Chip Roy, a senior political adviser to Ted Cruz, is leaving his job in the Senate for the Texas attorney general’s office.

The Texas Tribune reports that Roy will join attorney general-elect Ken Paxton’s team in Austin.

Roy made headlines in September when he stepped down as Cruz’s chief of staff, a position he had held since Cruz’s election in 2012, to take on a broader role in Cruz’s political operation. The move was widely interpreted as a signal that the freshmen senator was preparing a run for president in 2016. Now, Cruz is losing one of his top advisers altogether.

Roy is a former aide both to Texas senator John Cornyn and to Texas governor (and potential 2016 presidential candidate) Rick Perry, and he lent a hand writing the Perry’s 2010 book Fed Up: Our Fight to Save America From Washington.

That, certainly, is the spirit that has imbued Cruz’s time in on Capitol Hill, and that would color his presidential campaign. For now, it looks like Roy will be watching from Austin.