Tom Cotton was once an unlikely ally of and successor to President Trump. The Arkansas senator was once hailed by leading Never Trumpers as the future of the Republican Party and seen as a defender of the foreign policy Trump mostly campaigned against in the GOP primaries.

Instead, Cotton, 43, has emerged as part of a small populist contingent on Capitol Hill that is close to the Trump White House. No longer just a foreign policy hawk, he has succeeded Jeff Sessions as the Senate’s top immigration hawk. He shares Trump’s views on China. He argued in the New York Times for using the military to suppress rioting that broke out following George Floyd’s death in police custody, triggering a staff revolt and editorial upheaval at the paper.