Texas Republican Rep. Michael McCaul faces pressure to run for Sen. Ted Cruz’s seat in 2018, according to The Hill.
McCaul currently serves as chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security. His allowed term as chairman would be over by 2018, according to The Hill.
“Congressman McCaul is focused on winning reelection to the House this November and continuing his work protecting the United States as the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee,” McCaul spokesman Walter Zaykowski said in an official press release.
“He is also very focused on preserving the Republican majorities in Congress and winning the White House.”
CNN reports that GOP donors and Texas politicians started urging McCaul to consider running against Cruz after Cruz’s speech at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio.
Texas fundraiser George Seay told CNN, “Mike is very well-networked within the donor class, he knows an awful lot of people.”
Cruz fundraising teams are preparing for a $20 million race for the Senate, according to a Cruz adviser. There is no polling in Texas after the firebrand senator’s decision to not endorse Republican nominee Donald Trump in July, but the Cruz team is gearing up for a primary challenger.
A CNN national poll taken last month revealed only 33 percent of nationwide Republicans supported Cruz, immediately down from 60 percent in the week before the RNC.
McCaul has a firm hold on his seat, earning over 60 percent every year since 2004.
Cruz overcame an initial 6 percent polling position to win the nomination against David Dewhurst in 2012. Cruz lost the primary 44.6 to 34.2 percent, but because Dewhurst failed to win 50 percent, the race went to a runoff election that gave the nod to Cruz: 56.8 percent of the vote.
There were nine Republican contenders in the 2012 primary, which combined to earn over 22 percent of the 1.4 million voters in the race; that led to Cruz’s push for a runoff election.
Democrats plan to field Rep. Joaquin Castro of Texas to run in the general election, but a Democrat hasn’t won a statewide election in Texas in decades.
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