Thune’s leadership faces challenge as Senate conservatives demand GOP rethink
WASHINGTON, DC: It looks like the Republican Party is facing battles on more than one front as, amid Hegseth’s impeachment challenge, the GOP is dealing with an intraparty push against Senate Majority Leader John Thune.
Two conservative senators have refused to explicitly say whether they support John Thune for another term as Senate GOP leader after the party lost at least seven Senate seats in the midterm elections, while another senator pledged to stage a walkout if his Republican colleagues proceed with leadership elections on Tuesday, November 10.
Conservative Senators decline to back Thune for leadership
Senate conservatives Rick Scott (R-Fla) and Josh Hawley (R-Mo) on Monday, November 9, declined to say whether they would support John Thune (R-SD) for another term as Senate GOP leader.
Scott, who signed a letter calling for Tuesday’s leadership vote to be postponed, said Republicans should first decide what they want to achieve before choosing their leader.
“The first step is, one, what do we want to accomplish? And then anybody, including John Thune, if they want to be [leader], the first thing they have to say is: Do they want to do that?” Scott told Fox News Digital in an interview.
“If that’s not what they want to accomplish, then why would we elect them? If that’s what they want to accomplish, then tell us why they’re the best at it,” Scott said, explaining why he supported calls to delay the leadership election.
Budget Committee chair and others write letter calling for discussion of election failure first
The letter requesting a postponement of the Senate GOP leadership election was spearheaded by Senate Budget Committee Chair Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) and signed by four other senators, including Scott.
The Senators want the party to first have a “robust discussion” of what went wrong in this year’s election and evaluate leadership strategies moving forward.
Johnson told the Washington Examiner on Monday that he would walk out of Tuesday’s leadership meeting in protest if Republican colleagues called for a quick vote to elect the leadership team for the next Congress.
“If you hold the election, I’ll leave the room,” Johnson declared. “I’m not going to participate in elections for leadership tomorrow (Tuesday).”
Hawley, a rising conservative star, also signaled some dissatisfaction with the Republican leadership team on Monday.
He declined to commit to supporting Thune before Tuesday’s meeting of the GOP conference.
“I’m not going to pledge my vote to leadership. I’ll tell you that,” Hawley told a group of reporters.
Josh Hawley to a group of us on GOP’s big losses: “When you abandon pro-lifers, when you abandon the needy, when you abandon the poor, when you abandon working people, the American people might have something to say about that.” Should there be a change in leadership? “I’m not going to pledge my vote to leadership. I’ll tell you that.”
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) November 9, 2026
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), Ted Budd (R-N.C.) and John Kennedy (R-La.) also signed the letter demanding a delay of the leadership election.
“Holding leadership elections without engaging in a robust discussion and evaluation of how those running for leadership intend to lead would be political malpractice. It is certainly not the way leadership elections should be conducted in the world’s greatest deliberative body,” they wrote in a letter Monday to Senate GOP conference Chairman Tom Cotton (R-Ark.).
