President Trump’s endorsement has become the single most powerful force in Republican primaries, and the numbers now prove it in black and white.
A fresh report puts his GOP primary success rate at 98 percent across 312 endorsements, with five months still left before the 2026 elections.
A hot streak fades. This looks like dominance no modern president has come close to matching.
USA Today laid out the numbers on June 27, and even with the outlet’s cautionary framing, the primary picture is unmistakable for the Republican Party.
The report treats the endorsement record as one of the defining political forces shaping the 2026 midterm field, not a side note buried inside campaign coverage.
The report relies on Ballotpedia data showing 312 primary endorsements from Trump and a 98 percent success rate across congressional, state legislative, and statewide Republican contests in the 2026 cycle.
Several of those Trump-backed contenders won Republican primaries across multiple states on June 23 alone, giving Trump’s team a fresh batch of races to point to as the midterms come into sharper focus nationally.
One of those wins came from Anthony Constantino, a first-time candidate in New York who beat Assembly member Robert Smullen by roughly 20 points for a seat once held by Rep. Elise Stefanik.
The report included fair caveats. Trump-backed candidates have also taken some losses this year, including gubernatorial primaries in Iowa and Georgia, and some of the June 23 wins involved uncontested incumbents or unusual race dynamics.
Even with those qualifiers, the bottom line holds. When Trump puts his name behind a Republican in a primary, that Republican wins almost every time.
Trump made the point himself after the June 23 contests, posting that he went 16-0 helping elect what he called wonderful American patriots, and adding that the media did not say a word.
The data source behind the report is Ballotpedia, which maintains a running page that lists Donald Trump endorsements across federal, statewide, and state legislative contests.
That matters because the endorsement story is more than a vibes story or a social-media victory lap. The public database lets readers see the contests, the endorsed candidates, and the outcomes behind the headline number.
USA Today used that list for both the 312-primary-endorsement figure and the 98 percent success-rate figure, which is why the database matters beyond a single news cycle.
Critics can argue over general-election strategy, turnout, or whether Trump should involve himself in every down-ballot race. What they cannot easily wave away is the documented primary record itself.
Even skeptical analysts admitted the obvious. Rice University political science professor Mark Jones told the outlet that no modern president’s influence inside his own party has come close to Trump’s.
Jones pointed to both Trump’s willingness to endorse and his success when he does.
The report also described how Trump’s picks reshaped the party by ending or damaging the careers of veteran lawmakers who crossed him, naming Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, Texas Sen. John Cornyn, and Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie.
On the building side, Trump backed former Texas state Sen. Don Huffines for state comptroller, and Huffines won his GOP primary with 57 percent of the vote.
The Constantino race is a clean snapshot of how it works on the ground.
WRGB/CBS6 Albany confirmed that Sticker Mule CEO Anthony Constantino declared victory in the NY-21 Republican primary after defeating Robert Smullen.
That local race became one of the clearest fresh examples inside the broader national endorsement story because it involved a first-time candidate beating a better-known Republican rival.
The local report says the race was for the seat Rep. Elise Stefanik is leaving after more than a decade in Congress, giving Republicans a high-profile open-seat fight in upstate New York with national attention already attached.
CBS6 also noted that Constantino and Smullen had debated at the station’s Niskayuna studio, that Constantino is expected to face Democrat Blake Gendebien in November, and that Smullen said he would still run on the Conservative line.
USA Today supplied the Trump-endorsement context around that race, while CBS6 supplied the local result.
Taken together, it is exactly the sort of primary outcome that explains why Republican candidates still fight for Trump’s blessing.
The November general election is a separate fight, and Republicans still have to win it.
Inside the party, though, the question of who decides Republican primaries has a clear answer right now, and his name is on the ballot data.
What are your thoughts?
