KY: NRSC Setting Up Primary Challenge for Bunning?

KYPolitics reports:

A political bombshell this weekend from several well-placed GOP sources, in Frankfort and Washington: State senate President David Williams met with officials at the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) on Friday to discuss his interest in running for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Jim Bunning. Williams, in town for the National Governor's Association winter meeting, impressed GOP officials, who called his interest "serious."

It's no secret that NRSC chair John Cornyn and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell don't want Bunning to run for reelection, but it is almost unheard of for a campaign committee to actively support another candidate over the incumbent in a primary.

Bunning is unpopular, but not so unpopular within his own party that he would automatically lose to someone like Williams in the GOP primary.

As the folks over at Swing State Project point out, Williams supported a tax increase on alcohol and tobacco, "something that wouldn't go over well with the GOP rank-and-file." Bunning, meanwhile, has pretty good conservative bona fides and might be hard to take down in the primary, much to the dismay of Senate Republicans.