Opponents of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton have revived a 2012 incident involving a missing $1,000 pen in their campaign efforts ahead of the upcoming Senate race. The episode, which has long been a point of contention in Texas political circles, resurfaced last week in an advertisement supporting Paxton’s Democratic challenger, James Talarico.
The incident occurred at a Collin County courthouse outside Dallas, where Paxton, then a state lawmaker, was recorded on security footage taking a Montblanc pen belonging to attorney Joe Joplin from a security bin at a checkpoint. The pen, reportedly valued at approximately $1,000 and given to Joplin by his wife, was left unattended momentarily. Following the discovery, a sheriff’s deputy contacted Paxton, who acknowledged taking the pen and agreed to return it.
The pen episode first attracted significant attention during Paxton’s 2018 re-election campaign for attorney general, when it was used by Democratic nominee Justin Nelson as a symbol of questionable character. It reemerged this year amid Paxton’s contentious Republican primary fight against Senator John Cornyn, with Cornyn’s supporters highlighting the incident in attack ads. Now, with the Senate race underway, Talarico’s campaign has incorporated the episode into its message, featuring Joplin in a commercial urging voters to choose Talarico, who “won’t steal your pen.”
Paxton’s campaign dismissed the renewed focus on the pen as a “childish attack.” Spokeswoman Madison Cercy characterized the matter as a “mix-up at security” that had already been resolved. Talarico’s team, however, views the episode as illustrative of Paxton’s character flaws. The campaign has even sold pens bearing the slogan “Not Ken Paxton’s Pen” to supporters, echoing a similar strategy employed by Nelson’s 2018 attorney general campaign.
Despite the attention the pen story has garnered among political operatives and media, it remains unfamiliar to many Texas voters. At a recent Paxton fundraiser in Washington, a pilot who attended expressed uncertainty about the incident even after viewing the footage, noting the difficulty in determining whether the act was intentional or an honest mistake.
Paxton’s broader legal and ethical challenges have also been prominent in his political narrative. He has faced a 2015 indictment on securities fraud charges, which resulted in a restitution agreement without an admission of guilt, and a 2023 impeachment in the Texas Legislature on corruption allegations, from which he was acquitted. The pen incident, though minor in comparison, continues to be leveraged by opponents as a symbolic example in a race marked by these larger controversies.
As the Senate campaign intensifies, the pen episode underscores the enduring scrutiny on Paxton’s conduct and character, with both sides using it to mobilize support and frame the narrative around trust and integrity.