What exactly did Texas senators do for nine hours as they mulled Ken Paxton’s fate?

AUSTIN — It was not a traditional jury. The east end of the Texas Capitol’s second floor was sealed off, with only the 30 senators who are jurors allowed to be present.

They didn’t stay in one room.

During the nine hours of deliberations over two days, senators roamed through three rooms — the Betty King Room, the lieutenant governor’s dining room and the Senate chamber, said Senate Democratic Caucus Chairwoman Carol Alvarado of Houston.

Toward the end, most of them gathered in the chamber, Alvarado said.Exhibits were spread out at tables near the dais. Senators who are lawyers, from both parties, fielded colleagues’ questions about the exhibits informally, Alvarado recounted.

“I took three notepads full of notes,” she said.

For her, the Uber records of a fake account used by Attorney General Ken Paxton and the allegations of his misconduct by employees who became whistleblowers were the decisive pieces of evidence that drove her to vote to convict on all but one of the 16 impeachment articles.

“They gave very strong testimony,” Alvarado said of the whistleblowers.

Jurors seemed to be taking their responsibility seriously, she said.

On Friday afternoon, in the Betty King Room, a large group of senators, both Democrats and Republicans, spent about two hours watching a video recording of Paxton’s staff meeting with Austin real estate developer Nate Paul and his lawyer on Paul’s claim he was a victim of a federal frame-up, she noted.

Democrats could feel momentum for acquittal, she said.

“Our rules didn’t allow us to do any polling,” she explained. “But you could just kind of tell where things were going.”

There was no jury foreman, Alvarado said. However, Senate Rules Committee Chairman Brian Birdwell, R-Granbury, went around asking people if they were ready to vote, she said.

“He was sort of the person doing a lot of checking,” she said.

Sen. Nathan Johnson, D-Dallas, said what began as a commendable process ended badly, as Republican senators bloc-voted and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick gave a speech castigating the House.

“At moments, it felt kind of noble that you see people with very different viewpoints, taking time to look at evidence together and discussing earnestly the issues that we have,” he said.

“And it went on for hours and hours and hours. And then it eroded.”