Texas voters saw little of the Republican candidates for U.S. Senate on Monday — provided they stayed away from screens.
Sen. John Cornyn and Attorney General Ken Paxton, vying for the GOP nomination in Tuesday’s runoff, had no public campaign events scheduled for the final day of their more than yearlong contest. Instead, the two continued a television advertising barrage that has topped $109 million in spending, according to campaign finance reports, with the bulk coming from Cornyn’s side and its allied super PACs.
Cornyn, seeking a fifth term, spent part of the day hosting an annual, non-campaign event in San Antonio to recognize high school graduates attending the country’s service academies. His last public campaign event was held Friday in Corpus Christi.
Paxton’s final public rallies were Thursday in the Austin area and in San Antonio. Since then he has relied on his campaign and an outside super PAC to carry his primary message: that President Donald Trump endorsed him on May 19. The endorsement has been a central feature of Paxton’s closing advertising as he seeks to unseat an incumbent who has served in the Senate since 2002.
The runoff is the culmination of a primary that began with multiple Republican candidates and narrowed to a two-way race after the March 3 vote. Outside spending has shattered records for a Texas Senate primary, with Cornyn’s financial advantage enabling a lopsided advertising presence. Paxton, who has positioned himself as the insurgent candidate aligned with Trump, has leaned heavily on the president’s support to close the gap.
Tuesday’s election will test the durability of Trump’s endorsement in a statewide Republican primary and determine whether one of the Senate’s most senior Republicans survives a challenge from within his own party. Polls close Tuesday evening, with results expected to reflect a contest in which the final day was defined more by what voters saw on their televisions than what they heard from the candidates in person.