Trump tries to save reliable GOP House seat in Ohio

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump dove headfirst into a House special election Saturday evening, aiming to give Ohio Republican Troy Balderson a final push four days before Election Day.

The race in the suddenly competitive 12th District between the state lawmaker and Franklin County Recorder Danny O’Connor, polls say, is now essentially tied. Trump and Republican leaders are eager to keep the seat in GOP hands after the retirement of former Republican Rep. Pat Tiberi earlier this year.

That the president interrupted his 11-day working vacation at his New Jersey golf resort to take his unique bully pulpit to the district shows just how alarmed top Republicans are about the erosion of Balderson’s once-healthy lead. Voters in the district head to the polls Tuesday, and Trump urged rally attendees to help drive up Republican turnout.

The special election’s outcome, in a reliably GOP district in a state Trump won in 2016, is an early test of his influence with voters — and whether there is significant concern about his performance and policies.

“We’re going to have a tremendous victory for Troy,” Trump said Saturday, adding, “he’s the one I wanted to win” a GOP primary there in May over Melanie Leneghan. The president claimed there was a “false report that I was supporting somebody else.”

“He’s my first choice,” Trump said. “He’s really smart. He never stops working. … He’s going to hopefully be here for a long time.”

The president, as he often does at rallies where one GOP candidate is the focus, invited Balderson onstage to address the crowd from behind the podium with the seal of the president.

The candidate told the audience, “I need your vote on Aug. 7 so I can go to Congress and represent you and fight alongside this good man, this great man, President Trump to make America great again,” borrowing Trump’s 2016 campaign slogan. He also touted the health of the economy and made a direct plea to the districts senior citizen voters, saying he and Trump will protect Social Security and Medicare.

He charged O’Connor would “fight against the policies that are turning our country around.”

Minutes earlier, the ever-contrarian president said pundits’ predictions that Democrats will make big gains in November’s midterm elections will turn out to be wrong.

“They’re talking about this blue wave,” Trump said. “I don’t think so.”