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Paxton Visits Church, Cruz Rallies Support for Bid

Attorney General Ken Paxton made an appearance at a church in Pflugerville but declined to comment on how he is paying for his new attorney in his pending securities fraud indictment.
Photo via Office of the Texas Attorney General
Attorney General Ken Paxton made an appearance at a church in Pflugerville but declined to comment on how he is paying for his new attorney in his pending securities fraud indictment.

From Texas Standard:This week in Texas politics: in between court appearances, A.G. Paxton visits a church in central Texas and Sen. Cruz rounds up endorsements while Wendy Davis makes an endorsement of her own.

In many political minds, the United States is divided into segments: the liberal coasts, the conservative Midwest and south - and the big Bible Belt. If you were to envision a Venn diagram of segments that overlapped, Texas would appear boldly in the midst of the conservative South and the Bible Belt. So why, one might wonder, would it be big news that a state politician called for Christians to be more engaged in politics?

Here to review the state's political posturing this week –  Emily Ramshaweditor of the Texas Tribune.

The voice calling for Christians to engage by standing up for religious freedom this week was Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who opposed the Supreme Court's ruling on gay marriage on religious grounds, his statement got a lot of traction – but was it surprising?

"What was more surprisingly was that he's kept a relatively low-profile since being indicted on securities fraud charges," Ramshaw says.

She says it is telling that his handful of public appearance have been in churches. After losing a series of lawyers earlier this year, Ramshaw says he has hired another lawyer but it's unclear how he's paying for representation –  at the Pflugerville church a reporter asked about how he's paying and he did not answer the question.

"As with Rick Perry, these things are a long waiting game," Ramshaw says.

Also, this week, a group of Texas lawmakers gave their support for Sen. Ted Cruz's bid for presidency. "Those 40 legislators tend to be the sort of far-right insurgent legislators," she says. "There were no big surprises on that list."

Despite the rally of home-state support, polling numbers are still showing Trump ahead of Cruz in Texas and across the country, Ramshaw says.

After her endorsement of Hillary Clinton, Wendy Davis was  interviewed in Rolling Stone saying she would like to run again – but the question is where.

"She's still considered a celebrity among a particular media set," Ramshaw says.

"The question is whether she has an opportunity in a statewide race or whether she is waiting for this fated Democratic shift in Texas that we have not seen much evidence of."

Copyright 2020 KUT 90.5. To see more, visit KUT 90.5.

Emily Donahue is KUT’s news director. She has spent more than two decades in broadcast journalism and launched KUT’s news department in 2001. Previously, Emily was part of the Peabody-award winning team at Marketplace as producer of the Marketplace Morning Report. Since coming to KUT, Emily has overseen a doubling of the news staff and content, the accumulation of more than 50 local, national and international awards for journalistic excellence and served on several boards, including the Texas Associated Press Broadcasters and as a member of the 2011 Texas Association of Broadcasters Open Government Task Force. Emily lives in Austin and is currently working on her Master’s in Journalism from the University of Texas at Austin.