Did Ted Cruz convince Trump to stay neutral in race between Kobach and Marshall?
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz may have persuaded President Donald Trump to withhold an endorsement of Rep. Roger Marshall in the crucial race for Kansas’ open Senate seat.
While Trump has not closed the door to a last-minute endorsement, a source close to the president said not to expect one.
CNN first reported Thursday that Trump said on a Wednesday Air Force One flight he did not plan to endorse in the primary race to fill retiring GOP Sen. Pat Roberts’ seat. Cruz reminded him that Marshall backed then-Ohio Gov. John Kasich in the 2016 GOP primary for president, the report said.
A Cruz aide said Thursday evening that the senator does not comment on private conversations with the president.
However, two Republican sources familiar with the conversation confirmed the anecdote to The Star.
One source said that Trump’s political team has been pushing him to endorse Marshall, the congressman who represents western Kansas. They cite internal National Republican Senatorial Committee polling that shows 29 percent of GOP primary voters would jump to likely Democratic nominee Barbara Bollier in the general election if former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach wins the primary
Bollier, a former Republican who has served in the Kansas Legislature since 2010, left the party after endorsing Democrat Laura Kelly over Kobach in the 2018 gubernatorial election, which Kelly won.
National Republican groups believe Marshall is the party’s best option to hold the seat in November.
Kasich, one of Trump’s fiercest Republican critics, will be speaking on behalf of Trump’s general election opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden, at next month’s Democratic National Convention.
Cruz competed against both Kasich and Trump in the 2016 primary race, but has since become an ally of the president.
Cruz is advised by the same political consulting firm, Kansas City-based Axiom Strategies, as Bob Hamilton, a self-funding candidate who is running against Kobach and Marshall in the primary.
The second source confirmed Cruz steered Trump away from Marshall, but said he was not trying to push the president toward backing either Hamilton or Kobach.
“Just not Marshall,” the source said.
Marshall’s 2016 opponent, then-Rep. Tim Huelskamp, was the only member of the Kansas delegation to back Cruz in the 2016 Kansas caucus. Kobach was the only statewide official to support Trump.
Marshall and Kobach have both said they’ve spoken to the president throughout the campaign and the candidates have been overt in associating themselves with Trump in their campaign commercials.
Trump’s last-minute endorsement of Kobach in the historically close 2018 primary for governor elevated him over Gov. Jeff Colyer.
This story was originally published July 30, 2020 at 7:00 PM.
