The Ohio and Indiana primaries begin a major month of nomination contests that will test the strength of former President Donald Trump’s approval. Although Trump did not support him in the primary election for governor of Ohio, he played a major role in the Senate race to replace retired Republican Sen. Rob Portman. As Democrats and Republicans fight for control of Congress this fall, which will determine whether President Joe Biden can advance on some aspect of his agenda after 2022, nearly half of the most competitive games in the U.S. Senate are likely to be set by the end of this month. In Ohio, a blushing state that Trump has won twice, the former president backed JD Vance, the venture capitalist and author of Hillbilly Elegy, who was a staunch critic of Trump in 2016 but now says his initial assessment of he was wrong.
“It’s good to change your mind. In fact, you have to change your mind when the facts change, and I think that’s the truth of my view of President Trump, “Vance said Monday.
Trump’s support for Vance could boost the author by helping him double his support between a March Fox poll and another in April.
But most of the other leading Republican candidates vying for a seat in the Ohio Senate – including former Treasurer Josh Mandel, businessman Mike Gibbons and former Speaker Jane Timken, who all sought Trump’s approval – have made Vance past. his statements about the former president, claiming to have raised questions about his authenticity as a conservative.
Club for Growth Action, which supported Mandel, considered the issue in the final days of the race – in an effort to take advantage of the fact that approximately a quarter of GOP’s primary voters have not yet decided, according to an April Fox poll. half of those who expressed preferences for candidates said they could change their minds. U.S. Sen. Matt Dolan, the only Republican to call on the Republican Party to run in the 2020 election and reject Trump’s false claims about the results, saw his support increase in this month’s poll, but was not at the top of the package . Trump cited the strength of his approval during a rally in Nebraska last weekend, where he mentioned his chosen Senate candidate in Pennsylvania, the famous surgeon Mehmet Oz and Vance, although he confused Vance’s name – he seems to have confused the author with Mandel, the chief rival of Vance before he recovered. (Oz is in close competition with former hedge fund CEO David McCormick in Pennsylvania, who is holding his primary election on May 17.)
Responding to previous criticism of Vance during a televised rally on the eve of the election, Trump said Vance had “said some negative things about me, but made up for it with spades.”
“I think I can say that he is 1000% with us,” the former president added.
Mandel, for his part, received assistance in the last days of the election campaign from Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who called on Ohio Republicans to pay less attention to approvals and more to the consistency of the Conservative candidate’s results.
As for Democrats, Representative Tim Ryan will win the Senate primary, CNN projects. He consolidated his party’s support in the race against Morgan Harper, a lawyer and former senior adviser at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Ryan will face a tough battle in this state, which Trump won by 8 points in 2020.
Ohio gubernatorial primary
With the heated political debate over disguise, vaccine mandates and pandemic-era public health protocols receding, DeWine seemed poised to meet the challenges of former US envoy Jim Renachi and farmer Joe Bliststone.
The governor, who has built deep ties in Republican circles over many years of public service in Ohio, won national recognition in the early days of the pandemic for his careful handling of the growing Covid-19 cases. But as pandemic restrictions became more polarizing, he became a frequent target of the right and Trump, which seems to have made him vulnerable as he wanted to win a second term as governor.
DeWine has maintained a big lead in recent opinion polls, in part because Renachi and Blystone split the vote against the Republican incumbent as they vowed to protect Ohio residents from what they see as excessive government action. For Democrats, former Cincinnati Mayor John Cranley and former Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley are vying to be nominated in what would be a difficult climb against the Republican nominee in November.
There is a rematch between Democrat Schontel Brown and Nina Turner in Ohio’s 11th Congressional District. Brown won the support of Biden, as well as some moderate outside groups, but Turner, a former Ohio senator who was a key player in Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign, hoped to spur progressives to lead her to victory. in the newly drawn neighborhood, which includes more than Cleveland.
In Indiana, Republican Sen. Todd Young and Democrat Thomas McDermott, Hammond’s mayor, are running for office in Tuesday’s Senate election.
This story has been updated with additional developments.
Paul LeBlanc, Gabby Orr and Ethan Cohen contributed to this report.
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