Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton released a video message addressing the criminal charges against him the day before he is set to appear in court.
“These charges are false and I will prevail against them in court,” Paxton said in the four-minute long video. “... I never imagined that after being fairly elected by the people of Texas I would wake up one day to find myself charged with crimes I didn’t commit.”
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission recently filed civil fraud charges against Paxton over his efforts to convince investors to put money into a McKinney-based tech startup.
On the state level, Paxton also faces two first-degree felony charges of securities fraud and one third-degree felony charge of failing to register with the state to sell securities.
Thursday’s hearing starts at 10 a.m. at the Court of Criminal Appeals in Dallas. His lawyers will present arguments as to why the felony charges, involving a tech company called Severgy, should be dismissed.
A Collin County grand jury indicted Paxton in July of 2015.
Paxton allegedly persuaded two investors to buy at least $100,000 worth of stock in Servergy without disclosing that he would be compensated for it, according to court filings.
Speaking about the charges, Paxton says in the video, “The public will see for themselves that they are, at their roots, politically motivated. It’s not a coincidence that the chief witness against me is a political adversary of mine. Some folks are still upset that their moderate candidate didn’t win. And there are those folks that are upset that I am a conservative Christian and made no bones about it.”
Paxton spends about one minute talking about his indictments, saying he didn’t want his message filtered “by liberal reporters, spin doctors, and political opponents.”
At about 1:19 into the video, Paxton then shifts subjects to talk about his efforts as attorney general, spending much of the video talking about taking on the Obama administration over issues including immigration.
