Sen. Bill Cassidy, who voted to convict President Donald Trump on impeachment charges in 2021, has lost his Republican primary in Louisiana, as two challengers aligned with Trump advanced to a runoff.<\/p>\n
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Rep. Julia Letlow, who had Trump\u2019s endorsement in the race, will face state Treasurer John Fleming in a June 27 primary runoff, NBC News projects.<\/p>\n
![\"Parents](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/260120-Julia-Letlow-rs-1bee65.jpg\")
Rep. Julia Letlow, R-La., at the U.S. Capitol in 2023.Tom Williams \/ CQ-Roll Call via Getty Images<\/p>\n
Cassidy\u2019s loss further cements Trump\u2019s grip on the GOP, as the president looks to exact revenge against Republicans who have crossed him in the past. And it also means yet another Republican who voted to convict Trump during his 2021 impeachment will not be returning to Congress next year. <\/p>\n
Letlow was leading the primary field, winning 45% of the vote to Fleming\u2019s 28% and Cassidy\u2019s 25%, with 93% of the expected vote in. Since Letlow fell short of winning a majority of the primary vote, the race heads to a runoff. <\/p>\n
Follow live results here<\/a><\/p>\n Trump cheered Cassidy\u2019s lost in a Truth Social post<\/a> on Saturday night, referencing the impeachment vote and writing that Cassidy\u2019s \u201cdisloyalty to the man who got him elected is now a part of legend, and it\u2019s nice to see that his political career is OVER!\u201d<\/p>\n While Cassidy did not explicitly mention Trump in his election night speech, he did reference the president, especially Trump\u2019s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen you participate in democracy, sometimes it doesn\u2019t turn out the way you want it to. But you don\u2019t pout, you don\u2019t whine, you don\u2019t claim the election was stolen, you don\u2019t find a reason, you don\u2019t manufacture some excuse,\u201d Cassidy said. \u201cYou thank the voters for the privilege of representing the state or the country for as long as you\u2019ve had that privilege, and that\u2019s what I\u2019m doing right now.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cLet me just set the record straight, our country is not about one individual,\u201d Cassidy later added. \u201cIt is about the welfare of all Americans, and it is about our Constitution. And it is the welfare of my people and my state and my country and our Constitution, to which I am loyal. And if someone doesn\u2019t understand that, and attempts to control others through using the levers of power, they are about serving themselves. They\u2019re not about serving us. And that person is not qualified to be a leader.\u201d<\/p>\n Cassidy also noted that he has been \u201cattacked on the internet.\u201d <\/p>\n \u201cInsults only bother me if they come from somebody of character and integrity, and I find that people of character and integrity don\u2019t spend their time attacking people on the internet,\u201d Cassidy said.<\/p>\n No elected Republican senator has lost a primary since 2012. But Cassidy was dogged by some of his clashes with Trump, including his impeachment vote. He acknowledged in an interview last month that his impeachment vote \u201cmight be\u201d a liability<\/a> in the primary, but he stressed that he has continued to support the president\u2019s policies.<\/p>\n \u201cI tell people, \u2018Hey, you\u2019re married? Did ever your spouse do something that you didn\u2019t really like?\u2019 And you work through it,\u201d Cassidy said. \u201cI\u2019m focused on the now and the future. If you want somebody delivering for our state, to make Louisiana a place where people move to set down roots, raise their children and grandchildren, I\u2019m your guy.\u201d<\/p>\n But Cassidy\u2019s vote did not sit well with some Louisiana voters, like Elias Jacob FaKouri. <\/p>\n \u201cHe tried to impeach Trump, and Trump helped him get elected. That\u2019s pretty low,\u201d FaKouri, a Fleming supporter, said at a polling place in Baton Rouge. <\/p>\n \u201cIt is time for him to go,\u201d he later added.<\/p>\n Cassidy, a physician, was also in the spotlight during Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.\u2019s confirmation, given their disagreements over vaccines. Cassidy voted to confirm Kennedy to the post and has since sought a delicate balance <\/a>between criticizing HHS over issues like vaccines and trying not to antagonize Trump. <\/p>\n Cassidy\u2019s backers were not turned off by his clashes with Trump, instead praising his independent streak.<\/p>\n \u201cIt shows that he\u2019s less influenced by a party, which I like,\u201d Donny Gutierrez said at the Baton Rouge polling place, later adding, \u201cI think we need a lot more of that.\u201d<\/p>\n As Cassidy made his own case ahead of the primary, he and his allies also attacked Letlow over her stock trades and her past support for diversity, equity and inclusion efforts when she was working at the University of Louisiana, dubbing her \u201cLiberal Letlow<\/a>.\u201d <\/p>\n Letlow has dismissed those attacks by saying a third party has managed her stock trades and that she has shifted her stance on DEI initiatives. <\/p>\n \u201cCassidy is lying about me because he can\u2019t defend his own record,\u201d Letlow told NBC News last month. <\/p>\n Letlow, meanwhile, has been touting her endorsemen<\/a>t from Trump on the airwaves, with a boost from an allied outside group. Letlow also has the backing of GOP Gov. Jeff Landry. <\/p>\n She has attacked Cassidy and Fleming<\/a> as \u201cnever Trumpers\u201d and said when she launched her Senate run<\/a>, \u201cA state as conservative as ours, we shouldn\u2019t have to wonder how our senator will vote when the pressure\u2019s on.\u201d <\/p>\n Letlow told NBC News last month that the president\u2019s endorsement has been \u201ca huge source of energy for our campaign, because Louisiana Republicans trust President Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhen the president tells you need to step up, and when the voters in Louisiana are really encouraging, saying, we want an alternative, we want another choice, would you consider doing this? Would you pray about it? And you know, when I had that piece about it, I decided to go all in,\u201d Letlow said.<\/p>\n Letlow was first elected to the House in 2021, succeeding her husband who died of Covid before he was sworn into office.<\/p>\n Fleming has cast himself as a Trump ally even though he doesn\u2019t have the president\u2019s backing, launching an ad<\/a> that he is the \u201ctrue conservative\u201d in the race who was \u201cMAGA before MAGA was cool.\u201d <\/p>\n Fleming was elected as state treasurer in 2023 after serving in the first Trump administration. He served in Congress from 2009 to 2017 and was a founding member of the hard-right House Freedom Caucus, leaving the House to make an unsuccessful run for Senate in 2016. <\/p>\n The former congressman has largely self-funded his Senate run, loaning his campaign $10.6 million. He launched his campaign back in December 2024<\/a>, long before Letlow jumped in the race, criticizing Cassidy for his 2021 impeachment vote. <\/p>\n Fleming did say he faced some pressure to end his campaign and clear a path for Letlow to take on Cassidy, telling NBC News that someone \u201caround\u201d the Trump administration offered him a job to get him out of the race. The White House did not respond to a request for comment. <\/p>\n As the race heads to a runoff, it\u2019s not clear if Trump will become more engaged in the race. <\/p>\n A Trump political adviser recently told NBC News<\/a> that Trump and his orbit are more focused on defeating Kentucky GOP Rep. Thomas Massie in a May 19 primary, saying of the president, \u201cThere is no way he views Cassidy and Massie the same.\u201d<\/p>\n The president had not traveled to Louisiana to boost Letlow\u2019s campaign ahead of Saturday\u2019s primary, though he appeared in a TV ad <\/a>for Letlow and recently posted on Truth Social<\/a> blaming Cassidy for tanking his surgeon general nominee. Trump also encouraged voters to reject Cassidy<\/a> on Saturday morning, calling the senator a \u201cdisloyal disaster.\u201d<\/p>\n The Democratic primary is also heading to a runoff. NBC News projects that farmer Jamie Davis will advance, with the second candidate still unclear. <\/p>\n But Republicans are expected to be in a strong position to hold the seat in November. Republicans running for federal office have dominated recent elections in the Pelican State, which Trump won by 22 points in 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sen. Bill Cassidy, who voted to convict President Donald Trump on impeachment charges in 2021, has lost his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":647943,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4,450,451,3,452,453],"class_list":["post-647942","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647942","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=647942"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647942\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/647943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=647942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=647942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=647942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Sen.](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/260515-bill-cassidy-mn-1320-f217b0.jpg\")
Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., during a Senate hearing on Sept. 17, 2025.Kevin Dietsch \/ Getty Images file<\/p>\n