(CNN) The new Republican nominee for a US Senate seat in Virginia has already caused a great divide within his party in Washington.

Fewer than 24 hours after Corey Stewart's win Tuesday night, President Donald Trump took to Twitter to endorse his former Virginia campaign chair.

But congressional Republicans are cool to the campaign of the man who has embraced the commonwealth's Confederate past.

"Well look, we have a big map. Right now we are focused on Florida, North Dakota, Missouri, Indiana. Big map. I don't see Virginia in it," Sen. Cory Gardner, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the campaign arm for Senate Republicans.

Stewart has been campaigning non-stop in Virginia for more than two years. Within days of his narrow primary loss for governor in 2017 to former Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie, Stewart announced plans to challenge incumbent Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine. Over the course of those two years, Stewart passionately argued against the removal of Confederate monuments throughout Virginia and defended the actions of some involved in the Charlottesville white supremacist rally that ended in violence.

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