NEW ORLEANS (AP) — When Charles Wandfluh voted in Louisiana’s Republican primary over the weekend, he could only conjure the unflattering image of a panicked rodent when talking about Bill Cassidy’s desperate attemp t to cling to his U.S. Senate seat despite opposition from President Donald Trump. “He’s just a squirrel running around the tree, chasing nuts to find whatever he can get to benefit him,” said Wandfluh, 57, in a suburb of New Orleans. Cassidy’s scramble was in vain, and his defeat on Saturday demonstrated the near-impossibility of a political future within the Republican Party without Trump’s acquiescence. Despite outspending his rivals, Cassidy finished third in the primary, falling short of even making a runoff. The outcome was the latest and perhaps most spectacular failure by a Republican who tried to cross Trump and get away with it.
Even within a party notorious for its political contortions during the Trump era, Cassidy stood out. As a doctor, he overlooked Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s anti-vaccine activism to support his nomination as Trump’s health secretary, only inevitably to clash with Kennedy once he took the job.
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Cassidy was also unable to repair his relationship with Trump five years after voting to convict him during his impeachment trial over the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Although Cassidy tried to assure Republican voters that he remained committed to Trump’s agenda, that did not satisfy their loyalty to the Republican president. “He was trying to portray himself side by side with Trump, like he has worked with Trump on this and that,” Wandfluh complained. “I’m like, ‘You voted to impeach the guy!’”
