Rick Scott won’t be the next Senate Majority Leader, after coming in third in the first round of votes among Republican members.

But like the president-elect, Rick Scott could be in a position to push the country sharply to the right if Republicans in the U.S. Senate elect him as their leader on Wednesday. Scott, 71, is a relative newcomer to the Senate who lacks leadership experience,

As Republicans prepare to take control of the Senate in January, all eyes are on the three-way contest to replace Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who has held the top GOP post for nearly two decades and is stepping down at the end of the year.

In an interview with POLITICO Magazine, Liam Donovan, a former GOP political operative and lobbyist who’s a close observer of Capitol Hill, laid out the political landmines facing the candidates to be the next Senate majority leader and the sway that Trump holds — or doesn’t hold — in the contest.

In the first seriously contested Senate Republican leadership election in decades, three senators are vying to replace longtime GOP leader Mitch McConnell when he steps down from the post at the begin