Mike Pompeo has been Secretary of State for less than a year, but in the Trump administration, it’s never too early to start planning your exit strategy. According to Politico, Pompeo was scheduled to meet Sunday afternoon with veteran Republican strategist Ward Baker to discuss running for an open Senate seat in Kansas in 2020. Whether the meeting actually took place has not yet been reported, but Politico cited “two people familiar with the plans” as suggesting that Pompeo is, at the very least, interested. Majority leader Mitch McConnell is said to be spearheading the effort.

Depending on how soon he would have to step down in order to run, Pompeo’s resignation could be a major political headache for Trump. The State Department was already rocked by Trump’s unceremonious ouster of Rex Tillerson last year. Since then, the president has found a more steadfast ally in Pompeo; finding a replacement would likely be a long slog, and one that would give Democrats in the Senate yet another opportunity to rake a Cabinet nominee over the coals.

But Senate Republicans have their own problems to worry about. Ordinarily, the G.O.P. might not be sweating the retirement of Senator Pat Roberts, who will be vacating his Kansas Senate seat in 2020 after 23 years. But last November, Democrats proved that even deep-red Kansas is vulnerable to the blue wave, when Democrat Laura Kelly won the governorship over Trump ally Kris Kobach by 4.5 points. A big gun like Pompeo would give McConnell a better chance at holding onto his majority in 2020—and ensuring that a less-electable candidate runs away with the primary.

Pompeo, who formerly represented Kansas’s 4th District, is reportedly in no rush to make a decision. Other Kansas Republicans eyeing Roberts’ seat have indicated they would not run if Pompeo were to enter the race. But one must imagine that his employees at State, already irked at his flouting of diplomatic norms and unquestioning support of Trump, hope he makes the leap: as my colleague Abigail Tracy recently reported, his request that State employees work without pay during the shutdown has further alienated them. “I was really giving him the benefit of the doubt,” a person at the State Department told Tracy. “But someone’s true colors begin to show when times are tough.”

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