Attorney General Ken Paxton is in the headlines again, and as usual it’s not a good look for our state. Paxton has been revealed to have accepted a gift of $100,000 for his legal defense fund from the head of a company that his office was supposed to be investigating for Medicaid fraud.
From the Associated Press:
Ethics and legal experts say Paxton's acceptance of the money to help pay for his criminal defense on felony securities fraud charges wasn't a clear violation of Texas' loose ethics laws.
But internal policies in the Texas attorney general's office, obtained by The Associated Press, say agency employees "shall never" take gifts from an entity "the employee knows is being investigated" by the office.
Already under indictment for felony charges, Paxton has also previously come under fire for paying former employees at the Attorney General’s office “emergency leave” payments well after they had stopped working there.
As Paxton continues to dig himself into an even deeper hole, he keeps trying to distract from his legal troubles by going after LGBT people and reproductive rights. But if he’s taking money from the very people that he is actually supposed to be holding accountable, we’ll continue to hold him accountable too.
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