November 13, 2024 12:04 PM UTC

Sen. John Thune Wins Majority Leader Post In Notable Snub To MAGA

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• by: Colorado Pols

As USA TODAY reports, Senate Republicans today elected GOP Sen. John Thune of South Dakota to serve as the next Senate majority leader, replacing Sen. Mitch McConnell to lead the upper chamber for the first two years of the second Donald Trump administration:

Thune won in a secret-ballot vote of 29-24, beating out opposing candidates Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Rick Scott, R-Fla.

The 63-year-old Thune will succeed Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who has led his chamber’s Republicans since 2007 and is the longest-serving Senate party leader in U.S. history…

The choice of Sen. Thune over the MAGA movement favorite Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, whose bid for the post pretty much solely consisted of obsequiously brown-nosing the President-re-elect, is a sign that Trump’s control over what could be a trifecta of Republican power in the White House and Congress is not absolute–and the GOP-controlled Senate under Thune may be less inclined to rubber-stamp Trump’s otherwise unfettered agenda.

That’s why so many of the MAGA stakeholders with the ear of the incoming President made it clear that they did not want Thune for the job:

After Jan. 6, 2021, when a mob of Trump’s supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol building, Thune was among the many senators of both parties who condemned the rioters and opposed Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election results. Trump then called for someone to challenge Thune in his 2022 primary, but no one emerged, and Thune prevailed.

Thune initially endorsed Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., in the 2024 GOP primary, but later supported Trump after Scott dropped out of the race for the White House.

While by no means a “Never Trumper” after working hard to mend fences with Trump this year, the selection of Thune is nonetheless being hailed as a small victory for sanity and a potential check on Trump’s far-reaching designs to permanently reshape the federal government from the ground up. Thune appears to have failed the first test of that independence, pre-emptively giving in to Trump’s demand to have his Cabinet appointed via recess appointments instead of the normal confirmation process and vote by the full chamber. But that could change if Thune decides to grow a spine, and there will be many more tests.

One local political talking head who might have insight on how Thune intends to run the U.S. Senate in the Trump 2.0 era is former Colorado Republican Party chairman Dick Wadhams. Wadhams, who declared last spring he would not vote for Donald Trump, was Thune’s campaign manager during his successful 2004 bid to unseat former Sen. Tom Daschle–one of Wadhams’ last big wins before a string of defeats here in Colorado and disaffection with the direction of the state GOP robbed him of his star power. Expect Wadhams like Thune to watch what they say early on, but if this partnership frays in the same manner as Trump and Mitch McConnell’s did we may see it first between the lines in Wadhams’ opinion columns.

Republicans may have won big last week, but here is an early sign of cracks in the MAGA monolith.