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- Texas AG Ken Paxton and his wife, Senator Angela Paxton, left for Utah last week as Texas froze, according to the Houston Chronicle.
- Paxton is one of many Texas officials who left amid the crisis.
- Visit Insider’s Business section for more stories.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and his wife, Senator Angela Paxton, flew to Utah last week for business meetings as Texas faced extreme winter conditions and massive power outages, according to the Houston Chronicle.
The Paxtons left for Utah last Wednesday, the same day US Senator Ted Cruz from Texas and his family traveled to Cancun, according to the Dallas Morning News.
Paxton’s campaign spokesman Ian Prior told the Dallas Morning News that the attorney general had traveled to meet with Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes in Salt Lake City on Wednesday and Friday.
According to Prior, the two Republicans discussed an antitrust lawsuit that Texas, Utah, and others are bringing against Google, with Paxton also attending a presentation on the police training program. Prior did not tell the Morning News whether the trip was paid for with state money or out of pocket.
“I cannot share further additional details or specific reasons for the need for the meeting regarding Google as it involves an ongoing investigation,” Prior told The Morning News.
A spokeswoman for Senator Angela Paxton told The Morning News that she “joined AG Paxton on a previously planned trip to Utah, which included meetings that benefit her efforts to promote human dignity and support law enforcement “. Representatives for the couple claimed the trip was for business purposes.
On Wednesday night, the first day AG Paxton reportedly met Reyes, Paxton slammed the state’s electricity grid operator and electric companies on Twitter – pledging to investigate the Electric Reliability Council of Texas – sharing also a number Texans could call to report price abuse.
Paxton tweeted: “They left over 3 million homes without electricity for days, including mine,” Paxton tweeted Wednesday evening. “What are they doing in response? Raise the prices, stay silent, find excuses and play the blame game. This is unacceptable!”
While the couple were in Utah on Thursday, Angela Paxton tweeted a call for Texans to stay home.
“The roads are always dangerous. Please stay home, if you can, and use extreme caution if you have to drive,” she said. tweeted.
The attorney general’s office is tasked with responding to reports of price gouging, which particularly applied to bottled water and hotel rooms, as millions of Texans lost heat and water.
Paxton spokesman Prior confirmed that the Paxtons lost electricity at their residence but did not leave the state, “until power returned to most of the state. including his own home “.
Paxton’s office could not immediately be reached for comment.
On Wednesday morning, ERCOT reported that at least 2.7 million homes in Texas had no electricity. And that night, nearly 12 million Texans were having problems with their water service due to the aftermath of the storm and outages.
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