AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has long denied corruption accusations that have dogged him for years. But as his impeachment trial gets underway, another defense is emerging: that fellow Republicans plotted to oust him.
His attorneys have so far presented no evidence in the trial, which continued Thursday, that Paxton was the victim of an attempt to replace him. But as former aides give testimony about how Paxton pressured them to help a political donor who was under FBI investigation, Paxton's attorneys have raised questions about lobbyists and a meeting at Gov. Greg Abbott’s office, and have brought up George P. Bush, who lost to Paxton in last year’s Republican primary.
“It was not a mutiny,” Ryan Bangert, one of Paxton’s former aides, testified Thursday about a group of deputies who reported their boss to the FBI in 2020. “We were protecting the interest of the state and protecting the interest of the attorney general and, in my view, signing our professional death warrant at the same time.”
The start of the trial is putting into view how lawyers for Paxton, who has been shadowed by criminal charges and an ongoing FBI investigating for years, intend to defend one of Texas' most powerful figures. Paxton has pleaded not guilty to the articles of impeachment, which center on accusations of bribery and abuse of office.
The waving at a broad conspiracy is an extension of how Paxton has spent months denouncing his impeachment by the...
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