Spiegel Stuff: The Movement: Primaries affirm Trump's grip on GOP, but key tests are ahead

By Emily Brooks | Tuesday, May 12

© AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin

Primaries affirm Trump's grip on GOP, but key tests are ahead

Some of the biggest primary battles of the year have reaffirmed President Trump’s grip on Republicans, despite the party facing tough midterm odds — but more tests are coming.

Trump’s endorsement of Rep. Andy Barr (R-Ky.) for Senate last week, and an apparent offer to businessman Nate Morris to be an ambassador, led to Morris’s prompt withdrawal from the race — despite being a favorite of the MAGA-aligned activist base.

And in Indiana, six of the seven Republican state senators who faced Trump-backed challenges after refusing his request to approve a pro-GOP redistricting effort lost their primaries last week.

That loyalty among the GOP base is hardly new, but it is striking when taken together with Trump’s floundering approval ratings and the liability that’s posing for national Republicans and those in swing districts.

Republicans have a tough task ahead in keeping control of the House — even as their hopes were boosted by Virginia Supreme Court and U.S. Supreme Court decisions that tilted the redistricting war squarely in the GOP’s favor.

The president, though, seems most animated by ensuring he has control over Republican politicians — a dynamic that, if he is successful, could delay ideological debates about what a post-Trump GOP will stand for.

Trump’s battle for control over the party isn’t over.

There are three high-profile races this month that could test just how loyal Republican primary voters are to the president and the strength of his endorsement — namely, the primary challenges to Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) and Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.).

First up on Saturday, May 16 will be the Louisiana Senate Republican primary.

Cassidy has drawn Trump’s ire because he voted to convict Trump on impeachment charges after the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack. And the physician has clashed with the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) faction as well as Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., despite voting to confirm him.

Trump has endorsed Rep. Julia Letlow (R-La.) and pushed her to challenge Cassidy, but the GOP senate primary is a three-way race, with Louisiana State Treasurer John Fleming complicating it. It’s possible Cassidy hangs on until the June 27 runoff, but he might be knocked out, marking a win for Trump’s kingmaking abilities. The polling average from The Hill’s partner Decision Desk HQ currently puts Letlow at 34.4%, Fleming at 24.7% and Cassidy at 20.9%.

Massie, who has drawn Trump’s ire on everything from leading the push to release the Epstein Files to voting against the One Big Beautiful Bill and the Iran war, is hoping to hang on in his primary next week on Tuesday, May 19. Trump endorsed Navy SEAL Ed Gallrein, who is getting backing from Trump-aligned super PAC MAGA KY, led by Trump 2024 co-campaign manager Chris LaCivita, as well as by pro-Israel groups like the Republican Jewish Coalition and AIPAC-affiliated United Democracy Project super PAC.

According to ad-tracking firm AdImpact, there has been a whopping $21.5 million in ad spending and reservations for the Massie-Gallrein primary, making it the second-most expensive House primary on record — with the majority of that being pro-Gallrein or anti-Massie.

There haven’t been many public polls in the race, and House primaries are notoriously difficult to poll, but two polls in early April found Massie with a 5-point and 9-point edge.

Finally, Trump faces a key decision in whether to weigh in for the Texas Republican Senate primary runoff between Sen. John Cornyn and state Attorney General Ken Paxton on May 26. MAGA allies paint Cornyn as an unwelcome establishment candidate while backing Paxton. Meanwhile, Cornyn’s side blasts Paxton over his messy personal life and allegations of marital infidelity.

Trump said last week he would make an endorsement in the race “maybe relatively soon” — but that’s what he said about two months ago. Decision Desk HQ’s polling average puts Paxton at 46.6% and Cornyn at 43.2%.

Further reading: ‘It’s a mess’: With no Trump endorsement in Texas Senate race, Cornyn and Paxton are locked in an expensive brawl, by CNN’s Patrick Svitek… John Cornyn-Ken Paxton Senate runoff grows increasingly bitter as GOP unity fears mount, by John C. Moritz in the Houston Chronicle… Inside the wild fight to oust a top GOP Trump critic, by Axios’s Andrew Solender… RFK Jr.'s revenge, by Axios’s Alex Isenstadt… Trump turns sights on Bill Cassidy, Thomas Massie after decisive Indiana primary victories, by Fox News’s Paul Steinhauser…

Welcome to The Movement, a new weekly newsletter looking at the influences and debates on the right in Washington. I'm Emily Brooks, House leadership reporter at The Hill. Tell me what’s on your radar: ebrooks@thehill.com.

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INTERCOLLEGIATE STUDIES INSTITUTE PRESIDENT STEPPING DOWN

Johnny A. Burtka IV announced last week he is stepping down as president of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI), a non-profit that aims to promote conservative thought and “educating for liberty” on college campuses, ending a six-year tenure.

“After careful discernment, I hope to build something new that will more explicitly engage the role of faith in renewing Western Civilization — more on that to come,” Burtka posted to the social platform X.

Burtka had become a minor figure in conservative-world ideological controversy at the end of last year around the time that the Heritage Foundation faced inner turmoil over how its president defended Tucker Carlson for interviewing antisemitic streamer Nick Fuentes — which turned into a blowup over the larger ideological direction of the organization in the Trump era.

In November, two ISI board members, Christopher Long and Thomas Lynch, wrote an open letter saying they resigned after raising objections over the ideological direction of ISI, as I covered at the time. They panned Burtka’s pet podcast, Project Cosmos, for featuring edgy commentators that are more popular with the “New Right” and national conservatism movement, which the traditional free-market and small-government conservatives dislike. They lamented an ISI fellow being placed at the Tucker Carlson Network.

But Burtka got ample defense at the time — and is not leaving abruptly, saying he will continue as ISI president until the organization finds a new leader in a nationwide search.

In his last address at ISI’s “America 500 Gala for Western Civilization" a few weeks ago, Burtka quoted George Washington and Abraham Lincoln as he stressed the importance of retaining humility for those truly called to greatness.

COALITION BACKS NATIONAL DATA SECURITY FRAMEWORK

A coalition of 23 conservative and free-market leaders sent a letter to two GOP committee leaders in the House on Tuesday calling for passage of a bill to “establish a national privacy and data security framework.”

The letter — sent to House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Brett Guthrie (R-Ky.) and its Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade Chair Gus Bilirakis (R-Fla.) — praises the SECURE Data Act bill, which was crafted by the committee’s privacy working group.

“A federal data privacy standard is badly needed. Congress’s failure to pass one has led states to pass their own data privacy laws governing websites, ISPs, and online data brokers. If all 50 states move forward with their own privacy laws, it could cost the American economy over $1 trillion in the next decade, with $200 billion of that burden falling on small businesses,” the letter said.

The bill has been criticized by other data privacy advocates. The California Privacy Protection Agency last month wrote in a letter that that the bill’s preemption language would "remove important guardrails on businesses, make exercising privacy rights harder for consumers, and weaken available remedies, leaving Americans less protected."

The letter, though, pushed back: “Entrenched bureaucracies like the California Privacy Protection Agency are already lining up in opposition to the bill because they prefer a confusing patchwork of state laws that enrich trial lawyers and empower bureaucrats like themselves at the expense of consumers. Congress should ignore these entities and hold the line on strong preemption, no private right of action, and no open-ended regulation.”

Signatories include Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform; Lorenzo Montanari of the Property Rights Alliance; James Erwin of Digital Liberty; James Czernaiwski of the Consumer Choice Center; Lisa B. Nelson of ALEC Action; Brent Gardner of Americans for Prosperity; and more.

ON MY CALENDAR

Wednesday, May 20: The Freedom Conservatism Conference takes place in Washington, D.C. Details here.
Thursday, May 28, 2026: America’s Future Annual Gala and Awards Showcase in Washington, D.C. Details here.
Wednesday, June 3: The Tax Foundation and others host a “Tax Policy in a Competitive Global Economy” conference on Capitol Hill. Details here.

THREE MORE THINGS

1. SCOOPLET

Former Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares is joining Advancing American Freedom (AAF) as a Distinguished Fellow in the Edwin Meese III Institute for the Rule of Law. AAF Founder former Vice President Pence said in a statement that Miyares “was a champion of the Constitution and ensured that the Rule of Law reigned, that honorable law-abiding Virginians were safe, and that parental rights were cherished.”

2. WILES PRESENTED WOMEN OF VALOR AWARD

White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles was presented with Independent Women’s Women of Valor Award at the organization’s 2026 gala last week. In a speech accepting the award, Wiles talked about her recent breast cancer diagnosis: “I got a cancer diagnosis nine weeks ago. I come to work every day, I do my job, I don’t complain, and I think that sets an example, too, for the people I work with.” A number of Cabinet members and administration officials attended, including Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, Energy Secretary Chris Wright, FBI Director Kash Patel and Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr.

3. FAUCI STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS EXPIRES

Monday came and went without the Department of Justice indicting Dr. Anthony Fauci, In a blow to those like Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) who called for the former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director to be prosecuted for allegedly lying to Congress, despite former President Biden issuing a preemptive pardon to Fauci on his last day in office. GOP critics say the pardon is invalid because it was signed with an autopen.