AUSTIN, Texas — The Texas Senate on Tuesday rejected all of Ken Paxton’s efforts to dismiss the articles of impeachment against him prior to a trial, moving forward with the historic event.
Setting the tone, The Senate denied Paxton’s first two motions by votes of 24-6 and 22-8, the Texas Tribune reported.
The first motion asked the Senate to throw out all of the articles of impeachment for lack of evidence. Twelve Republicans joined all Senate Democrats in the vote to essentially move forward with a trial.
The 12 Republicans were Sens. Brian Birdwell of Granbury, Pete Flores of Pleasanton, Kelly Hancock of North Richland Hills, Joan Huffman of Houston, Bryan Hughes of Mineola, Phil King of Weatherford, Mayes Middleton of Galveston, Robert Nichols of Jacksonville, Charles Perry of Lubbock, Charles Schwertner of Georgetown, Kevin Sparks of Midland and Drew Springer of Muenster.
The six GOP senators who voted to dismiss all of the articles were Paul Bettencourt of Houston; Donna Campbell; Brandon Creighton; Bob Hall; Lois Kolkhorst and Tan Parker.
The second motion asked senators to exclude evidence from before Paxton’s current term. That motion struck at the heart of one of Paxton’s main arguments — that he cannot be impeached for any actions he allegedly took before he was reelected last year.
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The House impeached Paxton in May, alleging a yearslong pattern of lawbreaking and misconduct. He was immediately suspended from his job and the Senate trial, which started at 9 a.m. Tuesday, will determine whether he is permanently removed from office.
There were two dozen pretrial motions. A simple majority is required to approve any pretrial motions, and Paxton’s team challenged all articles of impeachment both individually and altogether. Under trial rules, the presiding officer, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick can rule on them unilaterally but has to put them to a Senate vote if they would lead to dismissal of any articles. A simply majority vote is required for those motions.
If the Senate proceeds to a trial, a two-thirds vote is required to convict Paxton. That means that if all 12 Democrats vote to convict, half the remaining 18 Republican with a vote have to join them. Paxton's wife, Sen. Angela Paxton, is disqualified from voting but allowed to attend the trial.
Paxton, who pleaded not guilty to all 16 articles, has called the impeachment a “politically motivated sham."
Editor's note: An earlier version included a typo that said Paxton pleaded guilty.
This story comes from The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans - and engages with them - about public policy, politics, government, and statewide issues.