Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy, who voted to convict President Donald J. Trump during his 2021 impeachment trial, has officially lost the state’s Republican primary, placing third. Congressman Julia Letlow, who Trump supported, finished first with 45% of the vote, and will advance to a runoff against State Treasurer John Fleming for the party’s Senate nomination.
Cassidy was one of seven Republican senators who voted to convict Trump in the aftermath of January 6th. More recently, Cassidy voted in 2025 to confirm Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., despite their disagreements on vaccines. Unsurprisingly, the move did not get him back into Trump’s good graces.
In his concession speech, Cassidy took a thinly veiled shot at Trump, saying, “When you take part in democracy, sometimes things don’t go your way. But you don’t sulk, you don’t complain, and you don’t say the election was stolen.” Trump, for his part, gloated about Cassidy’s loss on Truth Social, posting that Cassidy had “[…] voted to impeach me on preposterous charges that were fake then, and now, are criminally insane! His disloyalty to the man who got him elected is now part of legend, and it’s nice to see that his political career is OVER!”
Cassidy’s defeat comes as Trump is on a warpath in Republican primaries, having similarly defeated several Indiana Republican state senators who opposed redrawing congressional lines in advance of the 2026 midterms. Trump has been similarly targeting Congressman Thomas Massie of Kentucky, whose support of baseless Jeffrey Epstein conspiracy theories has given them a “bipartisan” veneer. Trump lobbed another attack at Massie in advance of the upcoming primary, posting, “The Worst Republican Congressman in History. Kentucky, vote the bum out on Tuesday. We can’t live with this troublemaker for another two years.”
The media was quick to mention Cassidy’s attempts to repair his relationship with Trump in the aftermath of his 2021 vote to convict, but given Trump’s dedication to ousting Republicans who have crossed him, the results are not a shock.
Democrats have largely taken a “no enemies to the left” approach in their coalition, papering over internal dissent. While Trump’s Republican critics may take conservative stances on various issues — Massie was quick to tout his pro-life and pro-gun endorsements in the Cassidy aftermath — some have become more known for publicly breaking with him and bolstering Democratic narratives about his presidency. They may yet become future electoral victims as Trump recognizes that the GOP needs to be united in order to effectively fight a unified Left.
