WASHINGTON (AP) — In the first seriously contested Senate Republican leadership election in decades, three senators are vying to replace longtime Republican leader Mitch McConnell when he steps down early next year and Republicans take back the Senate majority.
Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, Sen. John Cornyn of Texas and Sen. Rick Scott of Florida campaigned furiously to win the support of their colleagues in Wednesday’s secret ballot elections. All three are trying to convince their colleagues that they have the ear of newly-elected President Donald Trump and that they will be the best person to implement his agenda.
They are also trying to differentiate themselves from McConnell by saying they will give rank-and-file senators more power and be more communicative.
It is not clear who will win, or whether there will be multiple rounds of voting before a winner is chosen.
A look at the three candidates:
SEN. JOHN THUNE
Thune, 63, defeated then-Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle in 2004 after arguing during the campaign that Daschle had lost his South Dakota roots during his years in Democratic leadership. Now Thune wants to become majority leader himself.
Thune is a well-liked and respected communicator and is seen as a frontrunner for most of the year. He is currently the No. 2 Republican in the Senate and took over for McConnell for a few weeks last year while he was on medical leave. He is also a former chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee.
As he prepared to become leader, Thune spent much of the year campaigning for his colleagues. He has raised more than $31 million this cycle to elect Republicans to the Senate, including a $4 million transfer from his own campaign accounts to the Senate’s main campaign arm, according to his aides.
A potential liability for Thune was his previously rocky relationship with Trump. Thune was highly critical of the then-president as he attempted to overturn his 2020 election defeat and after the attack on the Capitol by Trump’s supporters on January 6, 2021. Thune then said Trump’s attempts to disrupt the peaceful transition of power were “inexcusable.”
This year, however, Thune and Trump have spoken often on the phone and Thune visited the then-Republican candidate at his home in Florida. Thune told The Associated Press last summer that he views their potential relationship as a professional one. If they both win the election, Thune said, “we have a job to do.”
SEN. JOHN CORNYN
Like Thune, Cornyn is a popular and respected member of the Senate GOP conference. A former attorney general of Texas and member of the state Supreme Court, he has done extensive work on the Senate Judiciary Committee. He was also McConnell’s No. 2, the position Thune now holds, for six years before being temporarily fired.
Cornyn, 72, has also spent much of the year courting his colleagues, raising money for them across the country. He has long been one of the top fundraisers in the Senate, and his aides say he raised more than $400 million for party candidates during his 22 years as president.
In 2022, after a gunman stormed a Texas elementary school and killed 19 children and two teachers, Cornyn was tapped by McConnell to lead the Republican Party’s gun legislation negotiations with Democrats. The bill, passed that summer, strengthened background checks for buyers under 21, increased prosecution of unlicensed gun sellers and poured millions of dollars into mental health care for young people. While Cornyn has touted his work on gun law, it could cost him some votes among the conference’s most conservative members.
Cornyn has also had some tensions with Trump in the past, including his initial suggestions that Trump might not be the best Republican candidate for 2024. But he too has smoothed relations with the new president by meeting with him while he was in Texas to campaign and visit him in Florida.
SEN. RICH SCOTT
While Thune and Cornyn both have leadership experience and have spent most of the year methodically trying to win over individual senators, Scott is running a different kind of campaign. And he believes he has a clear advantage: his relationship with Trump.
Scott, a former two-term governor of Florida and a successful businessman, was re-elected last week to a second term in the Senate, defeating Democrat Debbie Mucarsel-Powell by more than 10 points. He has been a booster of the incoming president for years and has positioned himself as a strong ally. Scott traveled to New York earlier this year to support Trump during Trump’s hush money trial and has openly said he wants Trump to support him.
He received a lot of support on social media last weekend when he was endorsed by people close to Trump, including Elon Musk. But Trump has not intervened in the Senate battle.
It’s unclear whether Scott’s outward approach could win him more support in the clubby Senate. He won 10 votes when he challenged McConnell for the post in 2022, and he will look to improve on that tally in the first round of voting on Wednesday.
Scott, 71, is part of a growing group of far-right senators who have criticized McConnell’s tenure and advocated for more power for individual members. Several senators in that group, including Sen. Mike Lee of Utah and Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, have endorsed him, arguing that his business experience and relationship with Trump should put him over the top.
