Trump's primary election endorsement power_ Enten & NewsNight weigh in

Bebefin Toons

CNN chief data analyst Harry Enten runs the numbers on Trump's primary election endorsement power in Texas. CNN's Sara Sidner hosts a NewsNight panel to discuss Trump's influence on incumbent Thomas Massie's loss against Ed Gallrein in the KY Republican primary- with a sharp turn into a discussion on the Epstein files.  0:00 Enten runs the numbers on Texas' tipping point 2:33 Jennings: Trump succeeded on getting rid of Massie 4:09 'The Republican party has become a party of pedophile protectors' 6:20 NewsNight discuss releasing Epstein files 7:54 Is Trump facing a problem with active congressmen?   Trump's primary election endorsement power: Enten & NewsNight weigh in  CNN 19.6M subscribers  Subscribe  Remix   1.7K   Share  Ask  134,043 views  May 20, 2026  #Midterms #Trump #News CNN chief data analyst Harry Enten runs the numbers on Trump's primary election endorsement power in Texas. CNN's Sara Sidner hosts a NewsNight panel to discuss Trump's influence on incumbent Thomas Massie's loss against Ed Gallrein in the KY Republican primary- with a sharp turn into a discussion on the Epstein files.  0:00 Enten runs the numbers on Texas' tipping point 2:33 Jennings: Trump succeeded on getting rid of Massie 4:09 'The Republican party has become a party of pedophile protectors' 6:20 NewsNight discuss releasing Epstein files 7:54 Is Trump facing a problem with active congressmen?  Watch more CNN here: https://cnn.it/4kh5RPe  #Trump #Midterms #News

Transcript

00:00Harry, I mean, obviously when the president said today that he was about to endorse in Texas,

00:03everyone was waiting to see if it would really happen. And then came the Truth Social Post.

00:08Yeah, it really happened. It really happened. And I can't think of an endorsement in Republican

00:14politics that has ever been as important as Donald John Trump's endorsement. And you see it in Texas.

00:20You saw, obviously, in Kentucky earlier night. You saw it in Louisiana over the weekend. And you see

00:24it in the Texas polling as well. Because just take a look here. Impact of Trump's endorsement

00:28in Texas. Among Republicans, look at what you see here. 55% of Republicans say that you would be

00:34more likely to vote for the candidate that Donald Trump endorses. You see 36% say no impact. Look

00:39at this, though. Just 9% say less likely to vote for the candidate that Trump endorses. But overall

00:45here, it's just very clear. If you get Trump's endorsement, as Ken Paxton has, then all of a

00:51sudden what we should expect to see is Republican voters lining up behind Ken Paxton, which of course

00:56is what we've seen in basically every single other contest, including obviously in Kentucky

01:01earlier this evening.

01:02But with Lisa Murkowski's comment there, she said, how does it help the president if we

01:06ended up losing Texas? It's because there's a real question about how Ken Paxton would

01:10fare against James Tallarico, the Democrat, come November.

01:14Yeah. Okay. So I think it's so important to note that you have one world, one galaxy in

01:20which you have the Republican primary electorate, and then you have completely other galaxy, which

01:24is the general electorate. And the polling here really tells the story, right? Because

01:28even before the endorsement, what you essentially saw here was a very close race, but one in which

01:33Ken Paxton was actually favored to win in the runoff over John Cornyn, obviously the incumbent.

01:37Paxton was ahead 48% to 45%. Based upon slide number one, of course, I expect that Paxton's

01:43lead is going to climb ever higher. So you see these numbers right here, but then look

01:47towards the general election because it is a completely different world because you can

01:52see it right here. Okay. Choice for Texas Senate. You got Tallarico here at 44%. And then look

01:58at here, Ken Paxton, a Republican, a Republican in Texas. The best he can do at this point is

02:05averaging 40% of the vote. I mean, I was looking at all the polling I could find. This is

02:10the

02:10best that a Democrat for Senate has been polling since like 2002. That is a very long time ago.

02:19When you have to go all the way back since I was in middle school, you know that the Democrat

02:22in

02:23this particular case is polling well in Texas.

02:25Harry Enten, that's why we keep you around. So we can go back to your middle school years.

02:30I know.

02:31Thank you, Harry, for those numbers.

02:33Well, it was the most expensive House primary in U.S. history. And the president made it a priority

02:38to get rid of Thomas Massey. And he succeeded because Massey had, frankly, become an opponent

02:43of the president inside of the party. And you just can't do that. You know, Massey used to,

02:47you know, reliably vote with the Republicans. That number had been falling over time. This is one of

02:52the most conservative districts in the country. It's certainly a conservative area of Kentucky.

02:57They gave Donald Trump a massive victory in 2024. And they expect the Republican congressman who

03:03represents them to be part of the team. The two big issues in the race that were in most of

03:07the

03:07advertising had to do with tax cuts and immigration. And Massey was against Trump on both of his big

03:13border security and tax cut bills. And so they said, look, we can get a Republican congressman

03:19that'll be part of the team and support the president. That campaign worked. I just want

03:23to also add one other thing. Thomas Massey tonight in his concession speech said something despicable,

03:32anti-Semitic, nasty, gutter politics, right at the end. What a way to go out. He said, I would have

03:39called Ed Galrine, but, you know, I had to, I had to find him in Tel Aviv. There was a,

03:45there was an

03:45undercurrent of anti-Semitism in this race on the Massey side. There's been an undercurrent of it in

03:51his career, unfortunately, and it really came out in an ugly way tonight. And I think it needs to be

03:56stated, acknowledged and condemned because it was pretty despicable. All right. So that's the

04:02perspective from, from the district in which you also live and have been watching all this.

04:08Tara, I am curious from you, can, can Republicans not go against the president anymore? Is that where

04:15we're at? Clearly the Republican party has become a party of pedophile protectors. America is watching.

04:22Okay. I don't agree with Thomas Massey on a lot of things, but you know, he did the right thing

04:28stepping up on the Epstein issue and took the side of the survivors and his cardinal sin against Donald

04:34Trump was the fact that he pushed to have the Epstein files transparently, um, opened up. And

04:41that was what upset Donald Trump. Trump wasn't after him because of any of the anti-Semitic things he

04:46said. I mean, that would have been nice, but he didn't care about that. He doesn't care about any of

04:50that. He was upset with Thomas Massey because Thomas Massey decided to put his whole career

04:55on the line for the Epstein survivors. And this is what the result has been. Now, I think that there

05:02are a lot of members of Congress who are looking at what's happening with this president. What a

05:06disastrous presidency this has been thus far. They're looking at his tanking poll numbers.

05:10They're looking at his priorities being all over the place, everywhere, but where they should be in a

05:13midterm election. But they're too scared to stand up and say, no, enough is enough. Because they're

05:20looking at what happened to Massey. They're looking at what happened to Cassidy. But you know what?

05:24Some things are bigger than your elected office. Where the hell is the integrity of these people

05:29in the Republican Party to stand up and do what's right, not only for the country, but for their own

05:32constituents. So, you know, Massey is another another casualty of the retribution tour. But I

05:38think people need to understand that the reason why Donald Trump went after him was because he was

05:43not subservient to him on the Epstein files. And that is a problem because America will remember

05:48who protected predators. Can we just do a little bit of fact checking on the Epstein issue? Did every

05:54member of the House Republican conference except for one vote to release the Epstein files? Yes or no?

05:59Because there was a discharge petition where they had to. The answer is yes. Did Donald Trump sign

06:03it into law? Yes or no? Because he knew that he was going to lose the discharge petition. So just

06:07for the record, the Republicans voted to release it. Donald Trump signed it. Because there was a

06:11discharge petition. They were forced to put it on the floor, Scott. They weren't. Come on. If they

06:15were open to doing it, then they would not have had to go through a discharge petition. I know you're

06:19trying to rearrange. No, I'm telling you the facts. But the facts are the Republicans passed it and Trump signed

06:25it.

06:25Scott, the White House brought in Lauren Boebert to the situation room and put all sorts of pressure

06:32on her to not vote for the discharge petition. And now Trump is going against Lauren Boebert. I mean,

06:39this Epstein thing is something that he has seen as a litmus test. And so, yeah, I mean,

06:45you can argue whatever you want. My point is, every Republican voted for. Are you saying every

06:48Republican will have a primary? But you know that they voted for it because there were

06:53a few Republicans, including Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Massey, who had the

07:00cojones, the courage to go against Trump. And you know that Trump- They had the courage in the last

07:05two years. He never cared about this until Trump took office. So let's be very clear about the timing

07:11People who voted for Donald Trump cared about this. That's right. Part of the MAGA agenda,

07:16part of what happened during the election is that people cared about the Epstein files.

07:20You raised a good question about the people who voted for Trump. As a voter in this district,

07:24let me stand up for my people. These people voted for Donald Trump. They also voted for Massey

07:30on the expectation that he would help Donald Trump enact his agenda. He stopped doing that.

07:35And it's pretty simple. They decided to get a congressman who will help him enact that agenda.

07:39It's easy to overanalyze this. The bottom line is they love Trump. They love his agenda. Tax cuts,

07:45border security, you name it. Massey got off that team and they wanted to put someone on the team

07:51who would help the president. It's pretty simple. I do want to ask you something. With these

07:56two people, Cassidy and now Massey, could Donald Trump be facing a problem when they come back?

08:05Because they're not going to be out of their office right away. What do you what do you see

08:09happening once they're back in Congress? Now they know they're not back. They're losing their seat.

08:14Do you see them deciding, OK, you know what? I mean, Cassidy just voted for to limit Trump's power.

08:19Yeah. Cassidy just came and voted for the war powers resolution. Right. So now he's free to do that.

08:24And from somebody who actually was part of the retribution for one of the first in 2019,

08:29right, in 2021, I can tell you right now that Trump does own the party. I used to make fun

08:33of it

08:33saying, you know, this is a Mississippi leghound party. Everybody's trying their best, right, to cozy up

08:38to Trump as quickly as possible. And I was pretty sure, right, that that wasn't going to keep happening.

08:42But it does. I was looking at Lindsey Graham. I don't know if there's anybody who could be more sort

08:45of

08:46subservient to what's happening right now. But the thing is, regardless, if that's what they're doing,

08:50right, everybody trying to get favor of Trump, that's exactly what it is. Also with Ed Galrine, we were talking

08:54about Massey 14 years. I served with Massey. And Massey had some bizarre behaviors. Okay.

09:01So let's just be honest. And he had some belief systems like the Fed's direction, right, some of the

09:05things like that that are absolutely insane. But Ed Galrine really didn't run much of a campaign.

09:09It was more of what the Republicans would call a Biden campaign where he stuck in the basement, right?

09:12This was just $32 million of pure, absolute bully ball, right, that Trump and AIPAC and those guys

09:19actually did to go after this guy. But I think this is actually a bad thing for the Republican Party

09:23because right now with the polling and what you're seeing with Trump right now, I think we're beyond

09:26political analysis. I think we're now into a diagnosis of tertiary failure with the Republican

09:31Party based on polling and what's happening right now. Lydia, the party at the primaries, of course,

09:36are not the general. Are you worried that this could backfire? Because if you look at Trump's

09:40polling numbers, they don't look good. And each of these people were backed by Trump, although the

09:45party has consistently put in those people who he has put up against the incumbents.

09:52Yeah, look, I mean, the fact that somebody like Massey lost so overwhelmingly would suggest that

09:58Republicans are still very aligned with Trump's agenda. The reason that Cornyn is in this position,

10:03the reason Massey was in this position is they weren't really aligned with the MAGA agenda.

10:08And so to your point earlier, too, of, you know, is Trump going to face headwinds with his agenda now

10:13that people don't want to vote against him? The reason that Massey and Cornyn are in a tough spot in

10:17the

10:17first place is because they weren't voting with Trump's agenda. And that's where Republican voters

10:22want to be seen. Cornyn voted with Trump 99% of the time. Good luck with that.

10:28It's not surprising that somebody who voted to impeach him. It's not surprising.

10:34Because he was against Trump 1% of the time. He is the guy that has got to face the

10:41music when it

10:42comes to Trump. So you can't say that it's not because they were against Trump's agenda. That

10:47just doesn't work. The math, the math doesn't matter. I will say as a matter of like Senate

10:51legislative affairs, if you're sitting in the White House, the Senate Republicans are going to be

10:57less governable now than they were previously. We saw Cassidy's vote on the war powers.

11:03You know, we'll see what happens to Cornyn here. You already had Tillis laying out there and others.

11:08And so, you know, it's a majority. But if you have a few people who are willing to go the

11:13other way

11:13on certain issues, it's harder to get them aligned. The House is still a very narrow majority,

11:19probably still a little more alignable. But right now, the Senate will be a difficult task for the

11:24for the legislative affairs. I do think, though, I mean, it's interesting. Cornyn, if he'd voted for

11:29the Save Act, Paxton in Texas said, oh, I'm going to drop out. So I think we're seeing a surge

11:34in the

11:34base and people who are really motivated to enact Trump's agenda were some of these

11:38older sort of centrist candidates, frankly, haven't followed through in that regard.

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