Talarico Ad Uses Alleged Pen Theft to Revisit Paxton’s Long Legal and Ethics History
AUSTIN, Texas — Democratic U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico is using an unusual piece of video — footage he says shows Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton taking a pen that did not belong to him — to draw attention to the Republican’s much longer history of legal and ethics controversies.
In the online ad, Talarico’s campaign focuses on what it describes as Paxton stealing a valuable pen, using the incident as a visual metaphor for its broader argument about the attorney general’s conduct in office. The campaign has even used the alleged theft in merchandise and other messaging. Recent reporting has described the item as a pen valued at about $1,000.
The allegation itself is not a criminal case against Paxton, and there is no indication that he has been charged with theft over the pen. But it gives Talarico an opening to revisit controversies that have followed Paxton for more than a decade, including felony securities-fraud charges and his historic impeachment by the Republican-controlled Texas House.
Nearly nine years under felony indictment
Paxton was indicted in 2015 on three felony securities charges stemming from private business dealings before he became attorney general. Two counts accused him of securities fraud for soliciting investors in the technology company Servergy without disclosing that he was being compensated to promote the company. A third alleged that he acted as an investment adviser representative without being properly registered.
The case remained pending for almost nine years.
In March 2024, prosecutors agreed to dismiss the charges under a pretrial agreement requiring Paxton to perform 100 hours of community service, complete 15 hours of legal-ethics training and pay approximately $271,000 in restitution to people prosecutors said had been financially harmed.
Paxton did not plead guilty and did not admit wrongdoing under the agreement.
Impeached by a Republican House
Paxton faced a separate political crisis in 2023 when the Republican-controlled Texas House voted to impeach him, temporarily suspending him from office.
The impeachment centered largely on allegations that Paxton abused the powers of the attorney general’s office to benefit Austin real-estate developer and political donor Nate Paul. Articles of impeachment accused Paxton of bribery, abuse of public trust, misapplication of public resources and obstruction, among other allegations.
The allegations followed complaints from senior employees in Paxton’s own office, who said the attorney general had improperly used government resources to assist Paul. Paxton denied wrongdoing.
After a highly publicized trial, the Texas Senate acquitted Paxton on all 16 articles it considered in September 2023. No article received the 21 votes needed to convict and remove him from office.
The acquittal did not erase the fact that Paxton became one of the rare statewide Texas officials to be impeached — and that the original impeachment vote came from a chamber controlled overwhelmingly by members of his own party.
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