Texas Sen. Mayes Middleton unleashing almost $17 million of his own money to win the Republican Party’s nomination for attorney general incited a big-dollar reaction from billionaires and millionaires in support of his opponent, US Rep. Chip Roy.
Roy’s backers have contributed $7.9 million in the weeks since he finished second to Middleton in the March 3 primary, a jolt that levels the playing field in their May 26 runoff and enables him to widely cast Middleton as an inexperienced litigator.
Middleton’s spending power pushed him 155,000 votes ahead of Roy in the primary, causing Roy to double back to donors with an urgent call for more generous support in the runoff to combat the exceedingly deep pockets of the oil and gas executive.
The two are vying to replace Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is in a Republican primary runoff for US Senate against Sen. John Cornyn.
Roy’s supporters “had a decision after March 3 whether they’d go throw in the towel or double down and support Roy,” said Mark Jones, a political science professor at Rice University. “They doubled down and supported Roy.”
Roy, responding to an X post Tuesday about his fundraising haul, said, “Turns out there are a lot of folks who want a qualified attorney as Attorney General of Texas.”
The biggest help, by far, was the $2.75 million from billionaire Alex Fairly, which includes forgiveness of a $1 million loan he’d given before the runoff.
Middleton’s Deep Pockets
Of the $5.7 million Middleton raised in the runoff fundraising period, $3.14 million was his own, upping his total self-fund in the race to $16.8 million. He also reported $100,000 donations from
The depths of Middleton’s wealth is largely unknown, but recent litigation he initiated in Texas offers an example of how quickly he amasses it. In early 2025, Middleton sought to recover $25 million including interest for a period of several days when he said a production company failed to pay him the market price for oil. The litigation involving royalties on 9,000 acres of land owned by Middleton in Webb County settled for an undisclosed amount last year.
The case in the Texas Business Court marked a rare instance that Middleton, a 2008 law graduate of University of Texas, was involved in litigation as a party or a lawyer. His minimal experience has formed Roy’s biggest attacks, with a campaign mailer distributed in the days before early voting began on May 18 proclaiming Middleton has never seen the inside of a courtroom.
The late-arriving money let Roy “rebut Middleton’s attacks and launch his own attacks,” said Jones, the Rice professor.
Though much of Roy’s campaign has focused on Middleton’s lack of legal experience, law firms were notably missing from the donation ledgers, signifying the political significance of the race for Texas’ top lawyer—over its importance within the legal community.
Charles Cooper, founding member of Cooper & Kirk, gave Roy $10,000 for the runoff, matching his pre-runoff contribution. Jonathan Newton of King & Spalding LLP also gave Roy $10,000, as did Adam Loewy, a personal injury lawyer who attended law school with Roy at University of Texas.
Middleton recorded a donation of a little more than $10,000 from Jackson Walker LLP partner William Hornberger.
Roy’s runoff fundraising totals, which cover all political activities through May 16, reveal a path for the four-term congressman to upset Middleton, who began the race as a relative unknown before launching self-funded TV buys targeting Roy for his tendency to break from President
Neither candidate secured a majority of votes needed to win the primary outright, but did get enough to leave behind two others, former Trump DOJ staffer Aaron Reitz and state Sen. Joan Huffman.
Middleton’s supporters are eager to remind voters that Roy voted to certify the results of the 2020 election, which made him an outlier among Republican lawmakers.
The office they’re fighting over is one of the most influential in the country, often taking the lead in litigation brought by several Republican states. With Trump as president, Paxton and his team often litigate alongside the Justice Department on issues related to immigration, privacy, and transgender care for minors. In the gap when Trump was out of office, Texas filed more than 100 lawsuits against the Biden administration.
The winner is almost sure to be the next Attorney General in a deeply-red state that last elected a Democrat to a statewide office three decades ago. On the Democratic side, state Sen. Nathan Johnson faces former Galveston, Texas, Mayor Joe Jaworski in a runoff attracting far less money than on the Republican side.