AUSTIN – Tony Buzbee, a high-powered attorney who will lead the defense of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton during his impeachment trial, called the allegations false and the proceedings “a farce” during the first press conference in the team on Wednesday.
Speaking to reporters at the GOP state headquarters in Austin, Buzbee criticized House lawmakers who voted for impeachment and described the investigation into the third-term attorney general as politically motivated and lacking in transparency. .
“The articles of impeachment that the House has brought up are nonsense. Just so we’re clear, the charges are false. They’re false,” Buzbee said. “Ken Paxton will never, ever be convicted by the Senate. Not on this evidence, not on this record.”
Paxton’s defense team also includes attorney Dan Cogdell, another Houston attorney who is also defending Paxton against separate charges of state securities fraud, he announced.
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The Texas Senate impeachment trial will begin this summer.
Related: Texas House impeaches Attorney General Ken Paxton
Buzbee anticipated that if the case was not dropped quickly, the proceedings could drag on for a long time. He said they identified 66 witnesses to question and thousands of documents to gather.
“If this is not summarily dismissed, then we are in for a fight,” he said. “This is all a farce designed by someone with a personal vendetta against Attorney General Paxton, and if it takes us a year to prove it, we’re going to take a year to prove it.”
The attorney general has been relatively quiet since fellow Republicans in the Texas House voted overwhelmingly for impeachment last month, alleging that he accepted bribes and abused his position to help a donor campaign under FBI investigation. Paxton, the first state official to be impeached in more than a century, has portrayed the proceedings as an attempt to thwart the will of voters.
Paxton, who is suspended from work without pay pending the outcome of the trial, did not appear at the news conference. Their lawyers did not say how they are being compensated.
Dan Cordell, attorney for ousted Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, speaks during a press conference at the Republican Party of Texas headquarters in Austin, Texas, Wednesday, June 7, 2023. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)(Eric Gay / ASSOCIATED PRESS)
Paxton’s legal team will face legendary attorneys Dick DeGuerin and Rusty Hardin, who have been tapped by House impeachment officials to plead their case for Paxton’s impeachment. The House General Investigations Committee quietly began investigating Paxton in March after he asked for $3.3 million to settle a whistleblower lawsuit and made the investigation public days before the impeachment vote.
Buzbee accused the GOP-led House of facing a “rushed, secretive kangaroo court” that he said was “more like something you would see in a third world country.”
“The speaker’s supporters and himself thought they could pull off what can only be described as a holiday weekend shooting to politically assassinate one of the most important conservative voices not only in Texas, but in the United States.” . he said
House Speaker Dade Phelan, R-Beaumont, declined to comment through a spokesman.
In a statement Wednesday evening, Hardin dismissed Buzbee and Cogdell’s criticisms and said both sides agree on the need for live testimony and cross-examination of witnesses. He added that the House impeachment was akin to an impeachment “designed simply to decide whether these serious allegations merit” a trial.
“All the due process, transparency and presentation of evidence that their lawyers are concerned about will be observed in a trial before the Senate,” he said.
Buzbee is known for taking on high-profile cases, including representing then-Gov. Rick Perry against allegations of abuse of power and almost two dozen women who accused then-Houston Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson of sexual assault. Buzbee also ran unsuccessfully for mayor of Houston in 2019 and contemplated another bid as recently as April, according to the Houston Chronicle.
Cogdell has handled some of the most memorable cases in the state’s history, including the successful defense of one of the few followers of David Koresh to survive a deadly siege by federal authorities against charges of conspiracy and murder.
Related: High-profile Texas attorneys hired to lead impeachment of Texas AG Ken Paxton
While he described Hardin as his “best friend with a bar card,” he called the House investigation “a travesty and a mockery of a procedure” and said it was “nonsense” that the impeachment was not about politics.
“I don’t want to turn this into a battle of personalities and a battle of legacies and all that nonsense. What I want is justice. What I want is objectivity. What I want is transparency,” Cogdell said.
Buzbee and Cogdell took issue with two articles of impeachment in particular.
Buzbee said they have evidence, including receipts he showed on a big screen, to disprove that campaign donor Nate Paul paid to remodel the kitchen of Paxton’s Austin home in exchange for political favors.
Cogdell said allegations that Paxton was guilty of obstructing justice by delaying his fraud trials are also false. He criticized House investigators for interviewing Brian Wice, one of the special prosecutors pursuing criminal fraud charges against Paxton, without interviewing Paxton himself or his attorneys.
Buzbee did not answer questions about how he and Cogdell were being compensated, noting only, “The public doesn’t pay me. That’s all you need to know.”
Six employees of the attorney general’s office, including the state attorney general, have also taken leaves of absence to assist in Paxton’s defense. None appeared at the press conference, and Buzbee said he would likely announce other members of the legal team after the Senate sets the rules for the trial on June 20.
The Senate trial is due to begin on August 28. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick will preside as judge while the 31 senators will serve as jurors. Paxton’s wife, McKinney Sen. Angela Paxton, has not yet said whether she will attend.
When asked if Angela Paxton should recuse herself from the impeachment trial vote, Buzbee said the decision is up to each senator and he could not speak for her.
In Paxton’s absence from the agency, Gov. Greg Abbott recently appointed John Scott, a former Texas secretary of state, to serve as acting attorney general.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
