Senate incumbents have an election rate that is well over 90% in any given year. In some years, 100% of Senate incumbents win reelection. It is unusual to see multiple Senate incumbents lose in the same year.
It is even more rare to have an incumbent senator defeated in a primary.
In Texas, factors are aligning that could create a nightmare scenario for the Republican Party, where an aging incumbent Senator (John Cornyn) is being challenged from the right in a three way Republican primary, where Trump has withheld his endorsement.
Two recent polls show both US Rep. Wesley Hunt and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton polling at around 25%, with Sen. John Cornyn in third place at 22%.
Cornyn’s struggles are happening even though Republican Senate leadership is supporting him and dumping money into a campaign to get him through the primary.
The issue is that Cornyn is more electable in a general election than either Republican, as polling shows that he leads both of the top two Democrats, James Talarico and Jasmine Crockett, in general election matchups.
The problem is that Cornyn might not survive the primary, and if Paxton, the scandal-ridden and unpopular among the broader electorate attorney general, is victorious, it sets up Democrats to be in the once-thought-of-as-unfathomable position of flipping the US Senate seat in deep-red Texas.
