Paxton to face Democrat Talarico in November after Cornyn primary defeat
US Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, a retiring Republican and one of the few GOP senators willing to publicly break with President Donald Trump, used a Sunday interview to criticize the president’s late endorsement of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in the state’s Republican Senate primary.
“He made a colossal mistake,” Tillis said on CNN’s State of the Union of Trump’s decision to back Paxton over four-term Sen. John Cornyn. “John Cornyn’s a great member of the US Senate. Paxton has his challenges,” Tillis added. “We would not be spending tens or hundreds of millions of dollars in Texas if Cornyn had won.”
Tillis described Trump’s involvement in the race as an “unforced error” that has placed the Texas Senate seat in play for Democrats in the November 3 general election. Trump endorsed Paxton just days before the May primary, in which the attorney general defeated Cornyn and advanced to face Talarico, a Democratic pastor and state legislator whose message of peace and populism has attracted much attention.
If he wins, Talarico would become the first Democrat in more than 30 years to win statewide office in Texas. The race has implications for Trump’s strength heading into November’s midterm federal elections.
When Trump chose to support Paxton, he highlighted the attorney general’s record as a steadfast supporter of the president’s Make America Great Again movement. Cornyn had previously said during the 2024 presidential campaign that Republicans should move on from Trump. In a social media post shortly before the May primary, Trump said Cornyn had been “VERY disloyal” to him and implored Texas voters to “REMEMBER!”
Paxton is struggling to overcome a series of political scandals. He was impeached in 2023 after being accused of corruption and was later acquitted in a trial in the Texas Senate. He was also indicted on charges of felony securities fraud, but the case was dismissed after a 2024 pretrial diversion agreement. In July 2025, his wife of 38 years, Angela Paxton, filed for divorce “on biblical grounds,” citing adultery.
Tillis’s Sunday comments are the latest in a string of public breaks with Trump. In April, he defended the NATO military alliance after Trump said he was “absolutely” considering withdrawing the US from it. “Any president that contemplates attempting to withdraw from Nato is not only fulfilling [Russian leader] Vladimir Putin and [Chinese premier] Xi Jinping’s greatest dreams but would be undermining America’s own national security interests,” Tillis said at the time.
He also called for then-Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem’s resignation after immigration agents killed two US citizens in Minneapolis in January, calling her leadership “a disaster” during the last Senate hearing before her firing.
On Thursday, Tillis was one of a small number of Republicans to vote in favor of a Democrat-led war powers resolution aimed at ending the US war with Iran. The proposal failed to pass the Senate by a 49-50 vote.