Pompeo has plenty of time to decide whether to run before the official filing deadline in June. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is pushing him hard to jump into the Kansas Senate race, several officials and GOP lawmakers told me, out of fear former Kansas secretary of state Kris Kobach might win the primary and then lose the general election to a Democrat. Pompeo is also mulling a run for president in 2024, and McConnell has argued the Senate would be a perfect perch from which to do that.
Trump said last month that Pompeo came to him and told him he wanted to stay. But Trump also hedged by saying that if there’s any danger the GOP could lose that seat, Pompeo might change his mind and “would win in a landslide because they love him in Kansas.” Pompeo himself, meanwhile, is sending mixed signals. This month he began posting from a new personal Twitter account with Kansas farmland in the banner photo.