Kaci Sisk was sitting in the House gallery Friday in support of Attorney General Ken Paxton.
The president of the Bulverde Spring Branch Conservative Republicans drove two hours to Austin this morning from Bulverde, a small town north of San Antonio, in the chance that the House would vote to impeach the attorney general. The debate will be Saturday.
“Paxton is the most effective attorney general this state has ever had,” said the conservative PAC president.
“Amen,” said Rebecca Broughton, who was sitting in a row behind Sisk.
Sisk said the impeachment was a baseless, retaliatory move against Paxton for calling on House Speaker Dade Phelan to resign earlier this week after a video of Phelan slurring his words while managing the House floor circulated online. Paxton, and others, suggested Phelan was drunk. Sisk lumped Phelan supporters and those who support Paxton’s impeachment together with the Democrats.
In reality, the Republican-led House committee that is moving forward with impeachment hearings began investigating Paxton months ago.
“Those who vote for impeachment are effectively siding with the Biden administration and corrupt DAs in the state,” Sisk said.
Wearing Texas state flag earrings and a jean jacket, Broughton agreed with everything Sisk said. Broughton, who is the precinct chair and treasurer for the Guadalupe County Republican Party, noted how every Republican she’s spoken with is in lockstep behind Paxton. The support from the Republican base is strong, Sisk said.
“We don’t care that he’s been indicted; we don’t care,” Sisk said. “It’s politically motivated because he is a serious warrior for conservative Texans and for this state.”
Despite Sisk and Broughton’s insistence that the majority of Republicans in the state were behind Paxton, there were few at the Capitol on Friday visibly in support of him. They attributed this to the fact that this sequence of events happened so quickly, and right before a holiday weekend, and therefore many couldn’t make it to the Capitol.
Both women pointed to his decisive victory last November as evidence of Paxton’s popularity. Paxton won reelection by almost 800,000 votes against his Democratic challenger Rochelle Garza. Sisk noted that voting to impeach Paxton would be disenfranchising millions of voters.
“How can they even have the arrogance to want to overturn an election?” Sisk asked.
— William Melhado
