Ken Paxton's evasive relationship with the press

AUSTIN (Nexstar) — 502 days ago, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton held a press conference — one of just two he has called in the last year and a half. It was a blockbuster political news event, both because it was meant to preempt his historic impeachment, and because in recent years he has made himself available to journalists almost as rarely as the Texas House has impeached statewide officials.

He took no questions.

During that long drought of public access to the state's top attorney, KXAN has submitted dozens of press inquiries to Paxton's office. They have not responded to one since September 2023. It marks an era of evasion in which Paxton has ignored inquiries and avoided accountability from the press.

"Democracy runs on information," the Texas Press Association's Donnis Baggett told Nexstar. "The flow of that information — two ways — is essential. But increasingly in this country... (officials) may control the message and their exposure to questioning about that message. That's not a healthy relationship. That's a one-way street."

Responding to journalists' questions

The OAG's website shows Paxton's communications staff has published over 200 press releases since October 2023. Each one includes a media contact email that has proven to be a one-way line of communication.

Email data Nexstar obtained through the Texas Public Information Act suggests Paxton's press team has an extraordinarily low response rate to journalists' inquiries.

From March to September, the Attorney General's Office received 2,722 emails to their "communications@oag.texas.gov" email account -- the main press contact and the only means of contacting their press office that they provide publicly. In the same timeframe, that account sent eight emails -- a sent/received ratio of 0.003%.

Individual press staffers also show a low response rate. Communications Director Paige Willey received 3,470 emails in the same period. She sent 907 emails, suggesting a press response rate of less than 26%. Lead press secretary Jonathan Richie sent just 197 emails for the 2,112 he received, suggesting a response rate of less than 9%.

The numbers suggest an evasive relationship with the press experienced anecdotally in newsrooms across Texas — the attorney general has expressed little interest in speaking with the traditional press, and by extension, with the constituents for whom he works.

Tracking tax dollars

In just the last few months, Paxton has sued Dallas, Austin, Bexar County, Harris County, Travis County, and migrant charities in Houston and El Paso — just to name a few of the lawsuits in which Texas taxpayers are paying the legal bills for both sides.

"Every tax dollar should be transparent," Texas Association of Broadcasters Vice President Michael Schneider said. "If we're making this decision — the extraordinary decision — to use tax dollars to sue a local government agency in Texas, then we should know what's going on, what's the reasoning behind the suit, how much money is being spent on the suit."

The Attorney General's Office also spends more than most government offices on their communications team. Communications Director Paige Willey gets paid more than $213,000 a year — that's more than the White House Press Secretary, more than Ken Paxton, and more than most of the assistant attorneys general on his staff. Lead Press Secretary Jonathan Richie makes another $90,000. Yet, their interactions with the press are scant.

"We should be able to find out how our money's being spent. We should be able to find out what is the reasoning behind policy that's enacted," Schneider said. "We need to be careful about the people we're electing, because we need to make sure that they're going to be accountable and responsive to the public."

Paxton's defense attorney responds

Paxton's defense attorney shed some light on the attorney general's relationship with the press.

"Let me share with you my exposure to that over the last decade of knowing him and representing him. I want you to imagine that every time you open the newspaper or open your phone or open a website, everything associated with your name for ten years is, 'Ken Paxton under indictment for securities fraud,'" attorney Mitch Little said. Little defended Paxton against securities fraud charges and impeachment before winning the Republican nomination for Texas House District 65.

"The ten-year framing that Ken Paxton has received, regardless of the accomplishments of his office, is that he's under indictment for securities fraud," Little said. "I think he has a much deeper level of exposure than I do to the media and the way that this is framed on behalf of and to advance the Democrat agenda. I think it's just true, and certainly you see it on a national level that the media is captured for the Democrats, and Republicans are tired of it and some of them have said, 'look, I'm not talking to you anymore.'"

Longtime journalists like Baggett agree that the press is partially responsible for improving its relationship with elected officials.

"The press owes it to the public first, and to the people in government second, and to themselves, to go the extra mile in trying to be as fair and balanced and equal — in all capital letters, bold face — as it is humanly possible to be," Baggett said. "I don't think that happens all the time, to be quite frank about it, and every time there's an egregious example of that it puts people deeper in the trenches. It makes them more defensive, more suspicious, and thereby hurts the effort to heal the wounds that this country is suffering right now, largely based on the lack of trust."

Nexstar contacted Paxton's office last Tuesday for comment on this story, seeking to better understand how his press team decides when and whether to respond to press inquiries, and whether they maintain a journalist "blacklist," as his former employees have testified under oath in his impeachment trial.

Nexstar did not receive a response.