The Texan Podcast - Inside the Impeachment: Paxton on Trial — Episode 3: The House Votes to Impeach

Episode Date: September 4, 2023

Support The Texan by subscribing at: https://thetexan.news/subscribe/Welcome to Inside the Impeachment: Paxton on Trial.In this special podcast series from The Texan, we're delving into the historic impeachment trial of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, accused of bribery and abuse of office — charges that have set the stage for one of the most riveting political sagas in the Lone Star State.Inside the Impeachment offers an exclusive backstage pass to the trial’s drama, strategy, and real-time developments. Whether you’re a political junkie or simply curious about the inner workings of Texas governance, this podcast is your front-row seat to history in the making. What can you expect?Daily debriefs during the trial, starting September 5thIn-depth analyses of arguments from both sidesBackground context to help you follow the proceedingsExpert interviews and insider insights Ahead of our daily podcasts at the start of the trial, we're releasing our first three episodes to give you background on everything you need to know to follow the trial.Look out for our daily episodes as the trial begins this week.

Howdy, folks. My name is Mackenzie DeLulo, and I'm the senior editor of The Texan. Welcome back to our special podcast series, Inside the Impeachment, Paxton on Trial. In this episode, senior reporter Hayden Sparks and I give you an inside look at the historic impeachment of Attorney General Ken Paxton that came in the final week of the 88th legislative session. In February, after Paxton requested the state pay $3.3 million for a settlement with his former senior staffers who raised criminal allegations against him, the Texas House General Investigating Committee, led by Chairman Andrew Murr, secretly began an investigation that would lead to their recommendation of impeachment.

The last week of the session was riddled with suspense, as it began with Paxton and his allies attacking House Speaker Dade Phelan with allegations of presiding over the chamber while drunk, and then took a turn when the investigation by the committee was revealed. By the end of the week, House members were faced with the reality that they would be voting on the impeachment of an elected statewide official, something that hadn't been done in over a century. Hayden and I were both in the Capitol for the historic event, and we'll give you a firsthand account of what happened and the political fallout that ensued. As the Senate begins its trial this week, our team will begin releasing daily breakdowns of the proceedings. Be sure to subscribe at TheTexan.News to get the latest on everything that occurs.

Welcome, welcome folks and happy Labor Day. Mackenzie DeLulo here with senior reporter Hayden Sparks on our final preliminary episode leading up to the impeachment trial of Attorney General Ken Paxton. Today we will cover the events that led up to the Texas House impeaching Paxton, effectively removing him from office, at least temporarily, prior to a trial in the Senate. Now, Hayden, we talked about how this is going to be a little bit, hopefully, more convenient for us to record. This is very recent stuff that happened. We're only a few months removed to this. The whistleblower allegations and just turn of events there, that's several years ago now at this point. We're very far removed from that,

even though that was the tipping point for all of this to start have the weekend to consider what's about to go down at the Texas State Capitol. And thankfully, we have a little bit of time to get ready on Labor Day, and we'll be ready to go on Tuesday morning. Nothing like a long weekend that is intermittently sprinkled with work, but also gives you a little bit more time to rest before a very big event in our lives in Texas politics. Hayden and I were talking that it's a good thing that we have a four-day weekend, but it took us a while to realize we wouldn't have that Monday to be in the office preparing for everything at the same time. So it's a little bit of a mixed bag there, but we're excited for it all to start. We're ready to bring you a firsthand coverage and do our best to make sure you are as informed as possible.

Hayden, let's go ahead and start. What was the series of events that preceded the House General Investigating Committee disclosing its investigation of Paxton? Today, we're going to zoom in on the past few months. As you mentioned in the opening, we talked a lot about things that happened years ago, the criminal charges that started in 2015, the whistleblower lawsuit that started in 2020. But today, we'll bring it closer to the impeachment trial itself. All of this unfolded over the course of a week. And when I say all of it unfolded over the course of a week, the public knowledge of this was only a few days before the impeachment took place. The day before the public found out that Ken Paxton was under

investigation by the House of Representatives, a series of pretty striking events took place. And the afternoon before the committee even made known that Paxton was under investigation, Paxton went on the offensive. At 2.30 the day before, this was a Tuesday, the General Investigating Committee said that it would meet later that afternoon at three o'clock. Seven minutes before that meeting was scheduled, Paxton tweeted out a statement calling for Speaker Phelan's resignation. And Mackenzie, you probably remember this. We had already seen the clip of Speaker Phelan from the dais that would be the focus of this resignation call by Paxton. Do you remember the first time you saw that clip?

Oh my gosh. Yeah. Well, and it was interesting too, because there were multiple national pundits who were out there tweeting about this. And so this went viral very, very quickly, this video of Speaker Phelan. And it wasn't just Texas reporters or Texas pundits who are critical of the speaker putting this out there. It was very obviously shared amongst nationwide pundits. And it went viral very, very quickly. So folks were talking about this. It was consuming a lot of the news cycle in the first couple of days of the week and had that very quickly changed. But regardless, like that's what we were talking about prior to this all happening. And it's important for listeners to remember, too, we had no clue that anything was happening with Attorney General Ken Paxton in the Texas House behind the scenes.

We had absolutely no clue. And we'll talk. We thought it was about something totally yes so like matter it was a matter a hayden or is it matter b i it was matter a so the texas house brian slayton was matter okay so the texas house had just weeks before voted to remove from office a texas state representative brian slayton um for an improper sexual relationship with a staffer in his office. And essentially, there were two matters on the docket of the General Investigating Committee in the Texas House, which deals with internal matters, basically. It's kind of like the HR department of the Texas House. But those matters weren't disclosed. We knew matter B was

the Slayton situation. We had no clue what matter A was. And most folks in and around Austin and throughout Texas thought matter A, very publicly, we're speaking about it as if it was fact, also dealt with Representative Jolanda Jones, a Democrat from Houston. And folks can go back and read about, we wrote about that back when it happened. So they can go back and read about that whole situation. But it was something entirely different. We had absolutely no idea that it related to General Paxton at all. And when it did become known, we had already seen this clip of Speaker Phelan. I remember where I was when I first saw it. I think I was at my apartment. The legislative session was wrapping up. And I remember seeing that clip for the first time, and I watched it over and over and over, and trying to develop my own opinion about what it was that I was watching. And in this clip, Speaker Phelan can be heard slurring his

words as he is passing a bill through on the floor. He's calling the question on a bill. And anyone who has watched the ledge for any amount of time knows how that process works. He states the question, calls for a vote, and then announces the result of the vote. But he had a great deal of difficulty getting those words out. And he stumbled over the word amendment. And it almost seemed like he was having trouble pronouncing the word amendment. And he's the Speaker of the House. He's gone through this process so many times. And it wasn't clear if he was having some kind of, if he was just exhausted, and he was out of energy, or if he was having some kind of health episode, or if he was inebriated because he sounded at first blush like somebody who had had a few drinks

and was very tired. And Paxton took full advantage of that in this announcement. He said that he called on Phelan to resign for being intoxicated on the dais. The key here, though, is he produced no evidence that Phelan was intoxicated. And this video of Phelan would no longer be in the discussion only a few days later because all of it would be overshadowed by the impeachment proceeding. But at the time that Paxton called on Phelan to resign, the committee had not yet disclosed the fact that it was investigating Paxton. At around 4.40 p.m., the committee announced that it had issued subpoenas in matter A, still not disclosing what the matter in question was, and that there would be a public hearing the next morning at eight o'clock. And that public hearing

that Wednesday would be when it would become publicly known that the committee was investigating Ken Paxton. And that hearing took place on May 24th when it took testimony from all of its investigators that it had hired to investigate Ken Paxton. So that was the first time that the public had a preview of all of the evidence that the committee used as the basis for recommending impeachment. And I'll go back to that video just once more, because we may never know exactly what was going on in that video. Phelan very well may have been just very tired that night. And there had been other videos of lawmakers where people have speculated they might have had a few drinks. And it's no secret

that people do drink at the Capitol. But that is obviously not something that can be presumed based on one video and Paxton did not produce any evidence. At the same time, anyone who knows me knows that I like exploring logical fallacies. There is a fallacy of ignorance called the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. So while the onus is usually on the person making the accusation, the fact that no evidence was produced of Phelan being intoxicated doesn't prove anything one way or the other. This simply fell out of the public conversation because Paxton's impeachment was recommended only a couple days later. But Paxton's attempt to go on the offensive in that way happened just half a day before all of this evidence came out

about Paxton. And I am recalling that Wednesday when that evidence first came out, I had no idea that by the end of the weekend, Texas would have no attorney general in office. The OEG would basically be vacant and that Paxton's assistants would be doing his job for him. But those were the events that were leading up to that first hearing where all of that evidence was laid out. But what were your thoughts on the committee moving so quickly between announcing the matter that it was Ken Paxton and then publicly airing all this evidence. What was your first impression of that? Yeah, I have a couple of thoughts. First of all, it's important for folks to also know that this is we had, what, five days left in the legislative session at this point.

So there were I mean, anybody who watches the legislature knows that those last few days are a flurry of legislative action where bills are being, you know, conference committee reports where the House and the Senate come together and figure out the final versions of legislation. Those are being passed through both chambers. Folks are really behind the scenes meeting together to just get things done at the very last and to make deadlines happen. It's a very hectic time of the legislative session. And it had already been, notwithstanding any impending impeachment trial or, excuse me, impeachment proceeding, a very eventful legislative session. And a lot of big bills had either died or were being altered significantly. The news cycle was wild. State officials already had a lot on their plates. So the fact that something as big as a impeachment recommendation would come from the House seemed like if you would have told me that on Monday of this week, it would have seemed

almost impossible. There's just so much going on. But where there's a will, there's a way. And also a reminder, my other thought here is that there was a significant portion of time between when, you know, this matter was publicly discussed as something the house would address. And when we found out what the matter itself was, there was a significant period of time where we did not know what this matter was, but we knew it was going to be addressed by the house. And so all the context we had for what was it a half day, I can't remember the hours you gave me there. But all we had for that period of time was, okay, the house is moving on something big. And right before they did, Ken Paxton tweeted out asking for the resignation of the speaker, this is a little suspicious. So we started to piece

together a little bit that this might be something that had to do with Paxton, but we had no idea what it was, the significance of that movement or that proceeding, we had no clue. So there was a lot of speculation by folks in Austin and around the state as to what it was. The aggressiveness of Paxton's response and the lack of evidence for his claim that Phelan was intoxicated on the dais, other than the video, was a huge tip off that this had something to do with him. And hindsight's 20-20. Obviously, we didn't know it had something to do with him, but it provoked, like you said, a lot of speculation. And none of this was new to the committee. They had been investigating this matter since February. This was the end of their process, but it was just the beginning of the public having any idea of what this was about. Wednesday morning, they had that evidentiary hearing. And by the end of Thursday, the committee had recommended these articles of impeachment against Paxton. The May 25th recommendation was less than 72 hours before the chamber would be asked to vote on the allegations. Saturday morning is when the House convened to consider the 20 articles of impeachment the committee recommended against Paxton.

And absent from the articles of impeachment was the allegation that he improperly interfered in the election results by filing frivolous lawsuits. And that had been a big accusation against Paxton and complaints had been filed with the state bar. But it's important to note that that particular charge was not part of this impeachment process. Despite the myriad articles of impeachment that were brought against Paxton, they did not include this pretty big accusation that had been leveled against him that he interfered with the election results. Although that would be somewhat ironic for the House of Representatives to do that, given that many of those lawmakers had participated in those efforts themselves.

So that was not included in the recommendation. But as we'll talk about when we get to the substance of the charges here in a minute or two, the charges centered on his alleged corrupt relationship with Nate Paul and then his ostensible interference with his securities fraud case and the prosecution thereof. That was the recommendation the committee passed on Thursday, May 25th. All of these events, Paxton's accusation against Phelan, his call for him to resign, the evidentiary hearing on Wednesday morning, and I use the term evidentiary hearing loosely. This was not a real grand jury or a real court at law, but this general

investigating committee's hearing laying out the findings or the observations of this panel of investigators. Then the next day, the House General Investigating Committee recommending articles of impeachment culminated in Saturday's legislative hearing on the House floor in which there were four hours of debate and a vote to suspend Paxton from office pending the Senate impeachment trial. Mack, you were there on the floor that day, as well as most of the Texans team, because it was an extraordinary day in Texas politics. What was your impression of the demeanor of lawmakers as they took this historic vote? It was somber in many ways.

I think that a lot of lawmakers, I mean, I remember you were on the house floor very early and watching different members move about prior to anything beginning or the house being gaveled in. But there were, I believe it was representative Charlie Guerin was distributing an op-ed from a former representative, David Simpson, um, talking about,

you know, why the house should impeach Paxton. There were arguments laid out in that op-ed that Garen was distributing. I don't think anyone in that chamber took it lightly. It was very much a somber day in that regard. And usually the House is very ruckus. Folks are talking a lot behind the scenes and on the sides of the chamber about whatever is going on or a different entirely topic of different bill. They're lobbying for

their own legislation. This was a very different feel in that it was quiet. Members listened to the speakers who were at the mics. You could speak better if that ever was not the case. You were there the entire time. But it was very passionate and serious in a lot of ways that was fascinating to watch. And I think there were a lot of lawmakers too, just because of the short runway to the arguments on the floor and the resolution being brought before the chamber. Because of that short runway, there were a lot of undecided members, particularly on the Republican side, who were waiting to see different arguments laid out. And I will say too, from a political perspective, to go back to the Phelan video, because Paxton went after Phelan and called for his resignation,

alleging that the speaker was inebriated, Very quickly, there became two sides to this. It was Phelan versus Paxton. And whether we like it or not, politics tends to be a team sport. or how folks were general voters, the public was viewing this whole proceeding very quickly became Paxton v. Phelan. And I think that was very quickly the case just because of how Paxton came after Phelan. And then very quickly, Phelan released what he'd been working on and his team of his leadership team had been working on behind the scenes as well. So let's go ahead and jump in then to the arguments for and against. You're on the floor early. How did the day shape up? It's hard to condense everything that was said into a few bullet points, but I'm going to give it my best shot here. The arguments in favor of Paxton's impeachment, and there were so many charges and allegations

presented. They were condensing the whistleblower lawsuit and the securities fraud case into a couple of hours of argument in favor of impeachment. And I think back on my time in high school debate, we would be given a resolution at the beginning of the year or the semester. We would have all this time to prepare. And then we would have 45 minutes to debate a mock resolution that had no consequence outside of the educational value and the benefit to the competitors. And I remember contrasting that with you had 150 lawmakers who were expected to debate and vote on a question that had been presented to them approximately 48 hours before, and they had only four hours to debate it. So the magnitude of what was going on was almost lost in how quickly everything moved that week and that day. And the arguments that they prepared, the General Investigating Committee had months and months to make their case. And they argued

that Paxton has been avoiding accountability for misconduct for many years, and that he has been able to cover up or conceal his actions from the public. And that's why the electorate continues to reelect him to office because it is not fully aware of his conduct. And the House impeachment team, including the chair of the General Investigating Committee, Andrew Murr, and the vice chair, Ann Johnson, presented this case that Paxton needed to be held accountable by the legislature. Johnson is a former prosecutor herself. And as I sat and heard her closing argument, I very much felt like I was a juror sitting in a courtroom and an assistant district attorney was

in front of me seeking to convince me that he ought to be convicted of a crime. And she said that many of the offenses of which they accuse him to be convicted of a crime. And she said that many of the offenses of which they accuse him could be considered felonies. The analogy the House Investigating Committee offered was the House of Representatives was like a grand jury, and it needed probable cause to send charges to be exhibited to the Senate. That was the argument they made in response to the charge that by opponents of impeachment that there was not enough evidence. And the primary arguments of the opponents was that all of this was based on hearsay, that they were being asked asked to make a judgment based off of a transcript of what investigators surmised from other people's statements of what they had witnessed. So they kept saying hearsay

upon hearsay upon hearsay because this team of investigators interviewed people. They reported their impressions to the General Investigating Committee. The General Investigating Committee reported that transcript and their impressions to the House, and then the House was making a judgment based on that. So that was the opponent's argument against impeachment was that this was mostly hearsay and that they had been given too little time to review all of this and that they had been given too little time to review all of this, and that they had not heard from witnesses. But I remember one lawmaker, specifically Terry Canales, who is a criminal defense attorney, who would empathize with those arguments, because he has probably represented clients and made many of those arguments himself, that they don't have to have a full blown trial on the House floor to simply send charges over.

This is a unique process that's not quite the same as a criminal indictment, but they were hinging their case on this idea that this was similar to a grand jury process and that the House had a duty, knowing the findings of the investigators or the observations of the investigators, to forward these articles of impeachment over to the House. And that's ultimately the argument that carried the day. Can you remember any other arguments that I might be missing, Mackenzie? Because I know that there were so many things that were said that day and so many people who spoke. But I know, we were all hanging on on different words. So I wondered if you remembered anything else that I might be forgetting.

Yeah, I mean, to paint the picture for folks, it's like the whole proceeding, aside from the resolution being introduced, yada, yada, started with the House impeachment, or excuse me, the House General Investigating Committee, each member coming forward with their own statement, like you said, I believe it was Murr first, the other members, and then it followed with Ann Johnson being the closing, the closer for their committee. And then it moved to debate. And so there were different members, like you said, Canales, Schaefer, Brian Harrison, John Smithy, and I think a lot of Harold Dutton. There were Democrats and Republicans getting up there to make different arguments. I do believe that to simplify this, members like Schaefer or Harrison being opposed to a measure like this,

although they did say that their primary concerns with impeachment was how rushed everything was, particularly Schaefer, Harrison outlined a little bit more of the politics of the situation, saying that he agreed with a lot of Paxton's moves and that he had been a conservative attorney general for the state, therefore aligning with a lot of Harrison's policy positions. Schaefer more outlined the proceedings and the procedure, saying that this was not done in a manner that gave the House enough time to consider everything. But I think, you know, if one was just to look at the House, they to be a much more, for example, he carries the House rules pretty much every session, at least in recent memory, where he'll come forward and

debate. He'll present the rules. Members will debate. That's how they decide how the House will be governed by its own rules, basically what the Speaker and members have to adhere to during the session. He has a very procedural mind. He loves to debate the intricacies of things. And he is not typically aligned with Freedom Caucus or Freedom Caucus adjacent members who tend to be on the most conservative spectrum of the House at odds with the speaker. He's pretty in line with what the speaker does, a Republican from a rural part of Texas. But he has some semblance of leadership position in the House. When he came forward and expressed concerns about the proceedings,

the procedure, saying that this was unprecedented, how rushed it was, that members weren't given as much notice as he, you know, he went back on a lot of precedent, which we don't have a ton of is that i believe they a statewide elected official being uh impeached or impeachment being considered had only happened you know one other time in texas history am i correct in that was a one other time there was a judge that was not as it was a different situation there was a governor paul ferguson but there also was a judge. That was 1917. Yes. So it was a long time ago. Over 100 years ago. I cannot overstate the historic, surreal nature of this. I think all our entire team just kept talking about how surreal that we were even like covering this, that this was even happening. But when Smithy got up there and started making those arguments,

I think a lot of folks who were pro-impeachment on the Republican side in leadership became a little concerned that they were losing votes. And so that was a big part of the shift of the day. We'll get to how the vote actually occurred and the breakdown of who voted which way. They didn't end up having much to be worried about. But I do think that that changed some members' minds who were on the fence, seeing a member like Smithy go up there and make those arguments. Yeah, it was a fascinating day. like the myriad of different political positions parsing through it was a very um uh specific and um nuanced debate all day it was so fascinating to watch but um

yeah so that's that's kind of what i'm remembering is the tide shifting a little bit there. And I think you'd be able to speak to, and I'm curious if after Smithy spoke, if you'd be able to say, yeah, the house was a little bit more abuzz with conversation and different people going around whipping votes and having conversations and those kinds of things. Was that the case? And did you see that happen? It was pretty quiet throughout the day. I think many of them probably knew how they were going to vote. They had already calculated all those political considerations in their minds. But those were certainly strong arguments that Smithy and others made for not passing this impeachment so soon after it was recommended. I know we're running out of time, and I want to get to the charges that were filed and get to the substance of the allegations a little bit more. So I'll give a 10,000-foot overview of the outcome of the vote. The final vote was 121 to 23. And most of the lawmakers who voted for impeachment were Democrats. That is an important fact to point out. Most of the supporters were Democrats. And most Republicans also supported impeachment. So both of those

facts are true. And they've been emphasized by each team in different ways. Two Democrats were absent from the vote. The only Democrat who voted present was Harold Dutton. He was one of the ones who spoke neutral on impeachment, and he made a fascinating argument. Representative Tom Oliverson was absent and excused, and all 23 votes against impeachment were Republicans. Strikingly, everyone from the Collin County delegation voted for impeachment. You'll remember that Collin County is Ken Paxton's stomping grounds. That's where his wife was elected senator. And to get to the substance of the allegations, and I'll run through them really quickly here, and I hope run through them really quickly here.

And I hope our listeners will forgive me for using this expression, but the House impeached the hell out of Paxton. They filed 20 charges, and each of them really boiled down to two primary allegations, that he had a corrupt relationship with Nate Paul, and that he impeded the prosecution of the securities fraud charges. So I'll run through these really quickly. Article one was disregard of official duty, that he failed to protect the Mitty Foundation. Disregard of official duty, Article 2, abuse of the opinion process, which concerned Nate Paul. Article 3 was disregard of official duty, abuse of the open records process, also regarding Nate Paul. Article 4 was disregard of official duty, misuse of official information, and that he used his office to benefit Nate Paul.

Article 5, disregard of official duty, engagement of Kamak. Brandon Kamak is the special prosecutor that he is alleged to have hired to conduct an illegitimate investigation, again, to benefit Nate Paul. Article six, disregard of official duty, termination of the whistleblowers, alleging that he improperly fired the employees who reported him. Article seven, misapplication of public resources, whistleblower investigation report. In other words, that he abused his office by trying to exonerate himself from those claims. Article eight, disregard of official duty, the settlement agreement. The legislature says he

shouldn't have entered that settlement. Article nine, constitutional bribery, Paul's employment of, and it says mistress. I personally don't care for that term. I'm going to say girlfriend. But that is the term that the articles of impeachment use. They allege that Nate Paul hired Paxton's girlfriend as part of a bribe. Article 10, constitutional bribery, Paul's providing renovations to Paxton's home. These are the famous tile countertops that Paul allegedly offered Paxton as a bribe. Article 11, obstruction of justice, abuse of the judicial process. And these concern the securities fraud charges. Article 12, obstruction of justice, abuse of the judicial process. Article, and these concern the securities fraud charges. Article 12, obstruction of justice, abuse of the judicial process. Article 13, false statements and official records.

The House accused him of lying to the Securities Board. Article 14, false statements and official records. The House accused him of lying to the Texas Ethics Commission. Article 15, false statements and official records. The House accused him of lying to the Texas Ethics Commission. Article 15, false statements and official records. The whistleblower response report, again, accusing him of trying to conceal his actions with the whistleblowers. And the remaining charges are overarching claims that the other accusations constitute other violations. So Article 16 is conspiracy and attempted conspiracy. Article 17 is misappropriation of public resources. Article 18 is dereliction of duty. Article 19 is unfitness for office. And Article 20 is abuse of public trust. And I'll quote the

last article because I think it encapsulates all the other articles. But the legislature accused him of, quote, while holding public office as Attorney General, Warren Kenneth Paxton used, misused, or failed to use his official powers in a manner calculated to subvert the lawful operation of the government of the state of Texas and obstruct the fair and impartial administration of justice, thereby bringing the office of attorney general into scandal and disrepute to the prejudice of public confidence in the government of the state as shown by the acts described in one or more articles, end quote.

And that will be the issue that is resolved by the upcoming impeachment trial. Yeah. And that's watching, you know, the House coming forward with 20 articles was very much a statement of, hey, we've got stuff. We're bringing forward a very strong and lengthy case against the Attorney General. And notable as well that as soon as the vote did take place and the 121 ayes voted that the process of removing, at least temporarily, the attorney general from his office took place. His second in command, Brent Webster, the first assistant attorney general, for at least a couple of days, I don remember how long it was but for a little while took his stead as as acting attorney general before somebody was appointed by governor abbott um it was just wild it was very wild to watch this all go down and yes i've encouraged folks

to go read the articles themselves just so you are aware and informed as to what exactly the house levied against um ken pa in their arguments. It's very notable and important that folks know. Yeah. And to contrast that, the U.S. Congress only impeached Donald Trump on three articles total. There were two impeachments of Donald Trump. The first one was abuse of office, and I'm blanking on the other charge, but it was two charges, abuse of office, and I believe obstruction of Congress. And then the third charge after the Capitol riot was incitement of insurrection. So I think it's clear here that the objective of the House is to get Paxton out of office. And they knew that they needed to give the Senate plenty of opportunity to do that.

And so they spread all these accusations out over 20 different charges. And like I said, those last five aren't new allegations. They are alleging that he committed other offenses by nature of the offenses they already accused him of. So they only have to sustain, the Senate only has to sustain one of these to remove Paxton from office. And I think the House, instead of trying to do this in one fell swoop with two or three articles of impeachment, they're giving them every opportunity to convict him. But it all comes down to the securities fraud case and the corruption allegations against him. And one thing that's notable as well as the Senate, when they released their rules of how they would operate throughout the trial, said that there would be individual votes on each article of impeachment. That was up to the Senate to determine as to whether they would vote as a whole to vote all for all 20 in one fell swoop or to vote individually upon each article. And they opted to do that. And so now that there are officially essentially 20 chances for the

senate to convict the attorney general the suspended attorney general to be completely accurate here so essentially what this means the attorney general suspended attorney general ken paxton has been impeached by the texas house he's been temporarily removed from office and now he awaits a trial in the senate where the senate will convict or not convict or an end and vote to acquit on these different 20 articles. Um, and there will be a separate vote if I'm not mistaken, Hayden on whether or not Paxton can run for office in Texas in the future. So 21 votes total on exactly, um, all these charges and one extra motion that the Senate will also, um, vote on. So it will be very notable. And I'm not sure if it'll be one. It might be 40 votes, because it might be one vote.

They might have to take that extra vote for each charge. And something I forgot to mention is a few of the articles of impeachment are held in abeyance. Yes. So they won't necessarily consider those. And also, I mean, you can speak to this far more than I can. You were there all day. But one thing that was very interesting to see, and not unexpected per se, but just, again, surreal was how packed the house was with reporters, with TV cameras, It was hard to find a seat on the side, which is typically not the case when you're on the house floor and you're credentialed by the media or as a member of the media, usually have plenty of different seats,

maybe not in the exact press box, but throughout the chamber, there are a lot of options. And there just weren't on this day. The gallery was packed. A lot of folks and the attorney general on a press conference, I believe the day before, called on folks to go attend. And the house made it very clear, Phelan made it very clear that if there were any demonstrations that folks would be escorted out, or if there was disrespect or noise or protests of any kind, that that would not be tolerated. And everyone was very quiet and respectful in the gallery, but there was certainly a show, uh,

in support of Paxton in the gallery as well. That's notable. And the reporters there was absolutely crazy. You know, I don't know if you have anything to add on that front, but it was a wild day on the house floor. I don't know if I've ever been in a room with that many people that got that quiet when the vote occurred on whether to remove Paxton pending the impeachment trial. Dillon directed the clerk to ring the bell for lawmakers to cast their votes. All the reporters gathered on the side and had cell phone cameras and different cameras pointing at the voting boards. And it got so quiet as everyone waited to see who would come down.

Which never happens that it's that quiet during a vote. Usually people are talking, run into their desks. It's not a very somber situation when votes are going down typically. And that was not the case this day. You could feel the gravity of what was happening. The House of Representatives knew what it was doing and they knew how serious it was. And so did the press. I've never seen that many reporters in my place. It was very heavy in that moment, what was happening and the historical significance of it. I have a feeling as we head toward the trial, a similar feeling will take over the Senate chamber. Hayden, thank you so much for covering this. We so appreciate you jumping on for these

preliminary episodes to give our listeners an idea of what all led to this. Thank you to our listeners. Again, this is our last episode before we switch to daily coverage of the trial itself. Our next installment will be published on Wednesday, September 6th, as our team recaps and debriefs the very first day of the proceedings. We appreciate how engaged folks have already been with this new podcast. Thanks, y'all so much and look forward to continuing with our daily installments. We'll catch up with y'all in a few days. Thanks for listening. Stay tuned. The trial starts tomorrow and we'll be releasing daily new

episodes of Inside the Impeachment, giving you a backstage pass to the trial's drama, strategy, and real-time developments. Be sure to follow The Texan wherever you listen to podcasts to stay up to date on new episodes. And if you're on Apple Podcasts, leave a rating and review so that more people can find us and stay informed with news you can trust. And to support our work, be sure to subscribe at thetexan.news.