Ben Sasse Defeats GOP Primary Challenger by 50 Points By John McCormack
The freshman senator from Nebraska cruised to victory despite his sometimes-uneasy relationships with both President Trump’s supporters and opponents.
Incumbent freshman Ben Sasse coasted to victory in Tuesday’s Nebraska GOP Senate primary with 75 percent of the vote.
Sasse had faced a challenge from Matt Innis, a businessman who argued he’d been insufficiently supportive of President Trump in the Senate. Sasse angered some Trump loyalists because he cast his presidential ballot for Mike Pence in November 2016 and has been more willing to criticize Trump than many of his GOP colleagues on a wide range of matters, from the president’s character and the Ukraine scandal to trade policy.
At the same time, Sasse’s record over the last few years has left some staunch Trump critics disappointed. He voted to uphold the president’s declaration of a national emergency to divert funding toward the construction of a border wall in March 2016, and he came to the conclusion that the president’s behavior in the Ukraine scandal was bad but didn’t merit removal from office. His criticism of the president also became quieter last year as he geared up for the primary, a development that helped earn him Trump’s endorsement and scorn from Michigan congressman Justin Amash, who left the Republican Party over his opposition to Trump:
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