Inside the Impeachment: Paxton on Trial — Day 2 (with Patrick Svitek)

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The second day of the impeachment trial continued with more testimony from Jeff Mateer, the former first assistant attorney general appointed under Paxton who was one of the eight employees to raise allegations of bribery and abuse of office to the FBI in 2020.

For this episode, The Texan reporters Brad Johnson and Matt Stringer are joined by Patrick Svitek of The Texas Tribune. 

We’ll get into more details of some of these highlights from today:

• Paxton, who left after the lunch break on the first day of the trial, did not return to the chamber for the proceedings.
• Attorneys for the House and Paxton began the day with an agreement on which evidence to pre-admit, and Paxton’s team said that the suspended attorney general has “nothing to hide” and would drop their objection to evidence on the grounds of privileged communication.
• With repeated objections of leading the witness from Paxton attorney Tony Buzbee, House attorney Rusty Hardin questioned Mateer regarding the timeline and reasoning he had when raising allegations to the FBI.
• The first name drop of Anthony Fauci, Texans for Lawsuit Reform, and George P. Bush.
• Mateer said he believed Mr. Paxton was “under the influence” or being “blackmailed” because he could not explain why he was working so hard to help Nate Paul, but that Mateer ultimately became convinced it was due to an extramarital affair.
• During the cross-examination, Buzbee attempted to draw a distinction between state code and the first article of impeachment regarding the attorney general’s authority to become involved in lawsuits related to charitable organizations — an apparent attempt to throw that article into doubt.
• Buzbee accused Mateer and the other whistleblowers for staging a coup against Attorney General Paxton.
• After finishing the questioning of Mateer late in the day, the House impeachment team called another former employee, Ryan Bangert, to the stand.