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United States Senate Republican Party primaries, 2020
| 2020 Republican Party primary elections |
|---|
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| Battleground primaries |
| U.S. Senate battlegrounds U.S. House battlegrounds State executive battlegrounds |
| Federal primaries |
| U.S. Senate primaries U.S. House primaries |
| State primaries |
| Gubernatorial primaries Attorney General primaries Secretary of State primaries State legislative primaries |
| Primary overviews |
| Republican Party primaries, 2020 Democratic Party primaries, 2020 Top-two battleground primaries, 2020 |
| Primaries by state |
Elections to the U.S. Senate were held on November 3, 2020. A total of 33 of the 100 seats were up for regular election. This page provides an overview of U.S. Senate Republican Party primaries in 2020.
Those elected to the U.S. Senate in the 33 regular elections on November 3, 2020, began their six-year terms on January 3, 2021.
Special elections were also held to fill vacancies that occurred in the 116th Congress, including 2020 special U.S. Senate elections in Arizona for the seat that John McCain (R) won in 2016 and in Georgia for the seat that Johnny Isakson (R) won in 2016.
This page focuses on the U.S. Senate Republican primaries. For more in-depth information about the U.S. Senate Democratic primaries and general elections, see the following pages:
Partisan breakdown
Republicans gained two Senate seats in the 2018 general elections, bringing their majority up to 53. Democrats held 45 seats following the election, and independents who caucused with Democrats held two.
| U.S. Senate Partisan Breakdown | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Party | As of November 5, 2018 | After the 2018 Election | |
| Democratic Party | 47 | 45 | |
| Republican Party | 51 | 53 | |
| Independent | 2 | 2 | |
| Vacancies | 0 | 0 | |
| Total | 100 | 100 | |
Republican primaries
Louisiana is included in the list below even though the state uses a majority-vote system in which all candidates regardless of partisan affiliation are listed on the same first-round ballot.
By date
| 2020 Republican primaries by date | |
|---|---|
| Date | State |
| March 3 | |
| March 10 | |
| March 17 | |
| May 12 | |
| May 19 | |
| June 2 | |
| June 9 | |
| June 23 | |
| June 30 | |
| July 7 | |
| July 14 | |
| August 4 | |
| August 6 | |
| August 11 | |
| August 18 | |
| September 1 | |
| September 8 | |
| September 15 | |
| November 3 | |
By state
Alabama
Republican primary candidatesAlaska
Republican primary candidates- Daniel S. Sullivan (Incumbent) ✔
Arizona
Republican primary candidates- Martha McSally (Incumbent) ✔
- Daniel McCarthy
- Sean Lyons (Write-in)
= candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyArkansas
Republican primary candidatesThis primary was canceled and this candidate advanced:
- Tom Cotton (Incumbent) ✔
Colorado
Republican primary candidates- Cory Gardner (Incumbent) ✔
Delaware
Republican primary candidates = candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyGeorgia
- Regular election - United States Senate election in Georgia, 2020 (June 9 Republican primary)
Republican primary candidates- David Perdue (Incumbent) ✔
Idaho
Republican primary candidates- Jim Risch (Incumbent) ✔
Illinois
Republican primary candidates = candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyIowa
Republican primary candidates- Joni Ernst (Incumbent) ✔
Kansas
Republican primary candidates- Lance Berland
- John Berman
- Derek Ellis
- Bob Hamilton
- Kris Kobach
- Dave Lindstrom
- Roger Marshall ✔
- Brian Matlock
- John Miller
- Steve Roberts
- Gabriel Mark Robles
= candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyKentucky
Republican primary candidates- Mitch McConnell (Incumbent) ✔
- Nicholas Alsager
- Paul John Frangedakis
- Louis Grider
- Naren James
- Kenneth Lowndes
- C. Wesley Morgan
= candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyLouisiana[1]
Primary candidates- Bill Cassidy (Incumbent) (Republican Party) ✔
- Beryl Billiot (Independent)
- John Paul Bourgeois (Independent)
- Reno Jean Daret III (Independent)
- Derrick Edwards (Democratic Party)
- Xan John (Independent)
- David Drew Knight (Democratic Party)
- M.V. Mendoza (Independent)
- Dustin Murphy (Republican Party)
- Jamar Myers-Montgomery (Independent)
- Adrian Perkins (Democratic Party)
- Antoine Pierce (Democratic Party)
- Melinda Mary Price (Independent)
- Aaron Sigler (Libertarian Party)
- Peter Wenstrup (Democratic Party)
= candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyMaine
Republican primary candidates- Susan Collins (Incumbent) ✔
Massachusetts
Republican primary candidates = candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyMichigan
Republican primary candidates = candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyMinnesota
Republican primary candidatesMississippi
Republican primary candidates- Cindy Hyde-Smith (Incumbent) ✔
Montana
Republican primary candidates- Steve Daines (Incumbent) ✔
- John B. Driscoll
- Daniel Larson
= candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyNebraska
Republican primary candidates- Ben Sasse (Incumbent) ✔
- Matt Innis
New Hampshire
Republican primary candidatesNew Jersey
Republican primary candidates = candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyNew Mexico
Republican primary candidates = candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyNorth Carolina
Republican primary candidates- Thom Tillis (Incumbent) ✔
- Larry Holmquist
- Sharon Hudson
- Paul Wright
= candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyOklahoma
Republican primary candidates- Jim Inhofe (Incumbent) ✔
- Neil Mavis
- JJ Stitt
- John Tompkins
= candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyOregon
Republican primary candidates = candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyRhode Island
Republican primary candidates
South Carolina
Republican primary candidates- Lindsey Graham (Incumbent) ✔
- Duke Buckner
- Michael LaPierre
- Joe Reynolds
= candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveySouth Dakota
Republican primary candidates- Mike Rounds (Incumbent) ✔
- Scyller Borglum
Tennessee
Republican primary candidates- Clifford Adkins
- Natisha Brooks
- Byron Bush
- Roy Cope
- Terry Dicus
- Tom Emerson Jr.
- George Flinn Jr.
- Bill Hagerty ✔
- Jon Henry
- Kent Morrell
- Glen Neal
- John Osborne
- Aaron Pettigrew
- David Schuster
- Manny Sethi
= candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyTexas
Republican primary candidates = candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyVirginia
Republican primary candidates = candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyWest Virginia
Republican primary candidates- Shelley Moore Capito (Incumbent) ✔
- Larry Butcher
- Allen Whitt
= candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveyWyoming
Republican primary candidates- R. Mark Armstrong
- Devon Cade
- John Holtz
- Michael Kemler
- Cynthia Lummis ✔
- Bryan Miller
- Donna Rice
- Star Roselli
- Robert Short
- Joshua Wheeler
= candidate completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection surveySeats up for election
Twelve seats held by Democrats and 23 seats held by Republicans were up for election in 2020, including the Arizona special election and the Georgia special election. In 2014, the Republican Party picked up nine seats, resulting in their having more seats to defend in 2020. The map below shows what seats were up for election and the incumbent heading into the election in each race.
Presidential election data
- Democrats were defending 2 seats in states won by Donald Trump (R) in the 2016 presidential election: Alabama (held by Doug Jones) and Michigan (held by Gary Peters). Trump won Alabama by 28 points and Michigan by less than 1 percentage point.
- Republicans were defending 2 seats in states won by Hillary Clinton (D) in the 2016 presidential election: Colorado (held by Cory Gardner) and Maine (held by Susan Collins). Clinton won Colorado by 5 points and Maine by 3 points.
In 2018, Senate seats were up for election in 10 states with a Democratic incumbent that Trump won and one state with a Republican incumbent that Clinton won. Click here for more details.
Outside ratings
The following table compared U.S. Senate race ratings from The Cook Political Report, Sabato's Crystal Ball, and Inside Elections prior to the November 2020 elections.
Special elections
Special elections to United States Senate are often required in the event of vacancies. This table lists special Senate elections from 2019 to 2020.
| Results of special elections to the 116th Congress (Senate) | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Race | Election date | Incumbent | Winner | Election MOV | Previous election MOV | 2016 Presidential election MOV |
| U.S. Senate in Arizona | November 3, 2020 | Martha McSally[2] |
 Mark Kelly |
D+3 | D+2 | R+4 |
| U.S. Senate in Georgia | January 5, 2021 (runoff) | Kelly Loeffler[3] |
Raphael Warnock |
D+2.1 | R+14 | R+5 |
See also
- United States Congress elections, 2020
- United States Senate elections, 2020
- United States Senate Democratic Party primaries, 2020
- United States Senate Democratic Party primaries, 2018
- United States Senate Republican Party primaries, 2018
- United States House of Representatives elections, 2020
- United States House Democratic Party primaries, 2020
- United States House Republican Party primaries, 2020
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Louisiana is included here even though the state uses a majority-vote system in which all candidates regardless of partisan affiliation are listed on the same first-round ballot.
- ↑ In December 2018, McSally was appointed to fill the Senate seat previously held by John McCain (R), who passed away in August 2018. Jon Kyl (R) was first appointed to the seat and held it from September 2018 to December 2018. The 2020 special election decided who would serve out the rest of the six-year term McCain was elected to in 2016.
- ↑ Isakson announced his resignation effective December 31, 2019. The 2020 special election decided who would serve out the rest of the six-year term Isakson was elected to in 2016.
