
Senate leadership shakeup looms for Republicans
Term limits — and the midterm campaign — could scramble the GOP leadership ladder after November.
Sen. John Thune passed on a run for the No. 2 GOP leadership job in 2012. He’s unlikely to do so again this fall.
With Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) term-limited out, the South Dakota senator has all but locked up the whip job ahead of the biggest Senate Republican leadership shakeup in years, according to senators and aides.
Thune has run the GOP’s messaging arm for six years now, cut a $2 million check to the Senate GOP’s campaign committee in 2016 and has developed a record as a bipartisan deal-cutter on the Senate Commerce Committee, which would serve him well in running the Senate floor.
Thune has not officially launched his bid — doing so seven months before ...