Ken Paxton Crushes John Cornyn In Stunning Texas MAGA Upset

Trump-backed Paxton humiliated the GOP establishment and ended Cornyn’s decades-long Senate career.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has officially defeated longtime Senator John Cornyn in Tuesday’s closely watched Republican Senate runoff, delivering a massive victory for the America First movement and ending Cornyn’s decades-long career in the U.S. Senate.

The race was called shortly after 9 p.m. Eastern Time once polls closed in western Texas. At the time of the call, Paxton was dominating the vote with roughly 63 percent support compared to Cornyn’s 37 percent, according to NBC News.

Paxton’s landslide victory stunned many political observers who had expected a razor-close finish after months of polling showed a tight race between the two Republicans. Instead, Paxton dramatically overperformed across the state, including in early voting where analysts had predicted Cornyn would hold an advantage.

The result marked a huge reversal from the March primary, when Cornyn narrowly finished ahead of Paxton by less than two points, 42 percent to 40.5 percent. Congressman Wesley Hunt’s share of the vote forced the runoff after no candidate crossed the 50 percent threshold needed to secure the nomination outright.

In the weeks leading up to Tuesday’s showdown, Paxton successfully consolidated the conservative grassroots vote while expanding support in rural Texas, East Texas, and key suburban counties. Cornyn retained strength in some urban centers, but it was nowhere near enough to stop the MAGA wave that swept through the runoff electorate.

The race quickly became one of the most expensive Senate primaries in Texas history. Overall spending reportedly topped $128 million, with establishment forces pouring more than $92 million into efforts backing Cornyn across both the primary and runoff periods.

Despite being massively outspent, Paxton powered to victory with strong grassroots enthusiasm and a late endorsement from President Donald Trump that electrified the race’s final stretch.

Trump officially endorsed Paxton on May 19, praising him as a “true MAGA Warrior” and pointing to the Senate’s failure to pass the SAVE America Act, a major election integrity bill aimed at strengthening voter verification requirements. Trump’s endorsement represented a major break with Senate Republican leadership, which had aggressively backed Cornyn and pushed the president to stay neutral.

The defeat also marks another devastating blow for the old Republican establishment after Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy recently lost his own re-election bid following backlash from Trump supporters over his impeachment vote.

Paxton will now face Democrat James Talarico in the general election. While Democrats are expected to heavily target the race, Republicans remain favored statewide given Texas’ long history of electing GOP candidates in statewide contests. No Democrat has won a U.S. Senate race in Texas since 1988.