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Mike Rounds hasn’t even launched a re-election campaign. He certainly hadn’t sought out an endorsement from President Donald Trump.
Yet it arrived this week anyway — three years after the South Dakota GOP senator said the 2020 election was “fair” and Trump vowed that he would “never endorse this jerk again.”
Shortly after Trump met on Monday with the state’s other senator, Majority Leader John Thune, the president called Rounds. Trump then posted his “complete and total endorsement.”
Rounds told Semafor that he took it as a sign of Trump’s pragmatic approach to Republican senators who haven’t always aligned with him.
“He has the ability to look at the practical side of things, and decide we can still work together,” Rounds said. “He’s found out that I’m very serious about trying to work to get things done. And we agree on a whole lot more than we disagree on.”
A Trump shift toward forgiving and forgetting lawmakers’ past perceived transgressions could have far-reaching implications for his party, especially in Texas and Louisiana. In Texas, GOP Sen. John Cornyn is facing state attorney general Ken Paxton in the country’s roughest primary, and polls show Paxton could make the seat harder to hold in a general election.
And perhaps no GOP senator has a tougher path to winning over Trump than Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., who voted to convict the president in his 2021 impeachment trial. Cassidy was invited twice last week to the White House, though, to celebrate legislative victories.
While it’s early to declare a new Trump rule for endorsements, his support of Rounds and close working relationship with Thune — whom Trump once vowed to take down in a primary — has most of his party optimistic that he’ll prioritize keeping the Senate majority and backing incumbents.
A White House official said there’s no “litmus test or a line” to govern getting an endorsement: “It’s different for every person.”
Still, this official added, “it’s a little too early on some of the more questionable ones … It’s [about] getting a better lay of the land and having better context as we get closer to the midterms.”
Cornyn publicly questioned Trump’s ability to win a general election a couple of years ago — which wasn’t exactly a unique opinion in the party heading into the 2024 election. But now Cornyn is optimistic that Trump might back him if he can close the polling gap with Paxton, who leads in early surveys. He’s also unworried about past comments sinking his chances.
“JD Vance wouldn’t be vice president and Marco Rubio wouldn’t be secretary of state if the president held a grudge,” Cornyn told Semafor, referring to both men’s past critical comments about Trump. “And I said nothing to compare with what they said.”
There are also persistent rumors in the party that Paxton could be offered a job in the Trump administration that would head off the primary. One person close to Trump suggested nothing firm is in the works, but speculated that a Paxton offer is possible.
Meanwhile, Cassidy spoke to the president at both events he attended this week but has not yet broached an endorsement. He’s planning to launch his re-election campaign next month.
“I got my shoutout, and continue to work very well together,” Cassidy said of his visits with Trump. “I don’t tend to speak for the president. But … right now we’ve got a great working relationship.′
Trump does like winners, and Cassidy has released internal poll numbers showing him way ahead of Louisiana Treasurer John Fleming. Republicans still believe another candidate, like Louisiana Rep. Julia Letlow, could enter the Senate primary.
“Will he endorse Cassidy? I seriously doubt it. Will he leave him alone? I think so,” said the person close to Trump. “Polling is polling. [The president] is well past the time when he used to do things because he liked a guy.”
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Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, hasn’t launched her re-election campaign yet, either, but nonetheless got invited to the White House recently for a meeting with officials about a third bid, which Republicans see as vital for keeping the majority.
She’s another case of Trump embracing Republicans who’ve gone their own way in the Trump era.
Ernst said warm things about Nikki Haley, Trump’s top primary foe, but quickly backed him after Haley dropped out in 2024. Now she said she’s getting “strong encouragement” from the White House.
“There’s always a lot of palace intrigue. It was nice to sit down and visit with the White House, and I’m so supportive of President Trump and everything he’s doing,” Ernst said in an interview. Asked if Trump would endorse her, she replied: “Yeah, I think he would.”
Ernst, Cassidy, and Cornyn have voted with Trump reliably since he became president, though not always reflexively. Ernst initially balked at Pete Hegseth’s nomination to be defense secretary, Cassidy struggled with the nomination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the Health and Human Services Department, and Rounds wrestled with Trump’s $9 billion spending cuts package.
But Trump endorsed Rounds soon after the South Dakota Republican voted for those cuts. Rounds said that vote didn’t come up in his conversation with the president on Monday.
The White House official said Trump is “appreciative of anyone” who helped pass his “big beautiful” tax and spending cuts bill earlier this month. Ernst, Cassidy, Cornyn, and Rounds are all in that camp.
Room for Disagreement
Retiring Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., was one of the GOP’s three dissenters on the megabill.
He told Semafor that before his decision not to run again, he didn’t ask for Trump’s endorsement and isn’t “sure that his endorsement would have helped me in a general election in North Carolina next year.”
“I’m not sure that the president’s endorsement was something I would have sought this time. I didn’t seek it the last time, but it was helpful,” Tillis said. “And the fact that I would or would not get it had nothing to do with my decision to not run again.”
Incumbent Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, also opposed that bill. She also voted to convict Trump in 2021’s impeachment, among many votes she’s broken with him on.
She told Semafor “I’ve never had his endorsement and I’ve never sought it. And I run my own race.”
Then there’s the special case of Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., whom Trump wants to defeat in a primary after Massie’s repeated clashes with the president so far this year.
Burgess and Shelby’s View
We often hear how important loyalty is to the president — and that’s still the case. He’s simultaneously showing that he can put that aside when it comes to winning Senate seats.
It may have helped that he learned in 2022 how hard it is to beat incumbent senators; that year he mounted a failed attempt to oust Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska.
Trump’s team includes campaign veterans like Susie Wiles whom he trusts enough to help steer him. For Wiles and other top aides, winning in the midterms is crucial — more crucial than publicly flaming a lawmaker who has a history of irritating Trump.
Trump’s advisers also understand GOP primaries are not helpful. The White House worked with the National Republican Senatorial Committee to avoid a contested primary in Michigan, for example, and they’re working in tandem to convince Ernst to run again.
The president also knows governing isn’t easy, and he’s cognizant of the dramas that plagued him eight years ago.
No one inside the administration, particularly Trump, wants to risk dealing with impeachments or stalled bills again — even if that means backing some Republicans who annoyed him in the past.
Notable
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Just a few weeks ago, Trump threatened to withhold endorsements from Republicans who wouldn’t back the rescissions bill.
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Trump hasn’t endorsed in New York City. He’s slamming the Democratic nominee but hasn’t officially backed any candidate.
