Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton fled his home to avoid a subpoena Monday in a federal lawsuit brought by groups seeking to help Texans get abortions out of state, court records show see.
Paxton ran from the garage of his home in McKinney, Texas, into a van driven by his wife, State Senator Angela Paxton, while refusing to accept documents from a processing server, according to one The affidavit was filed Monday in United States District Court in Austin.
The Paxtons drove off without taking the documents, which were left on the ground of the house, process serviceman Ernesto Martin Herrera wrote in the affidavit.
The subpoena asks Paxton, a Republican, to testify Tuesday morning in a civil lawsuit in which many Texas-based nonprofits want to continue to help residents bring abortions in other states. That includes paying out-of-state abortion providers and providing financial assistance to people who want abortions, as well as providing interstate travel for those providers. this.
Non-profits say their abortion support activities stopped right before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, defended federal abortion rights for decades, in a 5-4 vote in June. The high court ruling in the Dobbs Women’s Health Foundation v. Jackson also brought up another case, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, largely in favor of abortion rights established by Roe.
Paxton in a pair of tweets on Monday night claimed that he was showing concern for his family and attacked the media for covering the affidavit, without denying the content of the document. Whether.
“This is an absurd waste of time and the media should be ashamed of themselves,” Paxton tweeted in response to a tweet. Texas Tribune article.
“Across the country, conservatives have faced threats to their safety – many threats that have received little coverage or condemnation from the mainstream media.” , his tweet said.
“It was clear that the media wanted to cause another controversy regarding my work as Attorney General, so they attacked me for having the audacity to avoid a stranger lingering. outside my home and expressed concern for my family’s safety and well-being,” he said in a second tweet.
Herrera’s affidavit said he arrived at Paxton’s home at 8:28 a.m. Monday and was greeted at the front door by a woman who identified herself as Angela. When he told her he was trying to pass a subpoena to Ken Paxton, she told him that AG was on the phone.
Herrera, who said he recognized Ken Paxton in the house through the glass on the door, offered to wait for him. Angela replied that Paxton was “in a hurry to leave,” according to Herrera, who observed a black Chevy truck in the driveway and then saw another vehicle approaching.
At about 9:40 a.m., Herrera said he saw Paxton come out of his garage. Herrera went up the driveway toward Paxton and called out his name, at which point “he turned and went back inside the house through the same door in the garage.”
Minutes later, Angela stepped out of the truck and opened both the driver’s side and rear doors, Herrera wrote. A few minutes after she started the truck, “I saw Mr. Paxton RAN from the inside door of the garage towards the back door behind the driver,” Herrera wrote.
“I approached the truck, and loudly called his name and said I had court documents for him. Mr. Paxton ignored me and continued towards the truck. After determining that Mr. Paxton was will not take my subpoena hand, I declare that I am serving him the legal documents and am leaving them on the ground where he can get them,” Herrera wrote.
“Then I put the documents on the ground next to the truck. Service completed at 9:50 am. He got on the truck to leave the documents on the ground, and then both vehicles left,” he wrote. .
In July, Paxton sue the Biden administration according to Department of Health and Human Services guidelines that hospitals and doctors must perform abortions in an emergency situation.
Paxton, who was elected attorney general in 2014 and re-elected in 2018, has been accused of securities fraud for seven years, though the case has not yet gone to trial. He win the Republican primaries in Maybeat GOP challenger George P. Bush in a match.
