{"id":2027685,"date":"2023-09-11T06:25:02","date_gmt":"2023-09-11T10:25:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-case-against-ken-paxton-is-all-hat-no-cattle\/"},"modified":"2023-09-11T06:29:28","modified_gmt":"2023-09-11T10:29:28","slug":"the-case-against-ken-paxton-is-all-hat-no-cattle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-case-against-ken-paxton-is-all-hat-no-cattle\/","title":{"rendered":"Ken Paxton&#8217;s Case Lacks Substance"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">10<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fthe-case-against-ken-paxton-is-all-hat-no-cattle%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2027685&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div class=\"article-content\">\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The Impeachment Trial \u200dof Warren Kenneth Paxton<\/h2>\n<p>The first\u200d week of the\u200d impeachment\u200b trial of Warren Kenneth Paxton, the attorney general of Texas, came to a \u2062close\u200c Friday with some\u200c courtroom fireworks, but the testimony\u2064 generally left observers who \u2062were promised substantial proof of crimes wondering where all the \u200d\u201cshock and awe\u201d was.<\/p>\n<p>On Tuesday morning, the\u2062 trial was gaveled in by Lt. Gov. Dan\u2063 Patrick, sitting as judge before the entire Texas Senate, who are sitting as jurors. Almost\u2063 immediately Paxton\u2019s team made a variety of dismissal motions designed as \u2063test votes to discern where senators would lean on some of the more muddled \u200cand controversial impeachment articles. A\u2062 handful \u2064of Republican senators\u2063 voted\u200d to dismiss some, and a small cadre voted consistently to dismiss all, but\u200c each motion was denied by a solid majority of senators.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Before any witnesses were \u2064called, Judge Patrick exhorted the jury that\u200c according to the rules\u200c of the impeachment court that they had passed, only evidence \u200dthat\u200c was sworn <em>before<\/em> these proceedings could be considered as they assessed their final votes. While it may \u2062seem obvious, it was an important reminder and a\u2063 subtle rebuke of the Texas House, which had infamously \u2062rammed the impeachment resolution through the House in less \u2064than 48 hours over the Memorial\u200c holiday weekend in May after receiving\u2064 a mix\u2064 of closed and \u2062public third-hand summary testimony from \u200dsworn investigators who were recounting\u2064 interviews from witnesses who had not been sworn during their\u2062 own interviews.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Witness Testimony \u2063Went from Awkward to Worse<\/h3>\n<p>The House prosecution team\u2019s first witness was Jeff \u200bMateer\u200b who served as first <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/former-prison-nurse-found-guilty-of-sexually-assaulting-9-inmates\/\" title=\"Ex-Prison Nurse Convicted of Sexually Assaulting 9 Inmates\">assistant attorney \u2064general<\/a> under Ken \u200dPaxton. Mateer is \u200da widely respected Christian whose \u200bbiggest claim to \u200cfame\u200d was having his nomination for district judge under President\u200b Trump scuttled for being too conservative. In his testimony, he came across as an Alex Vindman-style bureaucrat\u2064 defending the \u201cinter-agency consensus\u201d who was upset at Paxton for marching to his own drum and\u2062 not strictly hewing to departmental policies \u2064\u2014 as actual elected officials are often wont to do.<\/p>\n<p>Defense Attorney\u2063 Tony Buzbee put on\u200b a masterclass in deconstructing a \u200bweb of complex allegations made by an otherwise credible witness. He offered innocent, compelling, and credible\u200b explanations for everything that drove\u200d the whistleblowers to assume Paxton\u2019s conduct was illegal, which Mateer struggled to refute. Mateer also came across as\u200b remaining deeply offended and judgmental about Paxton\u2019s prior confessed \u200cextramarital affair, which had clearly caused a rift between him and Paxton, thereby keeping any innocent explanations for Paxton\u2019s conduct from being candidly communicated \u200bbetween the two men.<\/p>\n<p>Next up was Ryan Bangert who served as deputy first assistant attorney general.\u200c His primary claim of misconduct was that during Covid, Paxton \u2062had sought to \u2063get official guidance released to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-case-against-ken-paxton-is-all-hat-no-cattle\/\" title=\"Ken Paxton's Case Lacks Substance\">forestall public \u201ccourthouse step\u201d foreclosure sales<\/a>. Bangert\u2019s theory of misconduct was that all along this was an effort to help Nate Paul\u2019s business interests, which he \u200dacknowledged \u2064was based on media reports, not any investigation of Paul\u2019s particular circumstance. Nate Paul was a friend \u200cand donor of Paxton who was persistent if not downright obnoxious in trying \u200cto leverage his connections with Paxton for help with his \u200bvarious legal troubles. Paxton\u2019s lawyer credibly established that because Paul had filed for bankruptcy prior to the time when the guidance was released \u2014 which automatically stayed the foreclosure \u2014 the guidance\u200d didn\u2019t benefit Paul \u2062at all.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>The\u2062 cross-examination \u2063derailed into additional back and forth about how offended Bangert was with how \u200dthe attorney\u2062 general didn\u2019t\u2063 follow the internal process for official opinions, which at one point had Bangert bizarrely arguing\u2062 a hyper-technical interpretation of Texas \u200dgovernment code. In Bangert\u2019s telling,\u2064 it \u200dmeant the\u2063 informal guidance that he himself had authored really was an official opinion \u2062under the statute, \u200beven though the guidance letter literally \u2064said, \u201cPlease note this \u200dletter is not a formal Attorney General opinion under section 402.042 \u2062of\u200d the Texas Government Code; rather it is intended only to convey informal legal \u200bguidance\u201d \u2014 as the closing\u200b line right above\u200d Bangert\u2019s own signature block.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Ryan Vasser, the final \u2063OAG lawyer to be called as a witness, nearly single-handedly broke the Central Texas drought with his \u2063own waterworks on the \u2063stand, and that was before he\u2062 had to publicly explain the cringe group texts \u200bmaking\u200b fun of his co-workers that he and his fellow whistleblowing \u2064wunderkinds had shared between themselves. Recall \u2062these were lawyers\u200c in the process of staging a mass\u200b exit, reporting their boss to the FBI, and \u2063seeking whistleblower protections \u2014 and they didn\u2019t have the good sense to consider that \u2063their text \u200cmessages would be discoverable during any future litigation.<\/p>\n<p>Vasser\u2062 was also the\u200d witness\u200c who acknowledged under cross-examination by Mitchell Little \u2062that\u2064 <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/TheMattBeebe\/status\/1699959983813591389\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">they \u201ctook no evidence\u201d<\/a> when reporting the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/new-york-ag-calls-for-investigation-into-cuomo-harassment-claims-with-subpoena-power\/\" title=\"New York AG Calls For Investigation Into Cuomo Harassment Claims With Subpoena Power\">elected attorney general<\/a> of Texas to the FBI whom <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/TheMattBeebe\/status\/1700122233547469256\">he \u2062had \u201cno reason not to\u201d trust<\/a>. He also acknowledged that for three years he\u200d and his fellow whistleblowers haven\u2019t paid a \u200csingle dime for representation from a high-powered Austin attorney <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/bwaltens\/status\/1700173658684105064\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">who just happens to be linked to Paxton\u2019s primary opponent, George \u200dP. Bush<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Iconic Texas Lawman Testifies<\/h3>\n<p>The final witness of the week was Texas Ranger \u200cDavid Maxwell, who served as Paxton\u2019s deputy\u2064 attorney general for criminal\u2063 justice. There is a mythology around Texas Rangers, and his resume alone ensured his testimony would capture the attention of the senators of the impeachment jury. He initially came across as\u200b a folksy, \u2062Andy Griffith-type \u2062guy\u200c sent from central casting to play the role \u200bof a tough Texas lawman. His allegations were powerful and, \u200dfor most of his time on the stand, appeared extremely credible.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>In Maxwell\u2019s telling, his concern began when Paxton advocated for the\u2063 AG\u2019s office to open an investigation \u2062into Nate Paul\u2019s alleged mistreatment by the FBI\u2063 and Texas DPS during a\u200c raid. Paul\u2019s contention was that the feds did him\u200b dirty by illegally altering the search warrants \u2062after the \u200cfact to expand\u200c their scope \u2064just to get him. His technical experts theorized that there was \u2064altered metadata in the digital versions that proved \u200dthe documents were changed.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Maxwell quickly developed the opinion \u201cthat Nate Paul was a criminal that we should \u2063not be associated with.\u201d \u2063Accordingly, he dragged his feet and\u200d ultimately refused to \u200bopen a formal investigation into the alleged FBI and DPS misconduct. Paxton, convinced of the idea the FBI was untrustworthy \u2063\u2014 not particularly far-fetched\u200d given what \u2062transpired with President Trump \u2014 eventually hired outside counsel to help explore and\u200b adjudicate Paul\u2019s claims, an act that would eventually become the primary catalyst for the \u201cwhistleblower\u201d complaints.<\/p>\n<p>Maxwell now claims any investigation into alleged law enforcement misconduct on behalf of Nate Paul would have been \u2063committing several federal \u2064crimes, including obstruction of \u2064justice and interfering with \u2063a federal investigation. It\u200c should be noted that\u200d three \u2063years hence, neither \u2062the FBI nor the hostile-to-Republicans Travis County district attorney\u2019s office sought charges for the investigation that was eventually opened at Paxton\u2019s direction.<\/p>\n<p>When pushed on the speculative nature of many of his claims and how he was\u2064 failing to\u200c make clear delineations between what he\u2063 <em>knew<\/em> versus what he \u2064 <em>suspected<\/em>, Maxwell demurred and argued that \u2064all he did was \u201cgive an \u200dinvestigative committee a lead to go and investigate,\u201d effectively \u2062shrugging off the lack\u2064 of evidence to support his claims as someone else\u2019s fault. This didn\u2019t sit well with Paxton\u2019s lawyer Dan Cogdell, who appeared to \u200cbe building up to accuse Maxwell of leveraging his vast\u200c experience \u200cat being a savvy witness to deliberately obscure the fact that \u200bhe wasn\u2019t speaking with \u201cpersonal knowledge\u201d when all heck \u200dbroke loose.<\/p>\n<p>After Cogdell suggested he was playing games from the witness \u2063stand, Maxwell\u200c sheepishly \u200dsmirked and said \u201cmaybe,\u201d which elicited laughter in the Senate chamber. Cogdell wasn\u2019t impressed and quickly and sternly accused him of playing a \u201cgame to throw people\u2062 off\u201d instead of \u201ctestifying \u200bto the truth.\u201d Maxwell dramatically paused \u2064and stared\u2062 Cogdell down and then became\u200b even more recalcitrant with the remainder of the \u2062cross.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Easily the most important moment in <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/bwaltens\/status\/1700258135309750390?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Maxwell\u2019s testimony<\/a> was when he \u2064stated, \u201cI didn\u2019t know if it was correct or incorrect.\u200d I passed it \u2064onto the House, that\u2019s their job.\u201d Admitting that his prior unsworn allegations to the House\u2019s investigators were speculative and not based on personal knowledge was\u200c a shocking admission.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Too Many Indians Fashioned as Chiefs<\/h3>\n<p>From the offered testimony, \u2064it\u2019s clear that in early 2020, discontent within \u2062the AG\u2019s office was coming to a crescendo. Against \u2063the backdrop of Covid craziness and a boss who had earlier confessed to and sought forgiveness from his leadership team, with his wife by his side, \u2063that he had\u200b been \u200dunfaithful, the leadership team \u2064became increasingly suspicious of Ken Paxton. What \u2063resulted was a toxic stew of \u201cworst possible assumption\u201d sprinkled with an \u201cI\u2019m\u2064 smarter than everyone else \u200bhere\u201d attitude that crippled that office.<\/p>\n<p>The rift widened as senior staff began arrogating \u200dto themselves the authority of the elected \u200battorney\u2062 general when he was in another state with the fig leaf of Paxton being \u201cabsent\u201d as justification, and Maxwell \u2063dragging his feet to thwart an investigation that Paxton wanted. Whether frustration with their boss begat suspicions around his integrity, or suspicions around his integrity begat their frustration is, at this point, unknowable to the outsider.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The First to\u2062 Plead His \u200cCase Seems Right \u200cUntil Another Comes and Examines Him<\/h3>\n<p>Maxwell\u2019s\u2062 admission highlighted how the House had largely just \u2064repeated suspicions and innuendo as fact\u2062 in their \u200bimpeachment articles and never did any sort of credible investigation that \u2064cross-examined the claims disgruntled people were making.\u2062 During the brief House impeachment debate in May, Rep. Matt Schaefer <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/lukemaciastx\/status\/1700175156952383513?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">rose to ask<\/a> \u200c if \u201cany member of the general investigations committee had cross-examined a\u2062 witness?\u201d Chairman Andrew Murr answered, \u201cWe hired long-skilled and qualified attorneys and investigators \u200bto do \u200cthat work for us.\u201d One wonders if he now regrets the decision \u200dto take that \u200cshortcut.<\/p>\n<p>With all \u200cfour witnesses, the\u200b defense did an effective job shaping their counter-narrative that\u200b self-righteous \u200band self-appointed defenders of the \u200dbureaucratic imperative had zealously judged\u2064 Paxton\u2019s conduct through a glass darkly, reinforced each other with \u2064a toxic cynicism, and lost\u2062 all perspective during their own makeshift in-house star chamber \u2064rush \u2064to judgment. \u2062The Texas House did no better in their so-called investigation before\u2063 they rushed through hastily assembled articles of impeachment.<\/p>\n<p>The degree to \u2063which the defense was able\u2063 to offer clear and concise explanations only serves to underscore how derelict the House investigators were and how much this\u200c entire affair has been \u2064a \u2064sham from the start. House members involved in pushing this should\u2064 be \u200dembarrassed \u200cto\u200b have foisted this upon Texas. It\u2019s a shameful abuse of the machinery of the state, a complete corruption of the important process \u2062of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/tennessee-gop-establishment-pushes-bill-to-hamstring-challengers-and-doxx-conservative-donors\/\" title=\"Tennessee GOP Establishment Pushes Bill To Hamstring Challengers And Doxx Conservative Donors\">holding elected officials accountable<\/a>, and a stain on each elected official involved.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The impeachment trial of Texas Attorney General Warren Kenneth Paxton concluded its first week with courtroom drama. However, observers expecting solid evidence of crimes were left disappointed. The trial commenced on Tuesday morning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2120,"featured_media":2027686,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[546],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2027685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-federalist"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2027685","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2120"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2027685"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2027685\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2027686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2027685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2027685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2027685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}