Aaron Reitz, a former Department of Justice lawyer and candidate for Texas attorney general, has endorsed his former opponent, Mayes Middleton, in the GOP primary runoff.
Middleton, a Galveston state senator, finished first in the March 3 primary, garnering nearly 40% of the vote. He is up against U.S. Rep. Chip Roy in the May 26 runoff, which resulted when neither candidate broke 50% of the vote earlier this month.
Reitz, who finished fourth with 14%, said in a statement that Middleton had earned his endorsement based on his staunch support of President Donald Trump, and because his “record in public service shows that he has the mind, heart, and willpower to keep his foot on the gas after Attorney General [Ken] Paxton leaves office.”
During the campaign, Reitz sharply criticized Middleton’s lack of legal experience and often referred to him as “Mayes Middleweight.” While Middleton is a licensed lawyer, he has worked exclusively within his family’s oil and gas business.
“We can’t have some child who’s never practiced law before in his life and is pretending to be a lawyer for the first time ever, who inherited his dad’s oil company, be the next attorney general,” Reitz told The Texas Tribune.
But those critiques were nothing next to his harsh words for Roy. Both Reitz and Roy served in senior positions under Paxton, at different times. While Reitz was endorsed by Paxton, Roy has had a tumultuous relationship with his former boss — Roy called on Paxton to resign after several senior agency officials reported him to the FBI for alleged abuse of office.
“Chip was the first elected official in America to demand that Paxton step down or be removed from office in 2020, and he was the leading national cheerleader pushing for Paxton’s impeachment and conviction in 2023,” Reitz said in his endorsement of Middleton.
Reitz also drew a contrast between Middleton’s staunch support of Trump and Roy’s record with the president. While Trump has recently complimented Roy, the two have clashed, especially after Roy voted to certify the 2020 election results and said Trump engaged in “clearly impeachable” conduct on Jan. 6, 2021.
“Mayes has always been aligned with President Trump,” Reitz wrote. “Trump described Mayes as a ‘very effective leader’ and said his ‘voting record on Conservative issues is second to none.’”
Roy has argued that this independence is a key attribute for the person running the largest red-state attorney general’s office in the country — no matter who is in the White House. Reitz, a close ally of Trump, disagreed.
“We engaged in a spirited primary competition for Texas Attorney General,” Reitz said about Middleton. “But now is the time to unite around our next champion.”
Middleton and Roy are vying for the office that Paxton is departing to challenge U.S. Sen. John Cornyn. The third-place finisher in the March primary, state Sen. Joan Huffman of Houston, has not issued an endorsement in the runoff.
Learn about The Texas Tribune’s policies, including our partnership with The Trust Project to increase transparency in news.
