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The divorce trial of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and State Sen. Angela Paxton has been canceled as they work towards an amicable resol

The agreement was reached only hours before lawyers for a coalition of media organizations were prepared to argue for the release of the documents on Friday morning.

Author: Paul Livengood

Published: 3:48 PM CDT June 2, 2026

Updated: 9:18 AM CDT June 3, 2026

DALLAS — Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton – who is running for U.S. Senator against James Talarico in November – and his wife, State Sen. Angela Paxton, have had their divorce trial canceled and taken off the docket, WFAA has learned.

The Paxtons filed for divorce in July 2025 amid allegations of Ken Paxton committing adultery, WFAA previously reported.

In a statement posted to X at the time, Angela Paxton (R-McKinney) wrote: "I believe marriage is a sacred covenant and I have earnestly pursued reconciliation. But in light of recent discoveries, I do not believe that it honors God or is loving to myself, my children, or Ken to remain in the marriage."

In December 2025, they unsealed their divorce records, and WFAA reviewed the 50-plus pages of court documents. The divorce documents had little detail about Ken Paxton's infidelity, which played a role in his unsuccessful impeachment trial in Austin in 2023.

"Respondent has committed adultery," Angela Paxton's lawyers wrote in her petition for divorce she filed against the AG on July 10.

Now, the court has told WFAA that Judge Bob Brotherton had canceled the trial, citing that "the parties are not ready to proceed with trial at this time." In a statement to WFAA, Ken Paxton's lawyers, Laura Roach and Jared Julian, said "the parties have jointly agreed that a trial setting is no longer necessary and the Court has removed the case from the trial docket."

#texas #republican #attorney general #ken paxton #divorce trial #canceled #angela paxton

One of the most celebrated divorce cases in the city took place in November 1925. Leonard "Kip" Rhinelander, scion of a wealthy and prominent New York family, had married Alice Jones the previous year after a romance of several years. Jones, the daughter of British immigrants, was working-class, and her father was of mixed race.

The tabloids got hold of the story and, despite Rhinelander's father's threats, went to town. Oddly, press coverage focused less on Jones's race than on the class differences between her and her husband. But the Hearst-run Daily Mirror blared "RHINELANDER WEDS NEGRESS/Society dumbfounded."

Under threat of disinheritance, Rhinelander left Jones and sued for divorce, claiming that she had deceived him by covering up her race.

Rhinelander v. Rhinelander attracted national attention. The plaintiffs tried to paint Jones as a tramp, bewitching the shy young heir and sleeping with him before the wedding. (The latter was true.) The (all-white, all-male) jury was allowed to examine Jones's skin and, when a letter written by Jones saying that she'd heard that Al Jolson was a "flirt" was put into evidence, the occasionally blackfaced singer was called to testify that he had not had an affair with her.

In the end, the jury ruled in Jones's favor. The couple reached a settlement agreement whereby Rhinelander paid Jones $32,500 (approximately $593,000 in today's dollars) per year, not adjusted for inflation, for the rest of her life (she died in 1989). Jones agreed not to use the Rhinelander name and never to speak or write about her story.

Novels like Passing by Nella Larsen and The Trial of Mrs. Rhinelander by Denny S. Bryce were influenced by The Rhineland divorce. The divorce also appears in Oscar Micheaux’s films, “The House Behind the Cedars” and “Thirty Years Later.”