Rand Paul wins 3rd Senate term in Kentucky

Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, a libertarian-leaning conservative and former presidential candidate, won a third term Tuesday by defeating a rival from the other end of the political spectrum, progressive Democrat Charles Booker.

First elected in the tea party-driven wave of 2010, Paul’s victory extended a long GOP winning streak in Kentucky Senate races. The Bluegrass State hasn’t elected a Democrat to the Senate since Wendell Ford in 1992.

Booker was the first Black Kentuckian to run as the state’s Democratic nominee for the Senate, but his trailblazing campaign came up short against Paul. It was Booker’s second bid for the Senate. In 2020, he barely lost the Democratic Senate primary to an establishment-backed rival routed that year by Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell in the general election.

Paul has gained a national voice in promoting limited government and restraint in U.S. foreign policy. One of the Senate’s most contrarian voices, he also denounced what he views as government overreach in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic.

After a dozen years as senator, Paul has regularly gone his own way, even putting himself at odds with his own party. The outspoken conservative has railed repeatedly against socialism, foreign aid and what he sees as excessive spending that he blames for driving up the nation’s debt.

Paul defied leaders of both parties this spring when he briefly delayed Senate approval of an additional $40 billion to help Ukraine withstand Russia’s invasion. Paul wanted language inserted that would have an inspector general scrutinize the new spending. Paul has voted against federal farm bills — vitally important for Kentucky’s agriculture sector — balking at the cost and its food aid sections.

The two candidates offered starkly different approaches to politics in GOP-trending Kentucky. Nationally, the outcome figured into the count for determining which party would control the Senate for the rest of Democrat Joe Biden’s term as president.

Booker, a former state lawmaker, promoted such social programs as Medicare for All and a basic universal income. He sought broad voter support with his “hood to the holler” campaign plank, vowing to uplift poor urban neighborhoods and struggling rural communities alike. He also backed criminal justice reforms.

In 2020, when he narrowly lost the Democratic Senate primary and a bid to face McConnell, Booker’s racial and economic justice message garnered him attention amid nationwide protests over the deaths of Black Americans in encounters with police.



FILE - U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., speaks at the ground breaking ceremony for the Kentucky Department of Veterans Affairs Bowling Green Veterans Center in Bowling Green, Ky., on Wednesday, Nov. 2, 2022. Paul is bidding for a third term Tuesday, Nov. 8 against a rival from the opposite end of the political spectrum, progressive Democrat Charles Booker. (Grace Ramey/Daily News via AP, File) THE ASSOCIATED PRESS