Texas Republicans’ Bid to Out-Hard Ass Each Other Continues

This is your TPM evening briefing.

Aug 13, 2025

*WASHINGTON, DC - APRIL 07: U.S. Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX). (Photo by Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images)*

As Texas Democrats mull when and how exactly they will return to the state, potentially later this week — despite the fact that Gov. Greg Abbott has vowed to keep calling for special sessions until his Trumped up congressional maps are approved — Texas Republicans’ efforts to outdo one another by attempting to arrest and punish Dems in creative ways are ongoing.

Last week, Attorney General Ken Paxton sued former U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX) and his political group, Powered by People. Paxton has claimed that O’Rourke was illegally funding Texas Democrats’ exodus from the state in order to deny their GOP colleagues a quorum to pass congressional maps designed to hand Republicans five new seats in the U.S. House. He was acting on Abbott’s ongoing claim that the Dems who left the state should be hit with felony bribery charges for any support they may have received to leave Texas or to pay the $500-a-day fines for breaking quorum.

Last night, Paxton upped the ante when he asked a Texas district court judge to jail O’Rourke for the duration of the lawsuit and to fine the former congressman. In the motion he claimed that O’Rourke had violated a court order issued by the district court judge last week that barred O’Rourke from doing any fundraising to help pay for Texas Dems’ exit.

Per the Texas Tribune:

On Tuesday, Paxton claimed that O’Rourke had violated that temporary injunction at a Fort Worth rally Saturday, when he told the crowd, “There are no refs in this game, fuck the rules.”
According to a video of the event, O’Rourke appeared to say that phrase after urging the crowd to support retaliatory redistricting in other blue states — not in relation to the injunction.

Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), who is fighting for his political life in a Republican Senate primary against Paxton, is trying to get in on the going-after-O’Rourke action. He’s been looking for ways to leverage his federal office to get the Trump administration involved in Texas since this story boiled over last week. He was the first to try to get federal law enforcement to help locate and arrest the Democrats who fled the state. Today, he sent a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi asking the DOJ to open an investigation into O’Rourke, “George Soros” and other amorphous, spooky, dark Dem groups supposedly funding Texas Dems’ protest against the gerrymandered maps and, also, their “plush lifestyles.”

The letter is pretty ridiculous. Here’s an excerpt:

But the House members who fled did not randomly decide to leave on August 3rd. Their flight was pre-planned months in advance and coordinated with outside individuals, special interest groups, and politicians from other states. Their devious and deceitful plan to derail the special session included coordinating funding drives giving, at an absolute minimum, the appearance that a sinister quid pro quo was reached between the fleeing House members and outside interest groups.

As we’ve mentioned in our coverage over the course of the past week, Cornyn and Paxton using the situation to out-hard ass each other is a pellucid campaigning strategy for both. They’re running against each other for Cornyn’s seat and Trump hasn’t yet endorsed anyone in the race. Paxton is pretty popular among Republican voters in Texas, though Cornyn has held the seat since 2002.

The focus on O’Rourke also signals there may be some legal murkiness to Paxton, Cornyn and Abbott’s various schemes to try to find ways to punish the Texas Dems who left the state to delay the Republican-controlled legislature’s adoption of new congressional maps that could help the party hold the U.S. House. The Texas GOP is engaging in the midcycle gerrymandering because President Trump asked them to. He’s worried Republicans are going to lose the House in the fall, which could significantly slow down his unconstitutional legislative power grab and give Democrats subpoena power.

Trump Intends to Force Congress to Let Him Run DC Police Longer

As expected, Trump was never going to be content with a limited, month-long federal takeover of the D.C. police. Per Axios:

Trump said during a press conference that his administration is going to push for a “long-term extension” of the federalization of the Metropolitan Police Department in a crime bill that will initially pertain to D.C. but will serve as a roadmap for other cities.
“If it’s a national emergency, we can do it without Congress,” Trump said. “But we expect to be before Congress very quickly.”

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