Inhofe endorses his own chief-of-staff to replace him in special election

Following his announcement that he would be retiring, thus triggering a special election this year, U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe endorsed his chief-of-staff Luke Holland as his hand-picked successor in office (more on that in a bit).

A Bartlesville native, Holland has served as Inhofe's top aide since 2017. His first introduction to Sen. Inhofe came, apparently, from Jim Inhofe's daughter, who was one of Holland's professors at the University of Arkansas. He first joined Inhofe's staff in 2009.

Inhofe was unable to attend Holland's press conference due to testing positive for COVID-19, but lent his endorsement over the phone at the event.

The special election will run concurrently with the regularly scheduled 2022 election, meaning the primary will be on June 28th and the general in November.

Though running with Inhofe's blessing and endorsement, Holland will have a distinct name-recognition disadvantage, plus the baggage of being, essentially, a career government bureaucrat.

Comments like this one also don't give Inhofe a good look:

Of Holland, Inhofe says: “I am endorsing Luke Holland and believe that he is without question the best qualified to carry this out. … he’s actually run this show for now a long period of time, we’re talking about several years.” pic.twitter.com/fsEr9GSY88

— Chris Polansky (@ChrisKPolansky) February 25, 2022

The U.S. Senate has more than it's fair share of narcissists and entitled individuals with an inflated opinion of themselves and a possessive attitude toward "their" seats and their successors. I fully agree with this comment:

Retiring senators endorsing staffers to replace them as though their seats are their personal property and/or in order to short circuit the primary process is a bad thing and should be discouraged harshly.

— Varad Mehta (@varadmehta) February 25, 2022

2022 will be interesting.