Congressman Louie Gohmert talks run for Texas attorney general

TYLER, Texas (KLTV) - U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Tyler) officially announced his run for Texas attorney general in a YouTube video posted on Monday. It follows his announcement earlier this month that he would join the race if he raised $1 million in 10 days. Day 10 was last Friday, but Gohmert’s announcement didn’t come until Monday

Gohmert said during an interview with KLTV anchor Blake Holland on Tuesday that, “some (money) came in after that.”

Like the other high-profile GOP challengers, Gohmert is taking aim at incumbent Ken Paxton’s legal problems, warning that they could cause Paxton to lose the general election if indicted after the primary.

“It was not something I really wanted to do. It was something I felt compelled to do,” he said.

Gohmert tells KLTV this will likely be the last office he runs for. And while he launches a run for state office, Gohmert’s seat in congress is already being eyed by two East Texans, one of them a former Gohmert intern-turned-oilfield roughneck from Shelby County.

U.S. Marine Aditya Atholi is a graduate of Center High School and Rice University. After working in the oilfield in Texas and New Mexico, he’s running as a “Roughneck for Congress.”

“We have a specific, simple, and practical plan to return to local self-government like we had in this country for hundreds of years. It’s something Republicans have always believed in. And we believe that this plan will work to bring back local self-government and if we can do that, that’s how we can return America to conservative nation like we’ve always been,” Atholi said.

Among the other candidates looking to take Gohmert’s seat, Smith County Judge Nathaniel Moran, who said earlier this month that if Gohmert chose to run for state office, he’d be interested in running for Congress.

Moran told us on Tuesday that he’s taking the holiday break to come to a final decision with his family and will make an announcement next week.

“Congressman Gohmert’s announcement that he’s going to run for Texas attorney general certainly expedites the decision-making process for me and my family as to whether or not we want to run to replace him in Congress, but this week we’re enjoying time with family. And we’re going to continue doing that this week and make a final decision that we’ll announce next week.”

State Rep. Matt Schaefer had previously expressed interest in also running for Gohmert’s seat, but recently announced on Twitter that he would be running for re-election in the Texas House.

Congressman Gohmert said he’s holding off on making any endorsements in the race.

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