MAGA Inc Makes First General-Election Ad Buy: $10 Million for Ken Paxton in Texas Senate Race

Since Trump's endorsement helped Ken Paxton knock off incumbent Sen. John Cornyn in the May primary runoff, Senate Republicans have spent months publicly and privately begging Trump's super PAC to actually spend money defending the seat. MAGA Inc. filed a $10 million ad buy with the Federal Election Commission on Saturday, its first major expenditure of the general election cycle in any race, according to CBS News and the Texas Tribune.

The money goes to Del Ray Media Inc. for television and digital ads: $5 million for positive spots boosting Paxton, $5 million for negative ads against Democratic state Rep. James Talarico, per the FEC filing cited by CNBC, PBS, Fortune and the Texas Tribune. Both ads focus on tax policy, casting Talarico as "High Tax Talarico" while framing Paxton's plan as offering tax breaks for housing and healthcare costs, according to MAGA Inc. spokesperson Alex Pfeiffer.

Why Republicans were nervous

Talarico, 37, has outraised Paxton significantly. In the second quarter he pulled in more than $30 million to Paxton's roughly $9 million, the Texas Tribune reported. Polls have shown Talarico with a narrow average lead, and multiple analysts rate the race a toss-up, a genuinely unusual label for a Texas Senate seat.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune told Fox News earlier this week that ad time in Texas runs about $8 million a week and that "their resources need to be brought to bear on Texas because it's not one that we can lose if we're going to hang on to a Republican majority." NBC News reported that four people involved in GOP strategy described growing frustration that Trump hadn't engaged in the midterms sooner.

Elon Musk's America PAC had already put in $1.4 million against Talarico on digital media and printing, the Texas Tribune reported, meaning Trump's operation was playing catch-up to another wealthy outside group.

The Paxton baggage

Paxton carries real political scar tissue. He was impeached by the Republican-controlled Texas House in 2023 on allegations of bribery and abuse of public trust, then acquitted by the state Senate after trial, according to NBC News and CBS News. During that trial it emerged Paxton was having an affair. His wife, state Sen. Angela Paxton, later filed for divorce "on biblical grounds" citing "recent discoveries," without elaborating further.

Despite that, Paxton polled at 61% approval among Texas Republicans in August, according to the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin, cited by CBS News. Some of Cornyn's former Senate colleagues have nonetheless worried openly that Paxton is a weaker general-election candidate than the incumbent he beat.

The tax fight, both sides

The MAGA Inc. ads hit Talarico for voting against a bill that would have required cities and counties to hold elections before raising property tax revenue by more than 3.5%, per the Texas Tribune. Talarico's economic platform includes raising taxes on corporations and high earners while expanding tax credits for parents and lower-income workers.

Talarico's campaign disputes the "high tax" framing directly. Spokesperson JT Ennis said in a statement to multiple outlets, including CBS News and the Texas Tribune, that "billionaire-backed dark money groups are lying about James Talarico" and that Talarico "was proud to vote for the largest property tax cut in Texas history and has consistently voted to cut taxes for working Texans." That's a factual dispute between two campaigns pointing to different votes and different framing of the same legislative record, one this outlet can't referee from the outside. Voters will have to weigh Paxton's tax-cut proposals against Talarico's actual voting history themselves.

The bigger money picture

MAGA Inc. holds at least $400 million, according to CBS News, though Trump has claimed the total raised is closer to $850 million and said he intends to spend $400-500 million on the midterms while banking the rest for 2028. Before Texas, the PAC's only other general-election spending this cycle was $827,000 in South Carolina supporting Sen. Lindsey Graham's reelection bid.

"I'm going to spend whatever amount of money necessary to try and help us," Trump told reporters Friday, adding, "This is my money," and stressing it's separate from Republican National Committee funds.

Whoever wins the Texas seat could help determine control of a Senate where Republicans hold only a slim majority, shaping the final two years of Trump's term. Talarico has criticized the Republican midterm convention set for Dallas this week, where entry reportedly costs $20,000, saying it amounts to donors "toasting their own corruption" while grocery prices rise. Whether $10 million in ads moves a race this close is the open question Texas voters will settle in November.