Fox Radio Fill-In Host and Allen West Fault Ken Paxton's Texas Senate Bid

Fox News correspondent Griff Jenkins and former Republican Representative Allen West spent a segment of The Brian Kilmeade Show on Tuesday picking apart Ken Paxton's Texas Senate campaign. Jenkins said that a Paxton loss would leave Republicans saying they had a candidate quality issue.

"I think it's fair to say that if Talarico ends up winning, they're going to look back the Republican Party and say, we had a candidate quality issue," said Jenkins, who was filling in while Kilmeade had the day off.

The criticism comes from inside the tent. Jenkins spent much of the same broadcast praising President Donald Trump's midterm campaigning. West, a retired Army lieutenant colonel, represented Florida in the House and is now executive director of the American Constitutional Rights Union.

Where the Texas Senate Race Stands

Paxton, the state's attorney general, is facing Democrat James Talarico, a state representative, for the open Senate seat. Talarico leads Paxton 47.2 percent to 43.6 percent in PolitiKool's polling average, and PolitiKool's polling average for the Senate map rates overall control a toss-up.

The show played a clip of CNN data analyst Harry Enten calling Texas the most likely seat to decide the chamber. Enten has also flagged Paxton's unpopularity. "If James Talarico actually wins in Texas, get this, he gives Democrats a 78% chance of winning the United States Senate," Enten said.

Jenkins added a clarification. "They need a net gain of four seats to take the majority," he said. Republicans hold 53 of the Senate's 100 seats.

Iceland, an Ad and a Recording

Jenkins started with the holiday. "He has made a handful of mistakes," he said. "And I was stunned on 4th of July. He was like over in London or something." When West corrected him to "Iceland," Jenkins went on: "Right, with his girlfriend. It's like, what are you doing? Get to 40 different barbecues on 4th of July, right?"

Video published by the Daily Mail showed Paxton boarding a flight from Washington Dulles to Reykjavík on June 27 with Christian influencer Tracy Duhon, the San Antonio Current reported.

Jenkins then turned to Angela Paxton, the Republican state senator who filed for divorce in July 2025, citing adultery, according to the Texas Tribune. The show aired her ad, in which she says, "Let's talk about the elephant in the room" and that she is "voting for the Republican ticket on November 3rd" without naming her husband. In September, she gave a speech to Republican women with the same title, telling them to back the party's nominees "even if we're mad at them," the Tribune reported.

"It seems like a bad messaging as far as I'm concerned," Jenkins said.

Jenkins was more cautious about a third item. "Look, I don't believe everything I read," he said, before describing a report that Paxton had been caught complaining that his campaign was being run from Washington. "It tells me that he's already trying to figure out who to blame for a loss."

That report holds up. In audio from a Sept. 24 lunch in Washington, Paxton said, "I've never been in a race where I felt less control over the campaign," Fox News reported. Nick Maddux, a Paxton adviser, called the coverage "manipulated nonsense." He said the remarks referred to the legal ban on campaigns coordinating with super PACs.

Allen West: 'Enough Baggage'

West's advice was blunt. "Ken Paxton needs to be on the border," he said, pointing to South Texas counties Trump flipped in 2024. Of the July trip, he said: "Here's the 250th anniversary of this incredible nation and you're not here, okay? What does that tell people?"

He told Paxton to "show remorse for the things that we know about because you have enough baggage to fill a C-17 cargo aircraft."

West's history of the state was approximate. He said Trump won Texas in 2024 "by almost 20 points" before revising it to "over 15." Trump won by 13.7 points.

What Happens Next

West still expects his side to win. "It will probably be within that 2% margin either way," he said. "But I think that Paxton will end up pulling it out once again."

He also said a loss would dominate the post-election coverage: "I think that'll be the big story come the 4th of November and probably for the rest of the week." Election Day is Nov. 3, four weeks away.