Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) was defeated in a three-way primary against two Trump-aligned challengers tonight. Emine Yücel has our story.
Rep. Julie Letlow (R-LA), endorsed by Trump, and Louisiana’s state treasurer, former congressman John Fleming, will proceed to a runoff next month. Cassidy, with about 25 percent of the vote, will not.
It’s another reminder of how, in 2026, the Republican Party is an entity wholly owned by Trump, where even the most mild ambivalence about the president is thoroughly punished. Indiana’s primaries in April gave us one example of this; tonight we have another.
Cassidy was one of the few remaining Republicans in the Senate to vote to convict Trump during his 2021, post-Jan. 6 impeachment trial. (Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska are the other Republicans who took that vote and remain in office.)
More recently, Cassidy partially bucked Trump through an embarrassing storyline involving RFK Jr.: The now-Secretary of Health and Human Services promised Cassidy, Chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, that he would chill with the anti-vax agenda if confirmed. We all know what happened next. As Emine details in her piece, Kennedy secured Cassidy’s critical vote for confirmation, than ignored that commitment, leaving Cassidy limply reminding everyone from the Senate floor that Kennedy is a liar.
Though he later opposed other unqualified health nominees, such as Casey Means for Surgeon General, Cassidy’s misguided vote for Kennedy is shaping up to be his legacy.
