Washington — Louisiana voters head to the polls Saturday for a high-stakes U.S. Senate primary in which Republican incumbent Sen. Bill Cassidy is fighting to keep his seat. Cassidy, 68, is running for a third Senate term in a crowded GOP field that includes Rep. Julia Letlow, who was endorsed by former President Donald Trump, and former Rep. John Fleming, the state treasurer.
Cassidy has a record of occasionally breaking with his party. He was one of seven Senate Republicans who voted to convict Mr. Trump in the 2021 impeachment trial after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol — a vote that has brought sustained criticism from Trump and his allies. Trump publicly endorsed Letlow in January and has repeatedly attacked Cassidy on social platforms, calling him disloyal and urging voters to back Letlow.
Letlow, 45, won a 2021 special election to represent Louisiana’s 5th Congressional District after the death of her husband, who died of COVID-19 complications before taking office. She has made loyalty to Trump-era positions and conservative credentials central to her campaign, arguing that Louisiana voters should not have to guess how their senator will vote under pressure.
Cassidy has tried to blunt Letlow’s attacks by pointing to her past comments supporting diversity, equity and inclusion programs in education, and by emphasizing his own record of securing resources and working with the administration on some priorities. The intra-party fight has opened space for Fleming, who previously served in the U.S. House and in the Trump administration, to appeal to conservative voters seeking an alternative.
The race also has a policy angle: Cassidy, who is a physician, has clashed with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at times despite providing the pivotal vote to advance Kennedy’s nomination last year. Cassidy criticized a change to the infant hepatitis B vaccine schedule and urged that certain vaccine advisory meetings be postponed, underscoring tensions between the senator and the HHS leadership.
If no candidate wins a simple majority, Louisiana will hold a runoff between the top two vote-getters on June 27. An April Emerson College poll showed a tight three-way contest, suggesting a runoff is likely. The outcome is being watched as a test of Trump’s sway over Republican primaries; in recent weeks Trump-backed efforts elsewhere have had mixed results.
The National Republican Senatorial Committee, meanwhile, has backed Cassidy, and Senate leaders have publicly praised his work for Louisiana. “Bill Cassidy has been a terrific senator for Louisiana,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said, adding that the NRSC aims to support incumbents while leaving the final decision to Louisiana voters.
On the Democratic side, candidates include former gubernatorial adviser Nick Albares, Navy veteran Gary Crockett and third-generation farmer Jamie Davis. But Louisiana is a strongly Republican state — Trump won about 60% of the vote in 2024, and Democrats have not won a U.S. Senate race there since 2008 — making the GOP primary outcome a likely determinant of November’s general election matchup.
Separately, Gov. Jeff Landry suspended the state’s House primaries after the Supreme Court struck down the congressional map, but the Senate primary remained scheduled to proceed.