John Cornyn of Texas lost a Republican primary runoff and will leave the Senate next January after nearly 25 years. Ken Paxton won with 63% of the vote, defeating Cornyn despite Cornyn being the logical choice for one of Texas’s two Senate seats. The president backed Paxton’s campaign even though it risked worsening clashes with Republican senators and potentially hurting the party in the midterms. Cornyn’s defeat is part of a broader pattern in which the president has toppled multiple lawmakers, sometimes for being seen as enemies and sometimes for lacking sufficient loyalty. The losses have been especially severe for incumbent senators, including Bill Cassidy in Louisiana after he voted to impeach Trump in 2021.
"Senator John Cornyn found that out on Tuesday: after nearly a quarter-century on Capitol Hill, he will have to go home next January following a crushing defeat in the runoff of Texas's Republican primary. His rival, the controversial state attorney general Ken Paxton, won with 63% of the vote. Cornyn was the logical Republican candidate for one of Texas's two Senate seats (the other one is held by Ted Cruz), the only one up in next month's midterm elections."
"But logic is not always the path chosen by the president of the United States who, after weeks of weighing his options, decided a few days ago to back Paxton's campaign even at the risk of deepening his clashes with Republican senators in the Capitol and of costing the party in the midterms. Adding to the humiliation of being felled by friendly fire and leaving through the back door after four terms in Washington is the fact that Cornyn's defeat is not an isolated incident."
"He joins a growing list of lawmakers Trump has easily toppled. Sometimes because, as with Kentucky representative Thomas Massie, he sees them as enemies. Other times because, as with Cornyn, he considers them insufficiently loyal. The bloodletting has been especially harsh for a type of candidate for whom primaries used to be a mild formality: incumbent senators seeking re-election."
"The first to fall was Bill Cassidy in Louisiana. His sin? Voting in 2021 to impeach Trump after the Capitol attack. Republicans still have to choose between two contenders in a runoff for his seat: Representative Julia Letlow, who has Trump's backing, and state treasurer John Fleming. Both will face voters on June 27."
Read at english.elpais.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]