The Texan Podcast - Inside the Impeachment: Paxton on Trial — Day 6 (with Brendan Steinhauser)

Episode Date: September 12, 2023

Read more about the impeachment: https://thetexan.news/paxton_impeachment/Today, attorneys in the impeachment trial questioned Brandon Cammack for most of the day, the special counselor Paxton retained on behalf of the Office of the Attorney General (OAG) to investigate the complaints of Austin real estate developer Nate Paul against federal authorities. Toward the end of the day, some additional witnesses were called to testify, including Joe Brown, who testified about applying for the special counsel job; Kendall Garrison, CEO of Amplify Credit Union; and Darren McCarty, a former employee of the OAG. Some big parts of the day included:The proceedings started about an hour late. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said that the chamber was ready on time, but that the legal teams had an issue to work out before the proceedings began. Brandon Cammack, who got married a week ago and has yet to honeymoon due to the trial, testified that he was hired by Paxton himself to serve as outside counsel for the OAG. He said the attorney general said he wanted to hire a “special prosecutor” to investigate “potential violations of the Texas Penal Code.”Cammack was recommended to Paxton by Michael Wynne, Nate Paul’s lawyer. He said he was “excited” and “flattered” to be working with the OAG.“The only person I reported to was Mr. Paxton,” said Cammack when asked about the allegations that he was working for the Travis County District Attorney’s Office. He said he primarily communicated with Paxton via an encrypted messaging app and Proton email addresses.Cammack, who issued over 30 grand jury subpoenas in his investigation to evaluate Paul’s allegations against federal authorities, said he got the list of names to be subpoenaed from Wynne and Paul. He said he had never issued a grand jury subpoena at the time.Per Cammack, U.S. Marshals showed up at his law office in Houston after he questioned a judge about his deceased wife in his investigation. Cammack voiced his concerns to Paxton and Brent Webster, the first assistant attorney general who replaced Jeff Mateer, at a meeting at a Starbucks in Austin. He testified that Webster informed him there that his contract with the agency was null and void and that he would not be paid for his work. Paxton’s defense pushed back against the line of questioning that asserted Cammack was naive and inexperienced in his role with the OAG.Cammack insisted that he never thought he was investigating a “baseless” allegation and said that Paxton did not “pressure” him to reach a particular conclusion. He testified that he was not trying to help or hurt Paul, allegations outlined in one of the articles of impeachment.The Houston-based lawyer testified that, “I never got any pushback from anyone at the attorney general’s office or the Travis County District Attorney’s Office” until he received a cease and desist letter from Mateer, the OAG’s first assistant attorney general at the time. Brown, a former assistant U.S. attorney, briefly testified about applying for the special counsel role that Cammack filled.Garrison was questioned about the “midnight opinion” allegedly written to help Paul and his business, and testified about Paul defaulting on loans he owed to the credit union.McCarty, who was the deputy attorney general for civil litigation at the OAG, resigned from the office but did not join the whistleblower lawsuit. He gave testimony about the attorney general’s intervention in the Mitte Foundation lawsuit. 

Howdy folks, this is Mackenzie DeLulo, Senior Editor at The Texan. Welcome back to another episode of Inside the Impeachment, Paxton on Trial. Today, attorneys in the impeachment trial questioned Brandon Kamek for most of the day. The special counselor Paxton retained on behalf of the Office of the Attorney General to investigate the complaints of Austin real estate developer Nate Paul against federal authorities. Toward the end of the Office of the Attorney General to investigate the complaints of Austin real estate developer Nate Paul against federal authorities. Toward the end of the day, some additional witnesses were called to testify, including Joe Brown, who testified about applying for the special counsel job, Kendall Garrison, CEO of Amplify Credit Union, and Darren McCarty, a former employee of the OAG.

Here's a recap. The proceedings started about an hour late. Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick said that the chamber was ready on time, but that the legal teams had an issue to work out before the proceedings began. Brandon Kamek, who got married a week ago and is yet to honeymoon due to the trial, testified that he was hired by Paxton himself to serve as outside counsel for the OAG. He said the attorney general said he wanted to hire a special prosecutor to investigate potential violations of the Texas Penal Code. Kamek was recommended to Paxton by Michael Wynn, Nate Paul's lawyer. He said he was

excited and flattered to be working with the OAG. The only person I reported to was Mr. Paxton, said Kamik when asked about the allegations that he was working for the Travis County District Attorney's Office. He said he primarily communicated with Paxton via an encrypted messaging app and Proton email addresses. Kamik, who issued over 30 grand jury subpoenas in his investigation to evaluate Paul's allegations against federal authorities, said he got the list of names to be subpoenas in his investigation to evaluate Paul's allegations against federal authorities said he got the list of names to be subpoenaed from Wynn and Paul. He said he had never issued a grand jury subpoena at the time. Per Kamek, U.S. Marshals showed up at his law office in Houston

after he questioned a judge about his deceased wife in his investigation. Kamek voiced his concerns to Paxton and Brent Webster, the first assistant attorney general who replaced Jeff Mateer, at a meeting at a Starbucks in Austin. He testified that Webster informed him there that his contract with the agency was null and void and that he would not be paid for his work. Paxton's defense pushed back against the line of questioning that asserted Kamik was naive and inexperienced in his role with the OAG. Kamek insisted that he never thought he was investigating a baseless allegation and said that Paxton did not pressure him to reach a particular conclusion.

He testified that he was not trying to help or hurt Paul. Allegations outlined in one of the articles of impeachment. The Houston-based lawyer testified that I have never got any pushback from anyone at the Attorney General's office or the Travis County District Attorney's office until he received a cease and desist letter from Mateer, the OAG's first Assistant Attorney General at the time. Enjoy this episode. Howdy, folks. Mackenzie DeLulo here, and we are on day six of the impeachment trial of suspended Attorney General Ken Paxton in the Texas Senate. I'm joined today by Brad Johnson and Matt Stringer to discuss the proceedings of today. Lots to talk about as always. And today we are joined by a very special guest, Republican strategist Brendan Steinhauser. Brendan, thank you

so much for joining us. Thank you for having me. We're so excited to have you join us. And I want to real quick before we dive into the details of today, I want to hear your perspective on the trial so far. You've been in and around Texas politics for a long time and have a lot of insight to share with our listeners. So tell us what's stood out to you. What's your insight on the arguments from the House Board of Managers and Paxton's defense? How generally do you think things are shaping up so far? Yeah, well, the first reaction to that is this is really fascinating as someone who loves Texas, loves Texas history and Texas politics. We haven't had a scenario like this in a very long time. And

the only thing really similar is the impeachment of Paul Ferguson, the governor from, I guess, the 1920s or so. And so there's not a lot to really fall back on in terms of the procedures and the rules and kind of what history may suggest about what is happening with this trial. So it's been really kind of interesting from that perspective, whether you're a reporter or a senator or a staffer or an operative watching this or a member of the general public, not really knowing what to expect and how it's all going to play out in terms of the order, the rules, the procedures, the processes, and of course, public opinion. I think that's been a big wild card as well,

because everyone says this isn't supposed to be political, but we all know that politics informs this process just like everything else, and it's going to play a big role. So I'd kind of start there and say it's really just fascinating from that perspective. It's been so far, you know, pretty interesting, not a lot of big surprises. I think the Paxton defense team has really done a pretty good job actually trying to make their case, trying to wave off the charges that led to the impeachment. I think overall people would say they've probably exceeded some expectations because there's been a lot out in the public domain about the various criminal trials, about Paxton's relationship with Nate Paul, all the sort of details of his affair and those sorts

of things. And so I think in some ways, I think his defense team has done a pretty good job and I think they've probably earned their paychecks so far. Time will tell. I think it's very hard to get a read on how the senators are actually consuming this information, what they're thinking about, what they're hearing. There is a high bar to vote to convict, both in terms of the evidence and in terms of the numbers that it requires. And so it's really hard to get a sense of what they're thinking or what they're doing, because obviously they're under a gag order. But we're all really watching to see how this thing is going to end up when it wraps up pretty soon. And we're hearing it maybe as soon as this weekend or maybe sometime early next week. But this is one of those rare

instances in politics where it is really completely unpredictable. It's hard to know how this is going to go. And it really could go either way at the end of the day. I love hearing you talk about not knowing how the senators are responding to this in any way right now. I cannot be the only one who's watching the live stream and very meticulously looking for some sort of reaction or facial expression from the senators. And I just haven't seen much at all. I mean, there have been, we've talked about it on the podcast a little bit, you know, you catch a senator putting eye drops in their eye or something like that. But really, there has been no indication of where, you know, folks land just based on

watching them react to testimony. So there's a lot of unknowns there. Let's go ahead and talk a little bit about yesterday. We recorded before a couple of folks took to the stand as witnesses, both former Travis County District Attorney Margaret Moore and former District Attorney employee Greg Cox. Both took the stand after we recorded. Greg Cox was a former employee of the Travis County District Attorney's office and was asked by the prosecution to describe potential crimes that Paxton may have committed while in office. And then the defense came forward and brought forward the fact that he had applied for a job with the OAG after writing that memo that outlined Paxton's potential crimes. Margaret Moore said that she sent the referral for Paul's case back to David Maxwell,

which was, in her words, an attempt to find a delicate way of declining to investigate due to her working relationship with Paxton. She denied that the Democrat-led Travis County DA's office was, quote, excited about the case against the Attorney General, saying in response to the defense, I can't speak for the entire office, but I was not excited about any of this. Matt, any thoughts on that last bit of testimony from last night? Well, I think you summarized the occurrences of yesterday pretty well with Cox. The defense, Busby in particular, on cross-examination made the first appearance of a ham sandwich in the trial, so to speak, and asking Cox if he's ever heard the saying, you can indict a ham sandwich.

And the point to that was that Cox had testified to all these things. You know, Paxton could potentially be charged with. And Busby's counterpoint was, well, you know, if a prosecutor wants to charge you with something, he can just charge you with something, you know. And then started questioning the appropriateness of Cox's testimony in a legal context, you know, and saying, you know, if this was a regular trial, would you be allowed to say that in here? No, you would not be able to come in here and say, well, you know, Paxton could have done this, this, you know, speculate the way he did. So, poking a lot of holes in that testimony. And then his former boss took the stand, Margaret Moore, the former Travis County District Attorney. And you saw the defense, witness after witness, really invoke a defense on Paxton's part as his motivation for appointing the special counsel and saying it wasn't entirely, you know, his call alone that Travis County District Attorney had done this referral.

And so the prosecution went down the rabbit hole on that. And, you know, she admitted, yes, I sent this referral or whatever she called it over to David Maxwell at the Attorney General's office, but with the clear intent that it go nowhere, that he not do anything with it, that, you know, basically she's very bluntly described on the stand that I was essentially giving him service. And I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, we'll look into this. We'll send a referral, all that sort of stuff, intending for it to dead end. With the assumption that she said, or she said that she had the assumption as well, that Maxwell would regard the case the same way she did.

Yes, absolutely. Pretty fascinating stuff. Okay, well, that was a little bit of last night we'll go ahead and jump into today we've had one witness primarily on the stand for most of the day brandon kamak kamak yeah i don't know well this name has been said in four different ways throughout the trial and i have had a very hard time saying it correctly today kamik um but bro why don't you go ahead and give us a quick rundown of the prosecution's questioning of Kamek? So we've heard a lot about Kamek throughout this process.

He is central to the allegations against Paxton as the hired prosecutor, special prosecutor to evaluate Nate Paul's case against the FBI and how the agency handled its investigation and raid of his office in relation to the Middy Foundation suit. His name specifically, Kamak is in Article 5. Kamak testified that he understood his duty in the Paul matter was to prepare a report and submit his findings to Paxton for any action the Attorney General chose to take. He was asked by Paxton to see if the FBI violated any state laws when it searched his office, any altering of the original search warrant, things that according to camac paxton used a proton email and messaging app signal to communicate with him throughout the investigation signals an encrypted messaging app used by honestly a lot of folks in politics but it was notable

yeah and it's especially useful for being able to automatically delete messages. Its high priority is privacy and security. KMAC signed a contract with the Attorney General worth $300 per hour and was tasked with investigating this. During it, he served over 30 grand jury subpoenas. Among those subpoenas was opposing counsel in the Middy Foundation case. The fact that KMAC said he was unaware of and they were included on the suggested list of subpoenas, people to be subpoenaed by Nate Paul and his attorney, Michael Wynn. That was something asked by the prosecution. If he knew that, would he have served them subpoenas? And he said, no.

Yeah. That was a very striking moment. Yeah. And throughout this whole situation, throughout the whole questioning, the prosecution was trying to illustrate him as kind of a novice. He was a young attorney. I think he'd been in the profession for five years. He said on the stand that he had never, he had never served, issued a grand jury subpoena before. And he took a lot of advice from Michael Wynn, Nate Paul's attorney throughout this process. And so he detailed further discussions and actions with the attorney general and his team, and then Nate Paul and Michael Wynn. Overall, the prosecution asserted that Paxton cooked up an investigation into faulty actions by the fbi to run cover for paul and rope this guy uh this newbie into the whole situation and he was none the wiser

one one thing that stuck out to me during the cam at cross-examination by the prosecution was he was asked, did you let Wynn go with you to serve these subpoenas? And he said, yes, I did. And he's like, were you aware or did he tell you about the law that prohibits him from going with you while serving this? He's like, no, I was not aware of that, nor was I made aware. You know, I guess I think he said, nor was I made aware, you know, I, I guess I think he said, nor was I, was I made aware by the AG's office, um, sort of as providing guidance on how to do his job. Um, and, uh, that was kind of an interesting, uh, point that, that, that arose, uh, with, with Wynn inserting himself into going along. And he said that he felt pressured.

And they said, could you describe that pressure? And he said, well, I felt like it was pressure to do a good job, so to speak. And all this investigation continued until things kind of came to a head when Jeff Mateer, the first witness that was called, the former first assistant attorney general and the first whistleblower on these allegations against the attorney general, sent KAMAC a cease and desist letter. Which eventually started the snowball rolling towards this contract between the attorney general's office, Paxton, and thisston attorney to be canceled and it also included an event where u.s marshals showed up to camax office unannounced camac had no idea it was happening he didn't know what was going on he testified um he said you know i'm i'm getting these cease and desist letters and then federal investigators are showing up to my office. What is happening?

And it eventually ended up culminated in this meeting, this weird story that he told of a meeting between himself, Paxton and Webster at a Starbucksbucks where they cancel his contract told him he would receive no payment for the work that had already been done and then almost left him there without his car they took him from the office they drove there together from the office and almost left him there after they cancel or they said that the contract was null and void yes and so um overall as the prosecution's kind of painting the picture here, they asked him if Paxton apologized to this guy for, quote, pulling the rug out from under him. Kamek said no. Yeah. Wild, wild story. So, Brendan, as you're hearing this testimony, as Kamek is being questioned by the House Board of Managers team. What were your takeaways today? Well, I think that, you know, an objective observer has to see with Kamek's testimony that it does appear that, you know, the attorney general was asking for kind of special treatment and favors for Nate Paul.

That seems pretty clear from that testimony. And that is one of the key pieces of the charges brought against the attorney general. Right. So, you know, he does make a case there that there was some irregularities, some odd things like having Paul's lawyer go with him to serve the subpoenas and that sort of thing. So that's one reaction. And then I think the other thing is there was a lot of sympathy probably for Kimmick getting roped into this situation that he probably had no idea what he was getting into.

He talked about how he was just there to, I think, to learn and grow. And it was kind of a career opportunity for him. And now he feels like he got dragged into this thing and doesn't know, you know, if he can ever kind of get out and clear his name, so to speak. So it was kind of a tough situation for him. But again, I think what the prosecution is trying to do here is to say, here is yet another example of the behaviors that they're alleging, right? That the attorney general Paxton used his office in ways that were inappropriate, illegal, et cetera. And so I thought this was an important part of the case for the prosecution. It's going to be very interesting to see where the senators eventually

come down on this particular count. And to your point, Brendan, they, you know, the prosecution did make a point of saying, okay, how did you feel about being contracted by the office of the attorney general? You know, you're a new lawyer, you've been practicing for five years, you're approached by the attorney general's office to do work for the top lawyer, the top law enforcement officer in the state. And he said he was, what were his words? He was like, I'm flattered. I was excited. At one point, lawyers were questioning him about appearing at a press conference with Paxton, and he got this little grin on his face. Very obviously, this was a huge opportunity for him. And I think it does go also to show that these whistleblowers who did work in the office

of the attorney general held very coveted spots in legal circles here in Texas. Working at the attorney general's office is certainly prestigious in many ways. And this was a huge, to your point, Brendan, a career opportunity for Kamek. So certainly a big part of the prosecution's argument here is that, yes, this was a big opportunity. He was paid $300 an hour. He was doing a lot of work. And I think in his initial interview with Paxton, which lasted, what, like 15, 20 minutes, so it wasn't that long. I'm trying to remember exactly how long that first one at the office. He met with Paxton. He went around and Paxton introduced him to Mateer.

He said Mateer was disengaged is how he referred to it. And like disengaged with the work that I would be doing, which kind of falls in line with Mateer's testimony of being very apprehensive about this outside contract being brought into the attorney general's office. So very fascinating testimony. Yeah, it was a, he had a lot to say, a lot of details to provide. And then on the cross, he, they, they kind of tinkered at the edges. They tried to assert that he was not this inexperienced, naive guy.

He was hired for a specific reason, a reason that at least for most of the stretch of this investigation, he was conducting. He was fulfilling the goal of what it was his assignment was. And so the defense attorney, Dan Cogdill also, uh, tried to, as he has done, the defense has done throughout this home in on a, an article in the specific language of the article and try and, um, show how it was errantly written. Uh, We saw it on the first two articles, the Charitable Trust, the second one about the Midnight Opinion. This one, he asked Kammack about the language baseless allegations in this article, the assertion that KAMAC was hired to investigate these baseless allegations that Paul made. He was asked, did the prosecution ever ask you about whether you thought these were baseless allegations? And he said, no, they did not. whether he thinks investigating the FBI is an illegitimate evaluation.

Can a state officer legitimately look into FBI malfeasance? And he said, yes, they can. I don't think it's the FBI's above reproach on this subject, that kind of thing. And then he talked about how he never got any pushback from the Attorney General's office or the Travis County DA's office for doing what he was doing until Mateer sent him the cease and desist letter.

So he was kind of blind to the stakes of what was going on, was his testimony. At least nobody clued him in on concerns they had in the background um what you mentioned matier being apprehensive but he didn't say specifically that you know this is not something i would like you doing right um well it sounded like he had very little communication with the attorney general's office and the staff themselves he was he repeatedly said he reported directly to Attorney General Ken Paxton. Brendan, when you look at this, and you were talking earlier about, of course,

the articles of impeachment being completely central to all of this. When you see Paxton's defense get up there, read the article of impeachment regarding Kamek and ask, okay, were you an attorney pro tem? And he said, no. Do you think you were investigating in a baseless complaint? No. Were you trying to benefit Nate Paul? Absolutely not. Obviously, the defense is going up there and trying to refute the claims in the allegations. And yet you do have the testimony when he was questioned by the prosecution saying, okay, well, Michael Wynn did come with me to issue some of these subpoenas. And there you know, there are all these different instances of, like you said, irregularities. In your mind, when you hear both sides, where does this come down on that article of impeachment?

Well, that is a good question. And I would say that, you know, it seems to me that Kamek is somewhat covering his own self, let me put it that way. I think he's concerned about, you know, how he might get, I don't know, caught up in all of this and probably has some reputational concerns and legal concerns and all sorts of things. So, of course, I could see that body language that, you know, at least he did nothing to his knowledge that was improper. But I don't think that that necessarily prevents it from being true that the intent of, you know, the attorney general was to provide some improper use of the office to provide support to and carry out the wishes of Nate Paul.

So I think that the senators will look to that as the crux of the issue, regardless of what Kamek said about kind of his perception of what he did and whether it was appropriate or not. So that's kind of my take on that particular count. But I think that it did come across to me that it's a pattern that the prosecution is trying to lay out a pattern of the AG using the office to benefit this one particular individual who really stands out. And I think what's interesting about all of this too is the fact that people keep referring

to that donation. Well, any of us who know Texas politics well and who've worked in Texas politics look at a $25,000 donation and say, okay, that's big comparatively speaking to other states or to other places. But in Texas, a statewide elected official, they often get six-figure checks and sometimes seven-figure checks. And so it is a little odd. There had to be something else more than just the donation itself. So I think they're trying to peel away those layers to get at what was the nature of this relationship? What else is there between Paxton and Paul? And so that's what you're seeing with some of these other things. But it is interesting and it's very hard to predict how each individual senator is going to

come down on this. And we've seen the defense constantly home in on specific actions, whether it's the opinion, whether it's hiring a special prosecutor, any of this stuff and saying, well, is that, is that something that the attorney general is not allowed to do? And most of the time the answer is no. The attorney general is within his realm of responsibilities even if it might be unusual an unusual action for him to take um which is why then abusive office becomes such an important term to define and when you have a room full of

senators who are all holding public office their perspective is very different from a regular jury right and bribery bribery and abusive office have kind of gone hand in hand during this but they're two very different charges one is very specific bribery abuse of office is a lot broader and it'd be a lot easier to prove by the prosecution whether they have or not it's a different question but um that's that's why they're focusing on on this aspect more than anything else i think and to brendan's uh point i mean i think the prosecution's trying to lay out the case as best they can and showing that yes and cammock it from all testimony and accounts it seems as though he was a um willing participant but a very unwilling participant in what turned out to actually,

what the alleged intent behind this investigation turned out to be. He was in above his head, didn't quite know what was going on, saw it as a career opportunity to work at the Office of Attorney General, but had no malintent himself. That's what it appears to be at this point. And unwitting. Yes, absolutely. And so when you're looking at this as well And unwitting. Yes, absolutely. And so when you're looking at this as well, it's easy for the defense to come in and say and ask those questions because, you know, the prosecution's trying to lay out the point of the, you know, Ken Paxton hired a naive, inexperienced person to come and carry these

things out on behalf of himself and Nate Paul, but he was naive and inexperienced, so he didn't know. And so he can get up there and be questioned by the defense. At any point, did Ken Paxton ask you to misrepresent the facts? No. Did you have any intent to help or hurt Nate Paul? No. And he can answer those questions very truthfully. So we'll see what happens there. I'm very curious to know, you know, how this actually ends up and I'd be, so I'd pay money to be inside one, a few of these senators brains right now, and how they're perceiving all of this. Um, yeah, we'll see what ends up happening. Brendan, any additional thoughts on the defense's line of questioning? Well, I was going to say, actually,

you know, your, your point on being in the brains of the senators is kind of a fun one because I think a lot of times people just think that they know exactly what those folks are thinking, right? It's so clear that they must be thinking this, they must be thinking that. And I've been in a lot of those conversations where they absolutely don't know what they're going to do. They don't know what they're thinking. They're asking everybody for opinions and advice, trying to figure out what the right thing to do is, the right thing legally, morally, ethically, constitutionally, and politically. And that's hard. Those things don't always line up. And so for me, I have to kind of chuckle a little bit

because right now, because of the gag order and because of the limitations on what they can really say, they don't have those sounding boards, those outside sounding boards in particular, outside of the bubble to really ask people what their opinions are. They have to rely on what they can collect just kind of in the public sphere. So I think this is one of those cases where, again, it's more interesting because they're trying to wade through all of this and make a calculation that's going to be imperfect as to how to vote. And there's certainly pressure coming from different sides, political pressure from Paxton and his allies, pressure from other folks who

are saying, we want you to convict. So it's really kind of an interesting and fascinating study in how policymakers make decisions. And this will be one for the political science professors and historians to study for a long time. Oh, no kidding. Okay. Then I'm very curious, Brendan, to hear your perspective on day one as senators for the first time, we're taking votes and kind of showing a little bit of their cards on those motions right up front. Obviously the gag order prevented them from talking about any of this in the public sphere. And even prior to the gag order, a lot of them had issued statements saying, I'm just ready for a fair trial. I'm not going to be issuing any statements or commenting on what's gone on after the House's vote to impeach. So I'm curious,

were there any big surprises for you when those senators did vote for different motions on day one? That's a good question. I was a little surprised how few senators voted to say, you know, we want to just dismiss these completely, right? That was a very low number. I was a little surprised. I thought it might be a little higher. But, you know, I think the final votes can be quite different and we shouldn't read too much into that. And part of me is thinking, too, back to the federal side where in the U.S. Senate, you have the cloture vote, which is where you need 60 votes to end debate and go to the final vote. And senators in Washington are notorious for voting yes on cloture and no on the final bill so they can have their cake and eat it, too. And so you might see that scenario play out as well.

Yes, we voted to allow this to proceed. We heard all the evidence and then we voted to acquit essentially because the evidence wasn't there and allows them to kind of have it both ways in some aspects. So I thought about that as an apt comparison to kind of keep in mind as we watch this process play out. Yeah, that's a great, great point. Matt, in terms of the defense and the prosecutors, Kamek's quite like questioning today. Did you have any final thoughts on how it all went down? Well, it's, once again, it's difficult to determine what kind of impact it had on the jury. And I think that's just, I just keep thinking about back to the

beginning of all this, whenever everybody kind of raised their eyebrows and thought, well, what kind of trial and court are you going to have, you know, with a bunch of politicians, you know, making the decisions and overseeing it. But you're seeing a lot of praise from across the spectrum for how Lieutenant Governor Patrick has got to play judge and the fairness that he's provided in the process. And I think the fact that everybody is really questioning, wondering, you know, what the senators are thinking and everything like that. It's how anybody would think in any trial, you know, that doesn't have a political thumb on one of the scales. So I think, you know, and also I've thought about this. When it's over, the senators will have to explain their rationale and their votes and whatever their decision is going to be.

There's going to be a lot of parties, constituents as well, you know, who want a good explanation on what they decided one way or the other. So I don't think you're going to see any uh shoot from the hip explanations i think that they're all taking it very seriously and um i think it's i think it's just like any trial would be uh which is an interesting thing like you said for the for the political science professors to study yeah absolutely um absolutely. So, yeah, no, it's just after today's. It's still quite the nail biter in my view. Yeah. As of this morning, I believe the defense had maybe three more hours than the prosecution did of time left in the trial. So, we'll see how that also wraps up. I'm curious, you know, Brendan, Lieutenant Governor

Dan Patrick, I think has done a very good and tactful job of finding a way to not really tick off any of the major stakeholders that might have issues with how the trial is run. You see, you know, the very pro-Paxton side ardently defending him on social media. You see folks who very much want to see Paxton go down and are convinced he's guilty on all counts. And somehow it seems the lieutenant governor has found a way to kind of weave his way into conducting the trial and not having at least a horde of criticism launched his way. I'm curious if you have any perspective on that. Yeah, I think that's a really good observation. He has always had his foot in a little bit of

both camps in the Republican Party, kind of the more kind of Tea Party, conservative, grassroots wing, and kind of the more mainstream Republican. Some would say establishment Republican as well. And on most issues, he's very conservative and leads a very conservative Senate and agenda. I think by all accounts, people would agree with that. But he's in a tough position politically because of just the nature of the Republican primary voters in Texas and what their opinion is on this matter, which is still moving and still somewhat in question among some folks. But Paxton still has a lot of support in the base, in the grassroots. And so I think Patrick is aware of that, but I agree. I think

he's done a real masterful job of, as you said, weaving through that and has managed to not alienate one side or the other. I find it kind of fun and comical to watch him have to decide whether or not to sustain or overrule objections from the attorneys. Now, that is my favorite part of the trial so far, just to watch him do that. So I really enjoyed that. And I'm sure this is not as fun for him as it is fun for me to watch that happen. That's a great point, too. The stakes are much higher for the lieutenant governor than us watching at home and picking apart everything that's happening.

So, folks, since we've been recording or preparing to record in the last hour, there have been three more witnesses who have gone to the stand. Joe Brown is one of them who, Brad, correct me if I'm wrong, and Matt, correct me if I'm wrong, but he was the first choice of the Office of the attorney general to hold brandon kamak's uh role yeah he was a former grayson county district attorney and then was was nominated by both texas senators and president trump and confirmed by the senate to be a u.s attorney during the trump administration there you go and then No, I didn't. And, yeah, as you said, he was one of two people. Brandon Kamek was the one who ultimately got the job, so to speak, for that outside special counsel, whatever that title really was. I'm not entirely clear. Special prosecutor is what Kamek today testified that Paxton called it in interviews.

And ultimately, you know, even though Brandon Kamek was a much newer, so to speak, attorney, Kamek still got the job. Yeah. So and then the next witness was Kendall Garrisonarrison the ceo of amplify credit union um brod you have any idea of what her testimony entailed uh discussing how the bank reacted to the midnight opinion and whether they adjusted their operations because of it how they decided to hold foreclosure auctions or whether even to hold them at all. It looks like from Twitter that they reacted to it in a way that would benefit the prosecution's case that this thing affected policy. But yeah, that was it.

It was a pretty quick testimony, I think. Yeah, there you go. And then the next witness who just took the stand a few moments ago is Darren McCarty, one of the OAG's employees who resigned. He was not one of those who joined the whistleblower lawsuit. But if you've been listening to testimony for the last few days, particularly from the other former employees and some of the whistleblowers, you've heard his name quite often. So I'm interested to hear his testimony.

Brendan, thank you so much for joining us. I'd love to hear any perspective you have on what we should be looking for this week as the trial starts to wrap up. Yeah, I think we'll just continue to, you know, try and pay attention to the closing arguments, even though the official closing arguments are an hour long or so and coming later. But as the prosecution starts to wind up its case and head toward the conclusion to the end of the week, just to see if there is what I would call kind of a smoking gun. And I think so far, I haven't seen that just yet. I've seen a lot of strong arguments here and there, some evidence that they've put forward. I think the witnesses are credible and I think believable to the senators. But I think one thing

a lot of folks are seeing is that there hasn't really been that big moment, that big reveal of something so striking or so, I don't know, shocking that it's going to tip this thing. So maybe that's coming, maybe not. But if it is coming, the prosecution has to do that here in its final few days. And if they don't have that kind of evidence, they don't have kind of a bombshell, then I think this goes right down to the wire and this really could go either way. And as I said at the beginning of the podcast, I think the defense team's done a pretty good job trying to raise doubts, trying to bat away these arguments, trying to say that you

may not like some of this or that, but raising questions as to whether these behaviors meet the standard, the high standard that would lead to a conviction in this case. And so we'll watch for how the prosecution wraps up its case and how the defense is able to continue to play defense. Absolutely. And as a reminder for folks as well, there are 20 articles of impeachment. I believe 16 total are being considered currently or 17, 16. And so those each individual article will be voted on by senators as well. And it only takes one article to be voted on with two thirds for conviction to happen in the Senate. So we'll be watching that very closely. And it's also why we're looking very closely at the individual articles is because those votes will be individualized. Gentlemen, I so appreciate

you joining me today. Brendan, we so appreciate your time. Thank you for joining our little podcast today. Folks, thank you for listening and we will catch you on the next episode. Thank you so much for tuning in to Inside the Impeachment, Paxton on Trial. For access to all of our team's coverage on this historic proceeding, visit thetexan.news and subscribe today.