‘Daniel embarrassed Trump’: Potential US Senate competitors take swipes at Cameron
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Mitch McConnell won’t run again in 2026
Longtime Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell will not seek reelection next year, he announced Thursday, ending a decades-long run as one of the most powerful Republicans in the country. McConnell, first elected in 1984, is the longest-serving Senate party leader in U.S. history.
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It didn’t take long for the newly intensified race for a Kentucky U.S. Senate seat to get chippy.
Republican Congressman Andy Barr and Kentucky businessman Nate Morris both took early swipes at former attorney general Daniel Cameron’s campaign for the U.S. Senate.
Cameron’s announcement — and the subsequent jabs at it — came in the immediate aftermath of U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell’s Thursday speech saying he would not seek reelection in 2026.
Neither Barr nor Morris have said they’re running for the seat, but they’ve both strongly hinted at it.
A Barr spokesperson said that Cameron “embarrassed” Republican President Donald Trump with his 2023 gubernatorial election loss to Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear; Cameron scored the president’s endorsement about a year before the GOP primary contest was decided decisively in his favor.
Spokesperson Tyler Staker compared Cameron’s loss to Beshear to Barr’s victory, where he brought Trump into the state to rally for him, over Amy McGrath in a closely-watched race.
“When President Trump and Andy Barr teamed up in his 2018 election, they won Kentucky’s toughest Congressional race against Amy McGrath and the Trump resistance,” Staker said.
“When President Trump endorsed Daniel Cameron for Governor, Daniel embarrassed the President and our party by losing in a state that President Trump won by over 30 points — including losing Andy Barr’s district by 19 points.”
The statement was titled “Barr Campaign Responds to Failed Candidate Daniel Cameron Jumping in Senate Race.”
Though chatter in Washington and Frankfort around who might step up in 2026 has been high in recent years, public discussion on the matter increased when reports surfaced earlier this month that Barr was considering a run.
Brandon Moody, a Cameron campaign strategist, shot back with a statement casting Barr, who was first elected to represent his Central Kentucky-based district in 2012, as a Washington insider.
“Daniel Cameron is up 30 points on Andy Barr in the latest statewide public polling,” Moody said. “So Andy is a little confused about electability. Probably too much wine last night from his hundredth lobbyist dinner of the month.”
Morris, who has been touring the state and making strong pro-Trump statements on social media of late, has also hinted at running for either Senate or governor.
The entrepreneur, who founded the waste-focused software company Rubicon, cast Cameron and Barr as McConnell’s “puppets” in a video posted to social media site X.
“The candidates that are looking at this race, Andy Barr and Daniel Cameron, have refused to call out Mitch McConnell for the sabotage of President Trump’s agenda,” Morris said. “We cannot have a Mitch McConnell Puppet filling his seat.
“This is a seat that belongs to the people, and we need to send someone to Washington who’s going to fight with president Trump.”
The Trump factor could prove momentous in the race to replace McConnell, who has further upset Trump loyalists with his votes against cabinet members like Tulsi Gabbard, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Pete Hegseth.
Phillip Wheeler, a Republican state Senator from Pikeville whose district supported Trump by a more than 65-point margin, said that the president’s support — if he gives it — is the key.
“My advice to any of them would be to find the quickest path to Donald J Trump,” Wheeler said.
“If you get a video of Donald Trump saying that ‘I’m for Andy Barr for Senate’ or ‘I’m for Daniel Cameron for Senate,’ clearly that’s going to move a lot of folks if you have the money to get that message out there.”
This story was originally published February 21, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
