00:02Ken Paxton has been one of President Trump's most loyal allies, and Trump has put his weight
00:07behind Paxton's Senate campaign in Texas. But in a new private recording, Paxton says one of
00:13Trump's big midterm events actually hurt him. In audio obtained by the New York Times, Paxton
00:19is asked about the impact of the RNC's midterm convention in Texas earlier in September. His
00:25answer was pretty direct. Quote, when we did that convention, it dropped our numbers. Everybody's
00:32numbers dropped. Paxton's campaign is pushing back hard, calling the Times reporting manipulated
00:37nonsense and saying its own latest polling shows his numbers have actually improved since the
00:43convention. And when Trump was asked about Paxton's comments Wednesday, he didn't exactly engage with
00:48the criticism. Instead, he defended the convention and pointed to its viewership. Well, I haven't
00:54heard that. But I can tell you that the convention was amazing. As you probably know, we had 107
01:00million views. Think of that. We had over 100 million views. I think 107. The NFL had 25 million
01:08views. So we had four times what the NFL did. And, you know, it's possible that could be true. I
01:14don't
01:15know if it's possible, but other people were helped greatly. The convention dubbed Trumpapalooza was
01:20something new for the RNC. The party doesn't normally hold a national convention during a midterm
01:26year. And Paxton doesn't have much room to lose support. Several recent polls have shown
01:32Democrat James Tallarico ahead, including a mayor's poll last week that had him up six.
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