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/* 2018 campaign */
==2018 campaign==
McDaniel is a candidate in the special election scheduled for November 6, 2018, to fill the twenty-six months remaining in Cochran's term. After Cochran announced that he will, as of April 1, leave his seat for health reasons after more than thirty-nine years in the office, Republican [[Governor]] [[Phil Bryant]] by-passed McDaniel and appointed a former Democrat, [[Cindy Hyde-Smith]], the state agricultural and commerce commissioner, to hold the seat until the special election. In a statement, McDaniel said that he was:
<blockquote>
The establishment should have learned [its] lesson in [[Alabama]]. By spending millions of dollars against conservative [[Mo Brooks]], they ended up losing the seat (with [[Roy Moore]]) to a Democrat ([[Doug Jones]]). Now, they are going to appoint one in Mississippi. Instead of unifying around my candidacy, and beating the Democrats, the establishment is once again going to waste millions of dollars of donors’ money over what should have been a safe Republican seat in Mississippi.<ref name=bryantappointment>{{cite web|url=https://www.conservativereview.com/articles/chris-mcdaniel-slams-mississippi-establishment-appointing-former-democrat-u-s-senate/|title=Chris McDaniel slams Misssissippi establishment for appointing former Democrat to U.S. Senate|publisher=Conservativereview.com|date=March 21, 2018|author=Chris Pandolfo|accessdate=March 22, 2018}}</ref></blockquote>
Some strategists question whether Hyde-Smith's former ties to the Democrats could hurt her chances in a race against McDaniel. The special election will be essentially non-partisan; each party will not be selecting nominees to contest the race. [[U.S. President]] [[Donald Trump]] is said to have no plans to endorse for campaign for has campaigned in Mississippi on behalf of Hyde-Smith. According Polls show Hyde-Smith headed to a December runoff contest with either McDaniel or the popular Democratic nominee, Mike Espy, an African-American [[Politicoliberal]], polling conducted by the National Republican Senatorial Committee shows Hyde-Smith trailing both McDaniel and a prospective Democratic candidateformer member of the [[United States House of Representatives]] who served briefly as [[United States Secretary of Agriculture]] under former U.S. President [[Bill Clinton]].<ref name=bryantappointment/> At the same time as the special election, [[RINO]] Senator [[Roger Wicker]] will be seeking seek reelection to a full term. McDaniel had first announced that he was challenging Wicker but then switched to campaign for the open seatvacated by Cochran.
In addition to Hyde-Smith and McDaniel, a third major senatorial candidate is Mike Espy, an African-American [[liberal]] Democratic former member of the [[United States House of Representatives]] who served briefly as [[United States Secretary of Agriculture]] under President [[Bill Clinton]].
In the campaign, McDaniel accused Hyde-Smith of having voted for [[Hillary Rodham Clinton]] in the 2008 presidential primary against [[Barack Obama]]. At the time Hyde-Smith was a Democrat, but she switched parties in 2010. Hyde-Smith denies having voted for Mrs. Clinton.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.washingtontimes.com/multimedia/image/ap_18079578888270jpg/|title=GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith swears she didn't vote for Hillary Clinton|publisher=''[[Washington Times]]''|date=October 7, 2018}}</ref>
==Personal life==
