Trump Shivs Sen. Bill Cassidy
Bulwark Takes
The Bulwark
4.7 • 1.2K Ratings
🗓️ 21 January 2026
⏱️ 15 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
JVL, Sam Stein, and Joe Perticone give their takes on how Trump abruptly endorsed a primary challenger to Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy. Even after Cassidy bent over backward to confirm RFK Jr., Trump still decided it was time to end him.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, everyone. I'm JVL here with my bulwark colleague, Sam Stein and Joe Perticoan. |
| 0:05.3 | And over the weekend, big news for the leopards. |
| 0:08.5 | They found some more faces to eat. |
| 0:11.7 | We got word from the White House that the present of the U.S. United States was eager to endorse a primary challenger to Senator Bill Cassidy. |
| 0:21.8 | And you say run, Julia, run. |
| 0:25.1 | And then today we get word that Representative Julia Letlow has announced that she is challenging Senator Bill Cassidy, who's running for his third term down in Louisiana. |
| 0:36.7 | Because I guess sacrificing yourself and voting |
| 0:40.4 | for RFK to become HHS secretary and humiliating yourself. That wasn't enough. It didn't work. |
| 0:48.5 | Sam, before we go to Joe, I know we're supposed to feel bad about this. |
| 0:56.0 | And we're supposed to feel, because Bill Cassidy did vote for impeachment, can't take that away from him. |
| 1:00.8 | He is one of the more responsible people. |
| 1:03.5 | He spoke very sternly to Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., and extracted some very important concessions from him, |
| 1:13.0 | which he waved his piece of paper. |
| 1:15.2 | You know, we will have vaccines in our time. |
| 1:23.1 | And, you know, like, he's probably better than your median MAGA senator would be. |
| 1:29.3 | And yet I can't feel anything except for contempt for him. |
| 1:31.8 | And I'm kind of openly moving for the Magas. |
| 1:33.1 | Tell me I'm wrong. |
| 1:35.4 | Well, I don't think you're wrong. |
| 1:40.6 | I think your motivation is maybe a little bit harsher than mine. |
| 1:44.0 | But I think your analysis is very astute. I feel like I come out of this |
| 1:46.4 | thinking that Bill Cassidy had contempt for his own voters in a variety of ways, right? One was |
... |
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