Trump Gets Revenge as Cassidy Ousted in Louisiana
The president called Cassidy “a disloyal disaster” and “a sleazebag, a terrible guy, who is BAD FOR LOUISIANA” in a Truth Social post.
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) spent five years trying to outlast his impeachment vote. On Saturday night in Louisiana, the clock ran out.
The Louisiana Republican failed to make the runoff in Saturday’s closed GOP Senate primary, finishing third behind Trump-endorsed Rep. Julia Letlow and state Treasurer John Fleming, who advance to a June 27 runoff. The result was a direct verdict on the vote Cassidy cast in February 2021, when he joined six other Republican senators in voting to convict Trump following the January 6 Capitol riot. Trump was acquitted. Cassidy was not forgiven.
With most of the vote counted, Letlow led with roughly 45 percent, nearly double Cassidy’s share. Fleming came in at about 28 percent, and Cassidy sat just under 25. The incumbent, with two terms, a $20 million ad campaign, and the backing of Senate Majority Leader John Thune, finished last. Because no candidate cleared 50 percent, Letlow and Fleming advance to a June 27 runoff for the Republican nomination.
Trump backed Letlow and made clear before Election Day that he wanted Cassidy gone. The president called Cassidy “a disloyal disaster” and “a sleazebag, a terrible guy, who is BAD FOR LOUISIANA” in a Truth Social post before polls closed.
Bill Cassidy, after falsely using his “relationship” with me during his political career, and winning Elections because of it, 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 a… pic.twitter.com/fspS8jCpLg
— Donald J Trump Truth Social Posts On X (@TrumpTruthOnX) May 17, 2026
“His disloyalty to the man who got him elected is now a part of a legend, and it’s nice to see that his political career is OVER!” Trump wrote on Truth Social after the result.
Cassidy spent Trump’s second term trying to win back the base. He voted to confirm RFK Jr. as HHS Secretary and backed other administration priorities, but the impeachment vote was not the kind of thing Louisiana Republicans were inclined to forgive. He made things worse when the surgeon general nomination of Casey Means, a close Kennedy ally, stalled in Cassidy’s Senate HELP Committee without a vote. Kennedy’s Make America Healthy Again supporters had been looking for a reason to come after him. That gave them one.
Letlow kept her message simple.
“This is not my seat, it’s the people’s seat,” Letlow told supporters. “Unfortunately, I believe [Cassidy] forgot that when he took that vote that he should not have, and Louisiana did not forget.”
Letlow also thanked Trump after the result, saying Louisiana voters were ready for “strong conservative leadership that will stand with President Trump and never waver.”
Cassidy conceded Saturday night and took one last shot in Trump’s direction.
“When you participate in democracy, sometimes it doesn’t turn out the way you want it to,” Cassidy said. “But you don’t pout, you don’t whine. You don’t claim the election was stolen… You don’t manufacture some excuse.”
Cassidy and an allied super PAC spent more than $20 million on ads, outspending Letlow and Fleming combined, according to AdImpact. Some of those ads hammered Letlow over her past support for DEI programs during her time at the University of Louisiana Monroe. None of it mattered. Money could not buy back what the impeachment vote cost him.
Louisiana’s new closed-primary system, which Republicans in the state legislature adopted last year after abandoning the longtime “jungle primary” format, almost certainly made things harder for Cassidy. Under the old rules, independents and Democrats could vote, and Cassidy had historically relied on that broader coalition. Saturday was the first Senate election under the new system, and it was a pure Republican electorate that rendered judgment. Cassidy opposed the change. He had reason to.
Letlow, with Trump’s endorsement, finished at 45 percent. Fleming, a former congressman who served in the Trump White House and ran as the more conservative option, came in at 28. The two will face each other June 27. The winner will be heavily favored in the general election in a state Trump carried by 22 points in 2024.
Saturday was not an isolated result. Earlier this month, Trump-backed challengers ousted five Indiana Republican state senators who had voted to block his congressional redistricting push. Kentucky votes Tuesday, where Trump is working to unseat Rep. Thomas Massie.
Cassidy is the first elected Republican senator to lose renomination since Indiana’s Richard Lugar in 2012. Lugar, too, had built a reputation for working across the aisle. His base eventually ran out of patience with him as well.
Cassidy outspent his opponents, held two terms worth of legislative accomplishments, and had the backing of Senate leadership. None of it was enough. For a large share of Republican primary voters in Louisiana, the impeachment vote was not something that faded with time or goodwill. Cassidy cast it five years ago, and on Saturday night, they cast theirs.
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I have a friend that is a small-town Republican, and the former mayor of tiny little McColl, SC. He is the definition of a RINO and loves him some Lindsey Graham.
These are the folks we need to ignore.
It wasn’t just about Trump.
Literally ANY so-called ‘bipartisan’ bill by Democrats screwing conservatives could count on Cassidy’s vote.
The only worse RINOs are Murkowski and McConnell (I’ll give Collins a pass since she’s legitimately the best we could get in Maine, as the Democrats are trying to replace her with Der Fuhrer right now).
“Der Fuhrer”
Oh yeah that tat tard.
“Senator, call for you on Line 3.”
“Did they give a name?”
“A Mr. Nelson Muntz.”
HA HA!
😹🤣😂
Doh! I had to look him up.
He used the loss as an opportunity to grandstand his virtue signaling, like a liberal.
The Mitt Romney of the South, worthless.
Good riddance.
Not even.
Romney was at least smart enough to ‘retire’ before being humiliated in the primary.
It takes a special kind of jackass egomaniac like Cassidy or Liz Cheney to run a campaign when they KNOW they’re polling around 25%.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The only good thing he did was to get a Landrieu out of office.
This is not only a repudiation of Cassidy, it’s a repudiation of the rino wing led by McConnell/Thune. They’ve done more damage to conservatives than the demonrats could ever hope to do on their own.
I understand Fleming favors Enforcement of our borders and immigration law, more than Letlow.
Hope people vote Fleming in the Run-off.
She doesn’t seem MAGA
You are probably right
Yes, need to be careful here. Fleming is the more conservative. While Trump is President Letlow will toe the line. But Trump leaves January, 2029, and Letlow has four more years after that. We wouldn’t want her to, as the NYT would say, “grow in office.”
We would all benefit more from Fleming than from Letlow. The primary is over. Now we must refocus on the runoff.
Karma can bite hard
RINOs dont seem to be doing well
Paxton is up over Cornyn so there is hope.
What a plus for real conservatives.
Ethically compromised versus spineless DC insider and anti-2A squish.
Please, remind me who really wins.
Not conservatives!
Cornyn is getting really vicious. That’s usually a good sign for Paxton.
Poachers sell their ground up horns to men who think it will cure their ED.
Anyone with half a brain would know this is a scam, since it has neither spine nor balls.
That’s rhino with an H for Horn. RINOs have no horn.
“Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) spent five years trying to outlast his impeachment vote. On Saturday night in Louisiana, the clock ran out.”
Now THAT is a ‘hook em and hold em’ intro paragraph. Well done.
Come on, TX! Get rid of Cornyn next.
I just put the neighborhood vote early signs out!!!
Central Texas
Grahamesty, Thune and Murkowski if you please.
“You don’t claim the election was stolen…”
Why not, Senator? It’s the truth, isn’t it? Or are you too stupid to see the obvious?
It probably won’t happen in my lifetime but eventually it will be mainstream that Joe Biden stole the 2020 election from the American people (not Donald Trump, mind you) with a lot of help from a lot of people who should be executed for their treason (but won’t be).
The irony is that if the Democrats hadn’t foisted that meat puppet upon us, Trump’s political difficulties would have continued unabated until another Democrat won the presidency in 2024.
Cheating resulted in the chaos of the Biden Administration, and gave Trump four years to regroup.
That’s known as bad strategy.
Enjoy retirement, Bill. You don’t deserve it.
Did he think the POTUS the only person in the country to not have a right to an opinion on the matter?
The eight million phantom votes that showed up for a candidate who never showed up, then vanished ever afterward, is all the proof needed for anybody but the braindead.
This guy, like Thune and maybe Cornyn, are going to screw Trump when they can.
It isn’t about Trump other than a convenient figurehead/high profile scalp to target. The DC establishment, the Acela corridor credentialed class, the corporatist/globalist goons comprising the ‘Rich Men North of Richmond’…. all of them despise the ascendant center/right populist coalition; the ordinary Citizens who comprise MAGA/MAHA, Tea Party, Perot vets. The same folks who offshore US manufacturing, gave China WTO access, fueled the recurring asset bubbles with goofy policies and bank bailouts, destroyed healthcare/health IN, let mobs run in the streets, enabled DEI/CRT, drove National Debt to $39 Trillion, let crime run rampant, opened up our borders…..all that and more… these folks began their assault on the broad middle-class before Trump and will continue it after Trump.
Wish I could thumb this up more times.
I believe biden is going to end up as the second biggest political backfire in American history, with obama as the first. If we would’ve had hillary after obama, she would’ve sealed our fate. Because she lost, their entire operation to drain the wealth from the middle class, put us under the government boot, turning the vast majority of our nation into debt slaves is being exposed for all to see, not just the political/law/culture junkies out here.
Cassidy is a doctor. He’ll tell you that every time he’s challenged about any of his emotional-finger-in-the-wind decisions – all of which were contrary to the Republican party.
He was asked if, while knowing what is known now, he would still vote to impeach Trump.
“I’m a doctor…..”
Cassidy’s still got TDS:
“When you participate in democracy, sometimes it doesn’t turn out the way you want it to,” Cassidy said. “But you don’t pout, you don’t whine. You don’t claim the election was stolen… You don’t manufacture some excuse.”
And he still aggressively ingores all of the post-analysis results which provides evidence of a major results-altering 2020 election cheating scandal.
Trump isn’t the only reason Cassidy lost … a lot of local folks recognized Cassidy for the RINO that he was on many issues.
The 2A community has been against him and Cornyn since the SAFER Act was passed with their support of the Dems.
Moon Griffon radio host has been bashing Cassidy for years.
A PAC reputed to be supporting Letlow has run some vicious (and false) attack ads against Fleming. Letlow is also rather squishy on matters that really count but always shows up with “feel good” stuff.
I woke up at 2 am on Sunday to go to the bathroom and my first thought was, “I wonder how Cassidy fared?”
I danced a jig when I saw he came in DEAD LAST. Early voting for the WIN!
However, it was not all sunshine and roses. Only 1 of the 5 amendments I voted for went the way I wanted… Denial of raising the mandatory retirement age from 70 to 75. Stop trying to make old farts remain on the bench. It’s not going to happen.
The amount of people GUSHING over Fleming was perplexing. The man was part of the Trump administration, yet did not receive the endorsement. And I’ve looked at the voting record of both Letlow and Fleming. Letlow is a much better fit for me than Fleming, who’s voting record is about the same.
Cassidy’s bitching at the end made my early vote that much sweeter.
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