This guy really is a piece of work.
Ken Paxton
When seeking a job at the Texas attorney general’s office, it’s less about what is on your résumé than who you know.
In Attorney General Ken Paxton’s first weeks in office, he filled his higher ranks with at least 14 people connected to him and other prominent Republicans — quiet “appointments” that his office defends in spite of state law, which requires that jobs be advertised when they’re filled from outside the agency.
An American-Statesman review of more than 1,800 pages of personnel files reveals that hiring procedures were relaxed or altogether ignored for those who had worked for Paxton, former Gov. Rick Perry or U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz. Records show several were hired weeks before they had even applied for the jobs, if an application was completed at all.
Meanwhile, people whose résumés didn’t include political connections often faced months of red tape, interviews and vetting — just the sort of competition that state law envisions for coveted state jobs.
It is not uncommon for elected officials to ignore a decades-old law meant to prevent political patronage in Texas, but the number of Paxton’s so-called appointees is notable, and correspondence obtained under the Texas Public Information Act suggests Paxton was promising lucrative jobs to his political allies months before he took office.
[…]
The Statesman asked three state agencies how state law might allow for “high-level appointments,” as Paxton’s office called them. None would provide answers.
The Texas Workforce Commission, the designated arbiter for job postings, deferred to the attorney general’s office, which stopped answering questions from the Statesman for this story. The Texas Legislative Council, whose lawyer assists legislators in drafting laws, deferred first to the attorney general’s office, then back to the Texas Workforce Commission.
The commission’s spokeswoman, Lisa Givens, said her office provides no guidance or oversight to ensure state officials are following the law. They just take what other agencies send them and post it.
“We don’t enforce the rule,” she said. “We accept the postings. There’s no enforcement in this provision.”
Givens did note, however, the statute says “any agency, so that would be any agency.”
Because the law is 25 years old, wrapped into two omnibus revisions of chunks of state law, it has received little attention in recent years. But earlier this year the Senate Research Center, providing context for another bill, was succinct in its interpretation: “State agencies are required to list job openings with the Texas Workforce Commission.”
“The job posting requirement is black and white,” said Craig McDonald of Texans for Public Justice, the left-leaning watchdog group whose ethics complaint against Paxton spurred an ongoing grand jury investigation into possible securities violations.
“In Texas, cronyism is allowed,” McDonald said. “But you have to at least follow the rules.”
Still, an official determination on whether Paxton broke the law can only come from the attorney general himself.
Isn’t that special? Read the whole thing, it’s a nice piece of reporting. There’s not much else that can be done, though perhaps if he’s still claiming to caer about ethics, perhaps Greg Abbott could add this to the Lege’s to do list in 2017. Beyond that, if nothing else this serves as further evidence, as if it were needed, that Paxton has the ethical and moral compass of a Russian hacker. His downfall, when it finally happens, is going to be epic.