teams that align with the gender they identify as, and putting the Ten Commandments in public school classrooms.<\/p>\n

Roy offered a nearly identical ideological vision for the agency, promising to use it to go after Muslim organizations, left-leaning district attorneys and election fraud. After entering the race as the presumptive frontrunner on name recognition alone, he faced an uphill climb over his relationship with Trump and the MAGA movement.<\/p>\n


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Roy, a fourth-term Austin congressman, former federal prosecutor and top aide to Paxton at the attorney general\u2019s office, criticized Middleton as inexperienced and unprepared for the job. Middleton is a licensed attorney, but has worked exclusively for his family oil business. He says he has practiced civil law as part of his work.<\/p>\n

A cadre of GOP donors stepped up in the homestretch to help Roy get that message out, making the most expensive attorney general\u2019s race in U.S. history all the more costly. Roy outspent Middleton on ads during the runoff, although Middleton spent more during the entire cycle.<\/p>\n

Roy carved a solitary path in Congress as a conservative firebrand with an uncompromising commitment to small government. He delayed and derailed priority legislation, clashed frequently with party leaders and took on often quixotic battles with fellow conservatives over spending limits and constitutional law.<\/p>\n

Roy\u2019s tension with Trump, and GOP leadership, showed he had the independence necessary to be Texas\u2019 next attorney general, he said, often citing Trump\u2019s comment from last summer saying Roy is \u201cnot easy, but he\u2019s good.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no greater compliment that [Trump] could give me,\u201d Roy said at a campaign stop earlier this month. \u201cThe guy that we praise for the Art of the Deal, the guy that we think is so strong in negotiating with other countries, to say that I\u2019m not easy, but I\u2019m good? That\u2019s what I want in our attorney general, whether it\u2019s me or someone else.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Trump\u2019s approval ratings have bottomed out nationally, he remains extremely popular among Texas Republicans, with 82% approving of the job he\u2019s doing as of April.<\/p>\n

\u201cRoy has had a problem there, and he chose to lean into those conflicts and use that as potentially as a strength,\u201d said Joshua Blank, research director at the Texas Politics Project. \u201cBut if recent races are any guide, deviation from the president is not of any value in the Republican primary.\u201d<\/p>\n

Middleton will now face his former colleague, Dallas state Sen. Nathan Johnson, in November. Johnson beat out former Galveston mayor Joe Jaworski on Tuesday night, securing his chance to try to reclaim the agency for the Democrats.<\/p>\n

Johnson has promised to restore the agency\u2019s non-partisan functions, like child support enforcement and consumer protection. He\u2019s also said he will stand with blue state attorneys general in pursuing litigation against the Trump administration.<\/p>\n

\u2014 This article first appeared on The Texas Tribune.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mayes Middleton defeats Chip Roy for Texas attorney general GOP nomination Published 9:55 pm Tuesday, May 26, 2026…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":667685,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4,450,451,3,452,453],"class_list":["post-667684","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667684","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=667684"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667684\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/667685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=667684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=667684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=667684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}