Kentucky U.S. Senate- Race of the Day

71 Days Until Election Day

Kentucky U.S. Senate

Status: Republican Incumbent

2020 Presidential Result: Red State (South)

Outlook: Likely Republican

In federal elections, Kentucky has become overwhelmingly Republican this century. Democrats still sometimes win the Governorship, such as what happened in 2019, but even that takes a very unpopular incumbent and a divided GOP for them to pull off.

Democrats should be under no illusions that they might knock off Rand Paul this cycle, as they were two years ago about beating his senior colleague Mitch McConnell. Motivation to vote against Paul though, as well as the dislike that even many conservatives have for him, makes it unlikely the incumbent will ever win a massive landslide. It is possible though that he will finish slightly better than McConnell did though

The Ophthalmologist son of a Gynecologist, Senator Paul owes his political career to his father Ron Paul, who served two stints as a Texas Congressman, and acquired a cult following in close to a true sense of the term. The elder Dr. Paul was the 1988 Libertarian nominee for President, before returning to Congress and the Republican Party and running for the GOP Presidential nomination in 2008 and 2012. In those bids, he achieved more support than many anticipated and was a bit of foreshadowing of anti-establishment changes happening within the Republican Party.

In 2010, Rand Paul used his father's national political network and fundraising base to launch a bid for the Senate in his commonwealth of Kentucky. At the height of the Tea Party Movement, Paul easily beat the establishment choice in the primary and despite controversy over his strict libertarian views, prickly personality, and some questionable incidences from his past, beat the Democrat by double digits and was off to Capitol Hill to join his father. Congressman Paul would retire in 2012 after his final Presidential bid. Senator Paul, considered somewhat more mainstream than his father, would endorse the winner of the nomination, Mitt Romney, while his father did not.

In the Senate, Paul took part in filibusters and rankled many of his colleagues. It was widely anticipated he would be one of the 2016 Republican Presidential candidates and his appeal to some young people typically on the left over views on foreign policy and drugs had him appear to be a potentially strong candidate. The Senator's Presidential campaign never lived up to the hype though, as many in the Tea Party gravitated towards Ted Cruz and much of his father's base found themselves oddly and fairly inconsistently attracted to Donald Trump, who was far from a libertarian, but spoke against a political and economic system they distrusted.

Paul feuded with Trump in some early debates but could never recover from the businessman's insults. After a fifth place finish in the Iowa Caucus, Paul ended his Presidential bid and ran for reelection to the Senate. Kentucky Republicans, led informally by McConnell, had changed the law so that a candidate could run for President and Senate at the same time, in order to benefit Paul. The two Kentucky Senators are not very much alike and were at opposite sides when Rand Paul started his political career in the state, but McConnell saw the benefit of making a home-state alliance with him.

After winning a second term by a solid margin, Paul became perhaps Trump's biggest ally in the Senate, and the two men would go on to spend personal time together. The Senator went even further in emulating Trump's online antagonism of foes in both parties and has publicly become seen as Dr. Anthony Fauci's biggest detractor on the issue of the Covid pandemic. Paul became one of the first Senators to contract the virus and put his colleagues at risk by continuing to work out for several days in the Senate gym as he awaited his positive test. Later, the Senator said that since had already had the virus he had no need to get vaccinated. During the January 6 riots on Capitol Hill, video showed a maskless Paul wandering around the Senate chamber amid the confusion. In seeking a third term, Paul took 86 percent of the vote in the May primary, against a field of largely anonymous opponents.

The Democrats' primary to oppose Paul was also a blowout. Charles Booker, a former State Representative took 73 percent against three opponents without political experience. In being elected to the Kentucky House from Louisville in 2018, the one Democrat bastion left in the state, Booker became the youngest African-American ever elected as a Kentucky state legislator. Two years earlier, he had finished in third place in a primary challenge to a longtime incumbent State Senator.

After just one term in the Kentucky House though, Booker set his sights higher and ran for the U.S. Senate in 2020. Many Democrats both nationally and in the state had been supporting former Marine pilot Amy McGrath as the kind of candidate who could strongly challenge McConnell. Booker ran as a more liberal alternative though and had the support of Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. As the primary neared, momentum was on Booker's side, especially in the wake of racial unrest in Louisville after the Breonna Taylor killing. Early voting may have saved McGrath in this circumstance, as she held on to win the primary 45-43. Still, it was a much stronger than expected statewide primary showing for Booker. Perhaps wounded by this battle, McGrath proved to be another easy challenger for the incumbent McConnell to defeat.

As many Republican parties in the states have moved toward the right, it is also true that Democrats in places like Kentucky are moving to the left, as conservative and moderate members who had been a part of the coalition are pushed out. It is unknown whether Booker would have given McConnell a stronger run two years ago than the more moderate McGrath did, but he definitely would not have won.

Now, Booker has benefited from being "next in line" and will get to run against Rand Paul. The challenger is running as an unabashed progressive which will make it difficult to win in a southern state like Kentucky.

Senator Paul still has fans back at home but some of the novelty of him as an outsider politician may have worn off as he seeks a third term. It is also true that a lot of people just do not like him, and Paul seems perfectly fine with that. For now, it is doubtful to see a path beyond the Senate for the once ambitious politician. He is not even mentioned in many lists of potential 2024 Republican Presidential candidates. It will take some huge breaks though to end Rand Paul's Senate career. The heavily favored incumbent was first elected by a 56-44 margin, and then won a second term by a 57-43 victory. I surmise he might be on path to win reelection by something like 58-42.

U.S. Senate races predicted thus far:

7 D (4 Safe, 2 Leans, 1 Tossup)

9 R (5 Safe, 2 Likely, 2 Leans)

Total with predictions thus far:

43 D (36 Holdover, 4 Safe, 2 Leans, 1 Tossup) 

38 R (29 Holdover, 5 Safe. 2 Likely, 2 Leans)