Please let this be true, please let this be true, please let this be true…
A crook any way you look
A federal appeals court last week rejected an unnamed Texas agency’s attempt to withhold records and shield its employees from appearing before a grand jury in a federal investigation that appears to be targeting Attorney General Ken Paxton.
The ruling appears to be the first major sign that federal officials are still investigating Paxton after he was impeached and subsequently acquitted by the Legislature last year over charges of bribery and abuse of office.
In a June 20 opinion, the federal Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals sided with a decision from the lower Western District of Texas, which found that the state agency could not use attorney-client privilege to withhold evidence from a Department of Justice inquiry into “alleged wrongdoing by senior Agency personnel.” The appeals court also cleared the way for two senior agency employees to testify before a grand jury on July 2.
The opinion does not identify the agency. But it refers to a years-long FBI investigation and notes dates and details that line up with a sealed federal case probing allegations from Paxton’s former top deputies. In October 2020, those deputies reported to federal authorities that the attorney general allegedly took bribes to benefit a friend and political donor, Austin real estate developer Nate Paul.
The case at issue in the Fifth Circuit opinion also remains sealed. But the opinion refers to earlier orders that seem to align with those issued in Paxton’s case, including an August 2021 decision that largely refused the agency’s attempt to limit the scope of the investigation.
Last month, the Texas Newsroom published an August 2021 order from U.S. District Court Judge David Ezra, of the Western District, that appears to be the same one referenced in the Fifth Circuit’s latest opinion. For example, the 2021 Western District ruling notes that investigators in Paxton’s case were allowed to take “additional investigative steps” to seek “four categories of information,” including any “actions or communications contemplated or undertaken” by Paxton or his senior staff to “interfere in or obstruct” the federal investigation. The Fifth Circuit’s opinion refers to the same language, including the same “four categories of information.”
See here for the previous update. A lot of signs and portents, and the pieces all fit, but as we’ve discussed before we just won’t know for sure until there’s an arrest or some unsealed indictments. And that’s if that happens, which may or may not ever be the case. There’s also the Presidential election to consider, because we know exactly where all of this will end up if The Former Guy (shudder) wins. In the meantime, keep your fingers crossed and light a candle or two. Texas Public Radio, which goes so far as to suggest this could mean action is imminent (be still my heart), has more.