by Kayla Guo, The Texas Tribune

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Attorney General Ken Paxton has spent much of his career, which has taken him to the heights of Republican politics, trailed by a raft of criminal and civil accusations.

But in the final days of the Biden administration, The Associated Press reported Thursday, the Justice Department defused the most serious legal threat he faced — a federal criminal probe into allegations of corruption — by declining to prosecute and effectively ending the investigation.

With the investigation over, Paxton has nearly cleared his crowded slate of career-threatening legal battles, just as he gears up for a likely 2026 primary run against U.S. Sen. John Cornyn.

“The end of this investigation is both politically and personally a huge boon for Ken Paxton,” said Matthew Wilson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University. “Paxton can point to that and say, ‘You see, even under a Democratic administration, they didn’t feel that there was anything there that merited moving forward.’”

Two sources familiar with the issue, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, told the AP of the Justice Department’s decision, including that it was made while President Joe Biden was still in office. The DOJ did not immediately respond to questions about confirming the AP report.

The development extends a multiyear string of legal victories vindicating the once-embattled Republican. It........

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