GOP Senate candidate Ken Paxton says Trump’s midterm convention hurt him in leaked audio

00:00:48

Though, to be honest with you, the numbers– when we did that convention, it dropped our numbers. Everybody’s numbers dropped. Right now, yeah, not good.

00:01:00

A senior advisor to Paxton’s campaign issued a statement calling the recording, quote, “more manipulated nonsense from the New York Times” and said Paxton was going to win the race. When CBS News asked Texas Senator John Cornyn, outgoing senator, for his reaction, he just had one word– whoops. Joining me now is CBS News political reporter Zak Hudak. So, Zak, no love lost there between Cornyn and Paxton. Give us your take on this remark. Lindsey, this is something we were reporting on, even leading up to that RNC midterm convention, which a lot of people saw as, more than anything, to try to help Ken Paxton by sending Donald Trump to the state for, basically, a extra large political rally. We reported on the fact that a lot of battleground candidates were actually opting out of going. They were saying, you know what? It does not help me to be closely associated with the president right now. I need to be in my home district. So while I don’t want to attribute automatic causation here, there is a reality that battleground candidates were concerned about being too closely associated with the president while prices are high, while the Iran war goes on, and while the president’s approval rating is below water. In the case of Paxton here, why I think it’s particularly significant is, this is a state that a Democrat has not won statewide since 1994. So even in a state like that, we hear Ken Paxton saying it’s gotten to the point where Donald Trump is a drag on Republicans like him. CBS News is also reporting Majority Leader John Thune is going out to campaign in several states. What does that indicate? Lindsey, that indicates– typically, a majority leader spends a midterm year mostly fundraising. In this last stretch, they will get out there. But the fact that he’s getting out there so aggressively, going to North Carolina and Nebraska, Kansas, Minnesota, Florida, and a handful of others, including Iowa twice, that shows that, number one, this is the final stretch, and both sides are going full out until the end, and number two, that places where Republicans typically aren’t particularly worried in a Senate race– Iowa, for instance– they need every boost they can get. So while this will probably help Republicans a little bit, it does show that Republicans are pretty uneasy going into midterms. And Marist released another poll yesterday showing Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed running 7 points ahead of GOP candidate Mike Rogers. What do you make of that? I think that is, as we’ve been discussing, Lindsey, the continued drag of President Trump’s policies on Republicans. We saw Mike Rogers try to create a little bit of space between the two of them, talking about tariffs and, particularly, tariffs on Canada in recent weeks. That clearly has not been enough. It is standard that things really tighten up in the final weeks in Michigan, so I don’t think El-Sayed should be calling this a win already. However, that poll also showed independent voters leaning more toward El-Sayed. So that is bad news for Rogers, who needs those voters in order to win the state.

00:03:49

Zak Hudak, thank you.