Tom Rice, one of ten Republican representatives who voted for the impeachment of President Donald Trump following the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021, lost his seat in a primary election held Tuesday evening in South Carolina, Texas, Maine and Nevada.
Posted at 1:52 p.m.
Representative of 7e district of South Carolina in the House of Representatives since January 3, 2013, Mr. Rice collected only 24% of the votes and was beaten by Russell Fry, an elected Republican from this state who received the support of Donald Trump.
Moreover, the candidates supported by the 45e President of the United States had strong primaries on Tuesday night, the most recent counts indicate.
photo courtesy of the united states congress
Tom Rice
According to fivethirtyeight.com, six of the seven candidates for the House of Representatives, the Senate or a governorship supported by Trump would have won their election or were ahead by the end of the evening.
Also in South Carolina, District 1 Representative Nancy Mace, who had drawn the ire of President Trump for criticizing her following the Jan. 6 uprising, won re-election with 53% of the vote. . She defeated candidate Katie Arrington, who had received support from Mr. Trump. But, unlike her colleague Tom, Rice, Nancy Mace did not vote to impeach the president.
What’s next?
Tom Rice is the first of ten Republican representatives in Congress to lose his seat after voting to impeach Trump. But he may not be the only one, says Rafael Jacob, researcher in residence at the Raoul-Dandurand Chair in Strategic and Diplomatic Studies (UQAM).
photo taken from tom rice’s facebook account
Defeated candidate Tom Rice conceded victory to his opponent on Facebook.
Observing that four of these ten elected Republicans are not standing again in the mid-term elections in November, Mr. Jacob indicates: “We do not need to read very far between the lines to understand that what is basis for announcing their retirement is that they were likely to be defeated in the primaries. »
“With nuances, we have the demonstration that Donald Trump remains an extremely strong figure, he continues. He’s not all-powerful, as we saw with the results in Georgia in May when just about every major candidate he backed died. But when you look at the big picture from the start of the primaries several weeks ago, it’s pretty clear that if you’re a Republican elected official or candidate and you dare to challenge Trump, it comes with enormous political risk. »
Wyoming Representative Liz Cheney, who sits on the current Commission of Inquiry into the events of January 6, 2021, will put her seat on the line in the August 2 primaries and analysts say her chances of re-election are slim . The other Republican sitting on the commission of seven elected, Adam Kinzinger (Illinois) is not running again this fall.
Photo Andrew Harnik, Associated Press
Liz Cheney is the current vice chair of the commission examining the events of January 6, 2021 on Capitol Hill.
Remember that in the United States, members of the House of Representatives are up for election every two years. It should also be remembered that Donald Trump was impeached twice at the end of his term as president, but survived the lawsuits brought in the Senate where it takes a two-thirds vote (67 senators) to impeach a president.
Democrats: one less seat
Elsewhere, in a special election held Tuesday in Texas following the resignation of Democratic Representative Filemon Vela, Republican candidate Mayra Flores, daughter of Mexican immigrants, was elected with 51% of the vote.
This gain eats away at the slim majority (220-2009) that the Democrats have in the House of Representatives. According to New York Timesthis victory also illustrates a gain in popularity for the Republicans in the Latin American community.