Exclusive: Texas AG Ken Paxton won't face new charges in impeachment trial, sources say

Investigators and prosecutors in suspended Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton's upcoming impeachment hearing in the Senate will not present additional charges against him before trial, with the deadline to do so coming Sunday, three sources familiar with the decision told the American-Statesman.

In setting rules for the Sept. 5 trial, senators gave a deadline — 30 days from the beginning of the proceeding — to the Texas House to file additional impeachment articles. The three sources who said that won't happen were not authorized to comment publicly on the decision.

House members on May 27 voted 121-23 to advance 20 articles of impeachment against Paxton, many of them accusing the state's top lawyer of bribery or misuse of office in connection with his relationship with Austin real estate developer Nate Paul.

As it stands, House lawyers will try to convict Paxton on 16 charges, setting aside for now four others related to an ongoing felony indictment Paxton faces for securities fraud.

Related: Paxton's securities fraud trial set for 2024. How his impeachment trial could tip the outcome.

Paxton, a three-term Republican, was immediately suspended from office without pay after the House's impeachment vote. Senators in the September trial will determine if he returns to office or is removed permanently. Paxton and his lawyers have offered a general denial against all allegations.

Speculation arose in late May that Paxton could face additional charges after a House investigating panel issued a dozen new subpoenas, many of them directed at Paxton’s finances. The entities that were subpoenaed included trusts, properties and bank accounts associated with Paxton and his wife, state Sen. Angela Paxton, R-McKinney. Investigators also issued a subpoena for ride-hailing company Uber.

The Wall Street Journal reported that House investigators were interested in a Paxton real estate spending spree during which the couple, from July 2021 to April 2022, acquired six properties totaling $3.5 million. The properties are in Oklahoma, Florida, Utah and Hawaii.

Logistically, pursuing additional charges before trial would have been tricky. In late May, when the House voted to impeach Ken Paxton, the Legislature was in session, with lawmakers working from Austin. The session is now over, meaning House investigators would have needed to wrangle House members back to Austin to formally consider additional charges.

Related: Woman with whom Ken Paxton allegedly had an affair identified by his lawyers

Prosecutors and the defense team will be limited to 24 hours each to present evidence in the case, as per the rules approved by the Senate. If House lawyers were to bring additional charges, they would not receive any extra time to litigate them.

The decision to not bring additional articles, however, does not preclude House lawyers from presenting new evidence to support the existing charges.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who is set to preside over the impeachment trial, said it will likely last two to three weeks. At the trial, Patrick or senators will rule on several motions, including one from Ken Paxton’s lawyers to prevent him from testifying.

Support from two-thirds of the Senate, or 21 of the 30 voting members, is needed to remove Paxton from office. Angela Paxton will not get to vote as she is the defendant's spouse. Initially, she announced she would not recuse herself from the case, but the Senate, in rules it approved for the hearing, barred her from participating.

More: Ken Paxton wants to disqualify three senators from his impeachment trial. Here's why.

The impeachment trial is but a small sample of Paxton’s many legal or ethical dilemmas. On Thursday, he appeared as a defendant in a Houston courtroom on an 8-year-old felony securities case, with the judge setting a loose trial date for February 2024.

Four articles against Paxton relate to that indictment, but those will not be part of his impeachment trial. Those articles are being held in abatement, meaning the Senate won’t consider them until a later date.

The attorney general's office under Paxton also faces a lawsuit from former employees who say they were unlawfully fired for reporting Paxton's alleged bribery involving Paul to the FBI. That lawsuit prompted a federal investigation into Paxton in 2020, which his lawyer, Dan Cogdell, confirmed this week is still active.

More: Texas Lt. Gov. Patrick, who'll oversee Paxton impeachment trial, gets $3M from pro-Paxton PAC

Paxton also faces potential discipline from the Texas State Bar due to a lawsuit he filed to challenge the 2020 presidential election results in four battleground states. The State Bar says Paxton lied about uncovering voter fraud.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Texas AG Ken Paxton won't face more charges before impeachment trial