Congress
Donald Trump’s revenge tour might not end in 2026
Donald Trump just ousted another Republican he viewed as insufficiently loyal. Two years from now, his revenge list could be even longer.
The president has already lashed out at two House Republicans due to perceived slights, with the White House floating a longer list of potential targets over the past year. Trump could also take aim at several GOP senators up for reelection in 2028 — including Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski, Kentucky’s Rand Paul and Indiana’s Todd Young — as he seeks to make a lasting mark on the Republican Party in the final stretch of his presidency.
The prospect that Trump’s much-ballyhooed “revenge tour” could continue into another election cycle was underscored by his late decision to endorse against Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who lost his renomination bid Tuesday night to Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.
Cornyn backed Trump in January 2024 and went to great lengths to win Trump’s favor once Trump secured the 2024 Republican nomination for president — after initially running lukewarm on his comeback bid. Trump’s decision to seek retribution anyway, some believe, could lead other GOP lawmakers to think twice about running for another term rather than mount a grueling and potentially futile bid for renomination.
“Look at all of them that are up in 2028 … do they think about retiring?” asked one Republican senator who was granted anonymity to speak candidly about colleagues who have previously broken with the president.
Others think it’s too soon to tell — especially if Trump’s moves to drum out more establishment-minded Republicans backfire in the November midterms.
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), who is leaving office at the end of this year, said in an interview that he “could see” some of his colleagues retiring rather than risk a Trump-fueled primary challenge.
“But I also think … he’s not going to carry the same weight in the 2028 election cycle, particularly if we’ve lost one or both chambers in 2026,” Tillis said of Trump. “So I think these members ought to be who they are. Period.”
Asked about the 2028 races, the White House pointed back to Trump’s Truth Social post endorsing Paxton over Cornyn, which does not address future races. Trump, in that post, said Cornyn was “not supportive of me when times were tough” and “was very late in backing me” in 2024.
Trump’s appetite for revenge also hasn’t been entirely consistent. Some congressional Republicans who were asking questions about Trump’s e fitness all the way back to the launch of his first presidential campaign in 2015 have managed to skate by.
That includes Sen. Susan Collins of Maine. She was one of seven Republicans to vote to convict Trump of an impeachment charge in 2021 but has largely escaped the president’s wrath as she tries to hold onto her seat in a Democratic-leaning state. Trump has also thrown his support behind Sen. Mike Rounds, despite once calling the South Dakotan a “jerk” he would never endorse again.
Trump hasn’t made any specific 2028 primary endorsements yet as he keeps focus squarely on 2026.
But he threatened to back a challenger to Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert earlier this month over her support for Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), who fell this month to a Trump-backed primary opponent — even though the filing deadline for Boebert’s 2026 primary has already passed.
He also took a whack at Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick last week — a day after the Pennsylvania Republican advanced past his uncontested primary for a sixth term representing a swingy suburban Philadelphia seat.
But the real fireworks could come in 2028 Senate primaries, which could feature several of Trump’s most persistent critics.
Three GOP senators up next cycle — Murkowski, Paul and Young — caught a tongue-lashing from the president earlier this year after they were among five Republicans who voted to advance a resolution that would have prevented the administration from taking additional military action against Venezuela. In addition to angry phone calls to the lawmakers at the time, Trump called them out in a Truth Social post where he said they “should never be elected to office again.”
Also up for reelection in 2028: Senate Majority Leader John Thune, who has generally enjoyed a positive relationship with Trump during his second presidential term but faces potential potholes ahead.
Trump, for instance, has shown no sign of backing off his attempt to eliminate the Senate filibuster, even as Thune publicly insists there aren’t the votes to do so. Thune also acknowledged last week that Trump’s effort to unseat incumbents would make advancing the GOP’s legislative agenda “slightly more complicated.”
Paul, meanwhile, has been a perennial gadfly for his party on everything from last year’s megabill to routine spending votes and the Iran war, where he has repeatedly backed efforts to curb the president’s ability to take military action without congressional signoff. Like Boebert, he was an outspoken backer of Massie’s reelection campaign.
Asked about his own history with Trump, Paul has batted down the notion his seat might be at risk — including after another GOP doctor-turned-senator, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, lost his bid for renomination this month.“I was a big defender of the president on impeachment, so I think there’s quite a bit of difference,” Paul told reporters, referring to Cassidy’s 2021 conviction vote.
Fellow Republicans are closely watching both Murkowski and Young ahead of 2028 — whether either gets a primary challenger, or runs again at all.
Young is gearing up to run for reelection. But at least one possible primary challenger is publicly eying the race, and Rep. Erin Houchin is among others who are thought to be looking at a run.
Houchin heartily backed Trump’s effort to oust eight Republicans in the Indiana state Senate who helped kill a GOP redistricting plan earlier this year, joining their primary challengers when they visited the White House before the state’s May primary. She also raised eyebrows recently when she hired the MAGA-aligned consultant Chris Grant, who rarely works on House races these days, for her reelection campaign.
Trump didn’t endorse Young during his 2022 race, where he ran unopposed in the primary. And in the lead-up to the 2024 election, Young said he didn’t support Trump as the party’s nominee.
But Young has also positioned himself as a team player during Trump’s second term, voting for the president’s nominees and major pieces of his agenda. Young ultimately flipped on the Venezuela resolution, voting to kill it after getting assurances from Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other Trump administration officials.
Still, Young and Trump have managed to keep things civil. Young flew on Air Force One with Trump and other lawmakers in March and Trump recognized him alongside Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan at a recent White House event as “good senators” and “great guys.”
Murkowski, meanwhile, is the only Senate Republican up for reelection in 2028 who voted to convict Trump on an impeachment charge of having “incited an insurrection” in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack at the Capitol by a mob of the president’s supporters.
Trump hasn’t shied away from criticizing Murkowski — calling her and Tillis “terrible senators” and saying that Murkowski “should be gone.” He has also backed an effort to eliminate Alaska’s all-party, ranked-choice voting system, which helped Murkowski edge out another Republican in 2022. He thanked other state-level Republicans and members of Alaska’s congressional delegation, but not Murkowski, in a recent Truth Social post related to the effort.
Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy is among those thought to be considering a challenge. Responding to a Fox News report last year that he would jump into the 2028 race, a spokesperson said at the time that “Governor Dunleavy is focused on moving Alaska forward during the remainder of his second term.” Other Republicans cautioned that they thought the report was a trial balloon for the governor, who is leaving office at the end of the year.
Murkowski provided a key vote to help pass last year’s tax-cuts-focused GOP megabill and has voted for Trump’s Cabinet nominees, though not Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. But she has also been one of the Senate Republicans most willing to push back publicly against Trump’s agenda, including helping kill the GOP Obamacare repeal plan during his first term. She voted against advancing Trump’s immigration enforcement bill and a GOP election measure earlier this year and frequently speaks out against Trump’s efforts to eliminate the filibuster.
Asked how she has survived Trump’s wrath so far, Murkowski said she has stayed focused on home-state issues, like the revamping of the federal polar icebreaking fleet.
“That’s what I think about,” she told reporters after Trump endorsed against Cornyn. “I don’t get caught up in, ‘Does the president love me today or hate me today?’ If I did, I would be a crazy woman, and I’m not a crazy woman.”
Adam Wren contributed to this report.
The chair of the House Agriculture Committee said he’s not willing to “accept bad results” as a tradeoff for the benefits of advancements in artificial intelligence — a direct rebuttal to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.
“As someone who practiced health care for 28 years, I’m never willing to accept bad results. I think we just need to do our best,” Rep. G.T. Thompson, a Pennsylvania Republican, told reporters Monday.
He was responding to Altman’s comments to Decoded by Blue Light News that people “should accept some bad things happening for the benefits of this technology and people having the agency.”
Pressed further on whether he agreed with Altman’s premise, Thompson replied, “No, I think we have to work harder to prevent any bad things from happening.”
Altman’s comments come in the wake of increased panic over the risks of catastrophic destruction from AI, with many industry leaders and experts arguing that guardrails are needed on the technology to prevent it from spinning out of human control.
Pressure is building on Congress to regulate the rapidly-advancing technology, but lawmakers are divided over whether the AI industry needs federal regulation or if it’s capable of governing itself.
The executives of major AI labs and tech companies gathered at the White House last week to discuss solutions with President Donald Trump, who believes overregulating AI will have national security repercussions. The group ended up signing a “morally binding” AI accord that critics say won’t do enough to prevent a worst-case scenario.
Thompson noted Monday he believes that AI will bring “tremendous solutions,” specifically in regards to finding cures for health issues like cancer and Alzheimer’s disease. But he also said AI has to be led with “principle” — comparing it to how he addressed digital assets in a bill to regulate the cryptocurrency industry, which he worked on as chair of the Agriculture Committee.
“The first principle is ‘do no harm.’ So we need to protect consumers, and that means, I think, building some guardrails — some guidelines — to do that,” Thompson said. He added that the second principle is to “foster innovation.”
“I think AI has a lot to do with that,” he added. “I don’t think AI works without RI: Real Intelligence.”
LE SUEUR, Minnesota — Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Monday there is no “consensus” yet on advancing a bill establishing permanent daylight saving time even as President Donald Trump ramps up pressure on Republicans to pass it.
Thune addressed the matter in a Monday interview after Trump used his Truth Social account multiple times over the weekend to rail against the legislation, known as the Sunshine Protection Act — going so far as to post the personal cell phone number of one of its GOP opponents, Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas.
“The president feels strongly on it like he does a lot of issues,” he said. “It’s something we’re having conversations about but there’s no clear path forward or consensus on it yet.”
While Trump singled out Cotton for scrutiny, Thune made clear the opposition to the permanent daylight saving time proposal — which would lead to very late winter sunrises in some parts of the country — ran deeper than one senator.
Cotton has publicly voiced opposition to the proposal for year, citing, among other things, the fact that children in his state would be going to school in the dark for part of the year.
Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) voiced similar objections Monday to reporters in the Capitol, saying he was mindful of “safety concerns in the more northern and rural states where children get on the school bus in very early hours.”
Thune, who spoke during a campaign swing in Minnesota with GOP Senate nominee Michele Tafoya, has himself opposed previous daylight saving bills. He said Monday that “a lot of it depends on where you are in the country” and that “your geography probably has as much to do with your position on that as anything.”
Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who has aligned himself closely with Trump, is among the lawmakers who have been pushing to get the bill through the Senate. He recently told POLITICO, “I’m going to make sure it gets passed this year.”
Riley Rogerson contributed to this report.
Democrats have pulled back some of their ads in North Carolina’s Senate race, days after the top Senate Republican super PAC paused its future spending in the state.
WinSenate, a group affiliated with the Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer-aligned Senate Majority PAC, has removed roughly $1.1 million in North Carolina ad buys this week, according to ad tracking firm AdImpact. The group still has roughly $18.8 million in future reservations through Election Day.
“Senate Majority PAC is committed to seeing this race through to victory, and will continue to make spending decisions based on how to best build a strong Senate majority,” Senate Majority PAC spokesperson Lauren French said in a statement.
The move, combined with the GOP-aligned Senate Leadership Fund’s decision to pause future spending, are a signal that both parties are shifting resources amid an ever-expanding Senate map. Democrats are increasingly confident in their North Carolina Senate nominee, Roy Cooper, as he continues to hold a sizable lead in public polling over Republican Michael Whatley — but some privately say states like Michigan and New Hampshire need more resources.
Meanwhile, multiple Republican groups, not just SLF, have retreated from the state in recent weeks, effectively deciding that it’s no longer worth the money to boost Whatley’s campaign.
The Koch-aligned Americans for Prosperity Action left North Carolina off its $22 million list of future spending across key Senate contests, and Old North Action removed $6.5 million in ad reservations last month.
The Cooper campaign, however, is still treating the race as competitive, pointing to North Carolina’s closely divided electorate and the fact that President Donald Trump won the state in each of the past three presidential elections.
“North Carolina is a truly 50/50 state and Democrats haven’t won a US Senate race in 18 years. We can’t take anything for granted or our eye off the ball,” said Morgan Jackson, a senior adviser to the Cooper campaign. “DC is broken and we’re going to continue to run this race like we’re ten points down to ensure North Carolinians get the change they desperately need.”
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