When Sen. Bill Cassidy voted to convict Donald Trump following the January 6 Capitol attack, he gave his opponents a five-year grievance to campaign on. He did not expect to show up to his own re-election fight as a spectator.
Louisiana Republicans vote Saturday in a Senate primary that looks nothing like what Cassidy’s team planned for. Trump endorsed Rep. Julia Letlow in January and urged her to run. State Treasurer John Fleming, who announced his challenge in December 2024, refused to clear the field. The result is a three-way race in which the incumbent is polling in third place and the two challengers spent the final weeks attacking each other, not him.
Where the Polling Stands
The most recent public survey of the race, conducted by Emerson College Polling and KLFY News 10, found Fleming at 28 percent, Letlow at 27 percent, and Cassidy at 21 percent, with 22 percent still undecided. The survey was conducted last month among likely Republican primary voters.
That tracks with where the race has been heading for months. A Quantus Insights survey in February 2026 showed Fleming at 34 percent, Letlow at 25 percent, and Cassidy at 20 percent. An earlier JMC Analytics survey from October 2025 had Fleming at 25 percent and Cassidy at 23 percent before Letlow entered the race.
LSU political science professor Robert Hogan told Louisiana Radio Network that the numbers signal a serious threat to Cassidy’s standing.
“The key thing to keep in mind is that Bill Cassidy, an incumbent who has won statewide in two previous elections, is so far behind," Hogan said. "Some of the polls indicate that he’s third.”
He added that if Cassidy finishes third on Saturday, his political career will likely be over.
Trump and Landry Endorsed Letlow. Fleming Stayed Anyway.
Trump endorsed Letlow on January 18, 2026. Gov. Jeff Landry quickly followed. Most of the other challengers who had been weighing a run stepped aside. The White House expected the field to consolidate around Letlow, clearing a path for a straightforward Trump-versus-Cassidy verdict.
Fleming did not move.
The Louisiana state treasurer, who largely self-funds his campaign, argued from the start that the Trump endorsement went to the wrong candidate. “What people expect from an endorsement from President Trump is really a candidate like me, but what they got was a candidate very similar to Cassidy,” Fleming told CNN.
Fleming’s pitch rests on a specific moment. He served as Trump’s deputy chief of staff in the final months of the first administration and was in the White House on January 6. While others resigned, Fleming stayed. “There were a lot of resignations in that White House on Jan. 6,” he said. “I stood there, stayed there, and did not leave my post.”
Fleming staked that argument against Trump’s own endorsed candidate, and it pulled enough support to ensure no one crosses the 50 percent threshold Saturday. A June 27 runoff is widely considered a certainty.
Cassidy’s Money, Cassidy’s Problem
Cassidy entered this race with the most money. According to NOLA.com, a super PAC supporting Cassidy spent $17.4 million on advertising through early May, compared to $5 million for Letlow and roughly $680,000 for Fleming. Cassidy also held a significant cash-on-hand advantage over both opponents as of April 1.
The money has not translated into votes. Cassidy’s fundraising base is tied to his position as chair of the Senate HELP Committee and his tenure as Louisiana’s senior senator, the same credentials that Republican primary voters have spent months treating as a liability.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune headlined a fundraiser for Cassidy in Baton Rouge in January. National Republicans have largely stayed out beyond that, confident the seat remains in GOP hands regardless of who wins. Trump’s team, by contrast, has made this race personal. Axios reported that Cassidy is the only sitting Republican senator Trump’s team is targeting for defeat this primary cycle.
The Debate Cassidy Skipped
Fleming and Letlow debated on May 5 on Moon Griffon’s conservative talk radio program. Cassidy declined to participate, despite repeated invitations. Griffon regularly refers to Cassidy as “Psycho Bill,” and the senator skipped the event entirely, leaving his two opponents alone on stage to draw contrasts voters will carry into the booth.
Letlow called Cassidy’s impeachment vote the “worst mistake that Cassidy could have made” and said Louisiana voters “have never forgotten it.” Fleming spent much of the debate arguing that Letlow is not substantively different from the incumbent she’s running against.
Cassidy’s campaign responded to the debate with a statement calling the clash a “cage match” and attaching images of popcorn. A Cassidy adviser told reporters this week that Fleming was “putting on a hard charge” in the final days but that the campaign would stay focused on Letlow, the candidate Cassidy considers the actual front-runner and his preferred runoff opponent.
What Cassidy Is Running On
Cassidy’s argument to voters is straightforward: he has delivered for Louisiana. He points to the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which he helped negotiate and which has brought an estimated $13.5 billion to the state. He describes himself as “a conservative who’s pro-life, pro-Second Amendment, pro-oil and gas” who works across the aisle when Louisiana needs it.
He has also spent months pushing back on the MAHA movement, pressing Robert F. Kennedy Jr. during his confirmation hearing on vaccine science. Cassidy ultimately voted to confirm Kennedy but has since criticized several of Kennedy’s policy decisions. Last month, Trump blamed Cassidy for the stalled nomination of Casey Means as surgeon general.
“I don’t really think President Trump likes me that much, but we work really well together,” Cassidy told reporters recently, recounting a conversation with a voter at Home Depot.
A New Primary System, A Different Electorate
Saturday’s primary operates under rules that did not exist the last time Cassidy ran. Louisiana moved from its open jungle primary, where all candidates appeared on one ballot, to closed partisan primaries for U.S. Senate beginning this cycle, following legislation Gov. Landry signed in 2024. Registered Republicans vote only in the Republican primary. Democrats are out. Unaffiliated voters may participate in either primary.
Cassidy’s two previous victories, in 2014 and 2020, came under the jungle primary system, where his main opposition came from Democrats. Saturday, he faces only Republican voters, the electorate most likely to hold the impeachment vote against him.
Polls close at 8 p.m. Central time. If no candidate clears 50 percent, the top two finishers advance to the June 27 runoff.
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