Senator John Cornyn is backing off a project to rename a highway in Texas in honor of President Donald Trump after the president backed his primary opponent.
Cornyn lost his primary to Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who Trump endorsed in the race.
During the race, Cornyn was seeking Trump’s nod and pushed for legislation that would rename U.S. Highway 287 to Interstate 47, referencing Trump as the 47th president.
After losing his race, the senator said that the renaming “may not make it into my priorities the next seven months,” according to Mediaite.
Even with Cornyn backing off, a roadway in Texas may still end up with Trump’s name on it. Texas state Representative Jared Patterson is pushing to rename the Dallas North Tollway after the president.
The renaming proposal wasn’t the only lure Cornyn used to try to earn Trump’s favor. The senator also posted a photo of himself reading Trump’s book, The Art of the Deal, on social media.
Paxton ultimately won out, likely at least in part due to his cheerleading of the Save America Act.
After his defeat, Cornyn posted the fable of the scorpion and the frog — in which a frog foolishly trusts a scorpion and both die because it is in the scorpion’s nature to sting — on his X feed.
“The dying frog asks the scorpion why it stung despite knowing the consequence, to which the scorpion replies: ‘I am sorry, but I couldn’t help myself. It’s my character,’” Cornyn wrote.
Cornyn recently told Hearst Newspapers that he plans to be more vocal in the future on issues where he and Trump “differ.”
That pledge is already coming true; on Tuesday, Cornyn joined with fellow Republican senators Bill Cassidy and Lisa Murkowski to oppose Trump’s pick for acting director of national intelligence, Bill Pulte.
“I have yet to see any evidence that he meets that statutory requirement,” Cornyn said of Pulte.
Cornyn’s term is up in January, and he told Hearst Newspapers that he is “looking forward to working in the private sector” following his electoral loss.
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