{"id":54,"date":"2026-05-24T21:37:45","date_gmt":"2026-05-24T21:37:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/americanindustryreview.com\/?p=54"},"modified":"2026-05-24T21:37:45","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T21:37:45","slug":"no-its-not-an-anti-incumbent-election-volume-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/americanindustryreview.com\/?p=54","title":{"rendered":"No, it\u2019s not an anti-incumbent election, Volume 4"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

ANALYSIS \u2014 Even with the potential of three incumbents losing primaries over the course of 10 days, please don\u2019t call this an anti-incumbent election.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Read more \u2018Anti-weaponization fund\u2019 mobilizes resistance among Democrats<\/a><\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie lost the 4th District GOP primary to Ed Gallrein in a race that garnered national attention. That was just three days after Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy finished third in his GOP primary, becoming the first senator to lose renomination since Alabama Republican Sen. Luther Strange in 2017.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And next week in Texas, GOP Sen. John Cornyn is at serious risk of losing his primary. The longtime incumbent was already on the ropes, but President Donald Trump\u2019s last-minute endorsement of state Attorney General Ken Paxton has likely sealed his fate.<\/p>\n

If Cornyn loses, the \u201canti-incumbent\u201d narrative will gain steam. And it will be wrong. The trend says more about Trump\u2019s influence within the Republican Party than voters\u2019 attitude toward incumbents at large.<\/p>\n

In 2024, when Massie was still more of a libertarian headache for GOP leadership, he won his primary with more than 75 percent of the vote. But after getting sideways with Trump, particularly over transparency and the release of the Epstein files, the contours of the race changed. The president made it his personal mission to defeat Massie, and he lost.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Cassidy would have sailed through his reelection if he hadn\u2019t voted to convict Trump at his 2021 impeachment trial. And Cornyn didn\u2019t really have any problems winning reelection for 20 years until Paxton challenged him and Trump decided that the senator wasn\u2019t loyal enough to warrant his support.<\/p>\n

The only other incumbent to lose reelection in a primary so far this cycle is Texas Rep. Dan Crenshaw, and the Republican\u2019s defeat shares some similarities with the more recent losses. Crenshaw had been on the outs with the MAGA wing of the Republican Party and Trump declined to endorse him in his race. But Crenshaw also had to run in a newly redrawn district against a state legislator who represented a chunk of that new seat. The congressman didn\u2019t lose simply because voters were mad at incumbents.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Anytime an incumbent loses in a primary, the political world acts like it\u2019s never happened before.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Read more Trump\u2019s influence on GOP primaries spurs \u2018pretty sour\u2019 feelings<\/a><\/p>\n

Such losses are more common in the House because there are more seats and redistricting can endanger incumbents in unique ways.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But incumbent losses are not unprecedented in the Senate either. Before Strange, Indiana Sen. Richard G.Lugar lost renomination in 2012 to fellow Republican Richard Mourdock. And in 2010, Utah Sen. Bob Bennett lost at the GOP convention and didn\u2019t even make it to the primary (eventually won by Mike Lee) while Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski lost renomination to Joe Miller, although she won the general election as a write-in candidate.<\/p>\n

Out-of-control narratives are nothing new, as well. My former boss and mentor, Stuart Rothenberg, spilled plenty of ink combating the \u201canti-incumbent\u201d narrative in Roll Call columns almost 20 years ago, including \u201cAn Anti-Incumbent Election? This Year? Of Course Not,\u201d from September 2006 and \u201cHere we go again: An anti-incumbent wave next year?\u201d from October 2007.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Many of Rothenberg\u2019s points are still relevant, including what he said about the 1992 cycle.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cTwenty-four House incumbents going down to defeat may well qualify as an anti-incumbent election in the abstract, but, alas, it\u2019s more complicated than that. The devil is in the details,\u201d he wrote. \u201cLarge numbers of incumbents lost that year because of scandals and redistricting, not because voters across the country were so angry with Capitol Hill or with politicians in general that they simply voted against incumbents, regardless of party.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

It could be a similar scene this cycle. A larger-than-usual number of House incumbents could be defeated, but it will likely be due to a combination of redistricting and voter dissatisfaction with Republicans as the party in power presiding over a country that is viewed as on the wrong track.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It won\u2019t be because voters are punishing incumbents equally from both parties simply because they hold office.<\/p>\n

Read more Will the House ban staff from prediction markets? These members aren\u2019t waiting<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ANALYSIS \u2014 Even with the potential of three incumbents losing primaries over the course of 10 days, please don\u2019t call this an anti-incumbent election.\u00a0 On Tuesday, Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie lost the 4th District GOP primary to Ed Gallrein in a race that garnered national attention. That was just three days after Louisiana Sen. Bill […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":53,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-54","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campaigns"],"yoast_head":"\nNo, it\u2019s not an anti-incumbent election, Volume 4 - American Industry Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/americanindustryreview.com\/?p=54\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"No, it\u2019s not an anti-incumbent election, Volume 4 - American Industry Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"ANALYSIS \u2014 Even with the potential of three incumbents losing primaries over the course of 10 days, please don\u2019t call this an anti-incumbent election.\u00a0 On Tuesday, Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie lost the 4th District GOP primary to Ed Gallrein in a race that garnered national attention. That was just three days after Louisiana Sen. 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