Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)
President Donald Trump stumped for an Ohio Republican running in a House special election.
Trump uses pull to help GOP effort to keep seat
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump dived into a House special election Saturday evening, aiming to give Ohio Republican Troy Balderson a final push four days before Election Day.
Polls indicate that the race in the suddenly competitive 12th District between the state lawmaker and Franklin County Recorder Danny O’Connor 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.
The president interrupted his 11-day working vacation at his New Jersey golf resort to take his bully pulpit to the district.
“We’re going to have a tremendous victory for Troy,” Trump said Saturday, adding, “he’s the one I wanted to win” the GOP primary in May over Melanie Leneghan.
“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 district’s senior citizen voters, saying he and Trump will protect Social Security and Medicare.
He said O’Connor would “fight against the policies that are turning our country around.”
The rally was something of a show of GOP force, trying to demonstrate to voters that Balderson has the support of the party’s top figures. Television cameras spotted Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, the founding chairman of the conservative House Freedom Caucus and a candidate to lead the party’s GOP caucus in the next Congress, shaking hands with rallygoers before Trump finally made his away onstage after a half-hour delay.