Senate Minority Whip Thune, close McConnell ally, to run for reelection

Sen. John Thune (S.D.), the No. 2 Senate Republican and a close ally of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), on Saturday announced he will run for reelection in 2022.

In a statement posted to Twitter, Thune said he is "uniquely positioned" to serve South Dakota and be "a strong and effective senator who can deliver the results they expect."

"I look forward to earning the support of all South Dakotans in the 2022 election for Senate," he continued.

Thune's decision, which he had held off announcing after going past his end-of-year timeline, will likely bring a sigh of relief to Senate Republicans, who had grown increasingly alarmed that the 61-year-old senator would retire after 2022.

"I've always promised that I would do the work, even when it was hard, uncomfortable, or unpopular," Thune said in the statement. "That work continues, which is why after careful consideration and prayer, and with the support of my family, I'm asking South Dakotans for the opportunity to continue serving them in the U.S. Senate."

It's also a boost to McConnell, who has seen a number of his closest allies exit the Senate in recent cycles.

McConnell - who will lose two members of his leadership team after 2022 to retirement - publicly urged Thune to run for reelection in a recent interview, warning that stepping down "would be a real setback from the country and our party."

Thune is viewed as a potential successor to McConnell, who will turn 80 in February, and the South Dakota senator acknowledged the potential that he could become GOP leader impacted his thinking on whether to retire.

McConnell has given no public indication that he intends to retire anytime soon, but in addition to Thune, Sens. John Cornyn (Texas), the former GOP whip, and Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) are also viewed as jockeying for the top spot.

With Thune's announcement, Senate Republicans are just waiting to hear from one member - GOP Sen. Ron Johnson (Wis.), who had previously pledged to retire after 2022 but has sounded increasingly likely to run again.

Thune has kept a tight lid on his thinking about his own reelection bid for months, despite routine peppering by reporters about whether he was running again in 2022.

Though GOP senators expressed confidence earlier this year that he would run, Thune set off alarm bells within the caucus when he told a South Dakota publication that his wife was ready for him to call it quits.

Thune joined the House of Representatives in 1997 and, after an initial Senate bid in 2002, sent a lightning bolt through Washington when he defeated then-Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle in 2004 in what was the most expensive race of the cycle.

But over the past year he's also found himself at odds with former President Trump because of the former president's push for GOP lawmakers to try to overturn the results of the 2020 election, which Trump and some of his closest allies have falsely claimed was "rigged" or "stolen."

Thune warned that a long-shot effort to throw out the Electoral College results in Congress would go down like a "shot dog."

The remarks sparked Trump's ire and the former president fired back that Thune was "Mitch's boy." Trump tried to convince South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem (R) to challenge Thune in a primary but she declined and is running for reelection to the state's top office.

While Trump has seemingly moved on from Thune, he's kept up a long-running, largely one-sided, feud with McConnell. Trump is flirting with running again in 2024 and continues to maintain a fierce grip on the party. Even out of office he has caused headaches for Senate GOP leadership by weighing into fights over the infrastructure bill and the debt ceiling.

But despite Trump's previous anger, Thune appears likely to win reelection and has $14,839,846.75 cash on hand in his campaign account as of the last fundraising quarter.

Senate Republicans, who are close allies of the former president, urged Thune to run and not to worry about a Trump-field primary challenge.

"He likes winners and John Thune is a winner," Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) told The New York Times.

Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who chairs the Senate GOP campaign arm, quickly formally endorsed Thune on Saturday, saying in a statement that "South Dakotans are lucky to have a conservative fighter like John Thune working for them in the Senate."

Republicans are defending 20 seats during the 2022 midterm elections, including five open seats where Sens. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), Rob Portman (R-Ohio), Richard Burr (R-N.C.), Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) and Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) are retiring.

But they are feeling increasingly confident about their chances of winning back the Senate, where they only need a net pickup of one seat to get the majority. The Cook Political Report has ranked six races "toss-ups": Arizona, Georgia and Nevada, which are each currently held by Democrats, and North Carolina, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, which are currently held by Republicans.

McConnell, during a recent interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, predicted that Republicans have a "great cycle" with a "good chance of getting the majority back."

"The atmosphere is terrible [for Democrats]," he added. "I have a hard time seeing how they get out of the hole by next November."

Lexi Lonas contributed to this report.

Updated 1:39 p.m.