AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — The State Bar of Texas is dropping efforts to discipline Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton over allegations that his failed efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election amounted to professional misconduct.
The decision, revealed Wednesday in court filings, ends a yearslong attempt to potentially sanction Paxton over making false claims of fraud when he filed a lawsuit that questioned Democrat Joe Biden’s victory over Republican President Donald Trump.
The move comes a month after the Texas Supreme Court ruled that Paxton’s top deputy could not be sanctioned over similar accusations. A disciplinary commission for the state bar cited that December ruling in moving to drop its lawsuit against Paxton.
A spokesperson for the State Bar of Texas declined to comment Thursday. Spokespeople for the attorney general did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
Paxton has long attacked the accusations against him as baseless and politically motivated.
The disciplinary commission accused Paxton of making false claims of fraud to the U.S. Supreme Court in his lawsuit challenging the election. The bar association pursued its own lawsuit against Paxton in 2022, and at the time, the committee said it sought to punish Paxton through disciplinary action as an attorney and not as a public official.
The bar complaint alleged that Paxton “misrepresented” facts to the Supreme Court in the suit seeking to overturn Biden’s victory. The suit was backed by Trump. The high court threw out the lawsuit.
The state bar disciplinary group’s punishments against an attorney can range from a written admonition to a suspension or disbarment.
The potential sanctions were among several legal clouds that had hung over Paxton. Last year, Paxton reached a deal to end criminal accusations of securities fraud, and the Texas Senate in 2023 acquitted him of corruption accusations in an impeachment trial.
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Lathan is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
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