By Breitbart News Network | Created at 2026-08-19 04:42:06 | Updated at 2026-08-20 04:06:58
1 day ago
President Donald Trump is scheduled to headline a Republican National Committee (RNC) fundraising event for the U.S. Senate campaign of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) later in August, according to a recent report.
The upcoming RNC fundraiser is set for August 27 in Houston, Texas, where host committee tickets are selling for $443,000 per couple and photo opportunities with the president are going for $88,600 per couple, according to an invitation posted by Teddy Schleifer of the New York Times:
While a Monday report from the Houston Chronicle stated that the “big question remains” on whether the RNC and Trump will use their financial resources to help Paxton, MSNOW’s Emily Hung reported on Tuesday evening that Trump will be headlining the event on his behalf:
“Per source familiar, Trump’s visit is focused on ensuring Paxton has the funds he needs to win the midterms, after his campaign spent the bulk of their war chest against [Sen. John] Cornyn during the runoff,” Hung wrote on X.
The source added that the aim of the fundraiser is to show donors that “Trump and his PACs are behind Paxton all the way.”
The news comes just a couple days after Paxton told Breitbart News in an exclusive interview that he ran out of campaign money during his primary fight against incumbent Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), who lost to the attorney general in their May runoff.
“Cornyn got himself humiliated Tuesday night by 28 points,” Breitbart News’s John Nolte opined with 98 percent of the vote in, the day after the election.
Trump gave Paxton his “complete and total endorsement” over Cornyn less than 10 days before their final face off against each other, calling the incumbent a “good man,” but adding, “He was not supportive of me when times were tough.”
The president’s announcement of support for Paxton came after months of staying out of the fray. Trump stated in February that he liked “all three” Republicans running for the seat, including Rep. Wesley Hunt (R-TX), who came in a distant third place in March’s first primary election before it headed to the May runoff, which Paxton handily won.
As the Texas Tribune put it, Paxton’s victory over Cornyn was a “crushing blow to the Texas GOP’s old guard, which has faltered in recent years against the Paxton-led insurgent wing.”
Speaking this past Saturday with Breitbart News Political Editor Bradley Jaye, Paxton said that he expected a difficult summer after emerging from a three-month runoff that Democrat U.S. Senate nominee James Talarico did not have to go through.
“I started June 1 with basically $0,” Paxton said, while Talarico “had just raised 30 million,” which the attorney general said came largely from donors in California and New York. According to Paxton, Talarico “had the ability to raise money for three months that I didn’t have.”
An Emerson College Polling survey taken August 9-10 of 1,000 likely Texas voters showed Paxton and Talarico in a “dead heat,” with 47 percent of respondents supporting the Republican, while 46 percent saying they support the Democrat. Five percent of respondents were undecided, and two percent said they support someone else.
However, the numbers were “sharply divided by age,” the pollster said.
“[V]oters under 50 favor Talarico by 15 points, 53% to 38%, while those over 50 break for Paxton by 11 points, 53% to 42%[.]”
Olivia Rondeau is a politics reporter for Breitbart News based in Washington, DC. Find her on X/Twitter and Instagram.
