Ken Paxton impeachment trial: Day 6 takeaways
AUSTIN (CBSNewsTexas.com) - On the sixth day of the impeachment trial of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, senators heard from four different witnesses, including one whose name has been spoken repeatedly over the course of the past week.
Here's a look at the key takeaways from Tuesday:
Senators hear from Brandon Cammack
The first witness called to the stand Tuesday, and the one whose testimony took most of the day, was Brandon Cammack. He's the outside counselor hired by Attorney General Paxton in 2020 to investigate real estate developer Nate Paul's claims about a raid conducted on his house and businesses.
Paul complained that federal authorities who executed a search warrant on his properties altered the warrant and covered it up. Paxton's top deputies have testified they found those claims to be ridiculous and refused to launch an investigation.
Cammack testified that while working as outside counsel, Nate Paul's lawyer sent him unprompted emails about the investigation into Paul's claims. Included in those emails were the names of people to serve subpoenas to. Among the names were people involved in litigation against either Paul or Paxton. Cammack testified that he didn't realize this fact and wouldn't have sent the subpoenas if he did.
He said when he tried to subpoena Microsoft, he received an email back telling him without a government email address, they wouldn't be able to respond.
"I knew I would need some type of credential to be able to do what I was asked to do," Cammack said.
U.S. Marshals also showed up at his office in Houston. Paxton was the first person he called.
"I just started blowing up his phone until he answered," Cammack said.
When they spoke, he said Paxton advised him not to speak with Marshals without hiring an attorney.
"I've gotten basically the rug pulled out from under me," Cammack said of how he felt at the time. "I'm going and working, everything is okay, I'm getting affirmation that everything is good and all of the sudden, I've got cease and desist letters, U.S. Marshals showing up at my office, and I'm trying to figure out how did we go from that to this."
During his testimony, Cammack also described how his stint with the attorney general's office ended.
Sometime during the first week of October, Cammack said he was called back to Austin for another meeting with Paxton. He assumed they would be meeting to discuss his contract. But when he arrived at the attorney general's office, they took him to a Starbucks.
During that meeting, he was told his contract was terminated and he wouldn't be getting paid.
"They left the Starbucks and tried to get in the car and take off," Cammack said. "And I said, 'Excuse me, can I get a ride back to my car?'"
In response, Rusty Hardin, lawyer for the House impeachment managers, said, "Are you saying that these guys took you over to a Starbucks outside the office, terminated your contract, told you you weren't going to get paid and then drove off, and if you hadn't said, 'Wait, wait, I got my car,' they'd have left you in the street?"
"That's what it looked like," Cammack said.
Encrypted messaging
Another revelation from Cammack's testimony Tuesday was the attorney general's use of encrypted messages.
Cammack said Paxton requested he download the Signal app and sent emails from a Proton Mail account.
He also said he got a phone specifically to communicate with the attorney general.
"Around that time I was getting calls from unknown numbers or potential spam," Cammack said. "I was like, 'I don't want to miss the attorney general's number,' so I got a separate number and gave it to him. That way I knew when that phone rang, that was Mr. Paxton calling."
Attorney details red flags
After Cammack's hours-long testimony, another attorney took the stand. Joe Brown is a former U.S. Attorney appointed by former President Donald Trump. He was also considered for the role of outside counsel, the role Cammack eventually got.
During his testimony Tuesday afternoon, Brown testified that while he was speaking with Paxton about the outside counsel job, he noted some red flags. A concern for Brown was the fact that the job would include investigating the FBI, the State Securities Board and DPS.
"I was aware of the fact that his [Paxton's] indictment involved those three agencies," Brown said. "I said, 'I had some concern ... that I would be under your [Paxton's] authority and investigating the same agencies that were involved in your indictment.'"
Ultimately, Brown did not get the job. He said on Tuesday that he didn't know what happened.
Paxton is still awaiting trial in a long-delayed criminal securities fraud. A hearing in that case has been set for October after the impeachment trial is over.
The trial resumes Wednesday at 9 a.m. You can watch a live stream of the trial in the player above or on the CBS News Texas YouTube channel.
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