Attorney General Ken Paxton defeated incumbent Sen. John Cornyn in the Texas Republican primary runoff Tuesday, ending the senior senator’s two-decade hold on one of the state’s most powerful seats.
Paxton’s victory is a blunt statement of Trump-era Republican politics — Cornyn, a four-term senator first elected in 2002, was cast by primary opponents as insufficiently aligned with the president.
Trump himself had signaled support for Paxton, whose primary campaign leaned hard into loyalty to the White House.
The result arrived as Trump chaired his 12th Cabinet meeting of his second term in Washington. The session drew attention for what remained unresolved on the table: a framework deal with Iran that could avert military conflict has yet to be finalized, according to reporting reviewed by the Wail.
Administration officials have offered no firm timeline on the Iran negotiations. The Cabinet meeting produced no public statement on that front as of Tuesday afternoon.
Paxton will face the Democratic nominee in November’s general election for the Texas Senate seat. The general election is scheduled for November 4, 2026.