Trump backs GOP's JD Vance in US Senate primary in Ohio
COLUMBUS, OHIO >> Former President Donald Trump is endorsing “Hillbilly Elegy” author J.D. Vance in Ohio's competitive Republican Senate primary, ending months of jockeying in a race where his backing could be pivotal.
In a statement, Trump described Vance as “the candidate most qualified and ready to win in November.”
“We cannot play games.
It is all about winning!” he wrote.
The decision is a major blow for Vance's top rivals — former state treasurer Josh Mandel, investment banker Mike Gibbons and former Ohio Republican Party chair Jane Timken — who have been locked in a heated and contentious race for both the nomination and Trump's backing in a primary that is now less than three weeks away.
On Thursday night, dozens of Republican leaders in Ohio mounted a last-minute effort to urge Trump not to endorse Vance following a news report that said Trump had made a decision and was planning to go with Vance.
While Gibbons and Mandel had been leading in recent polls, officials backing various candidates had long conceded that Trump's coveted support would likely push his pick to the front of the pack in a race that has revolved, to a large extent, around him.
In addition to trips down to Mar-a-Lago, the candidates and their affiliated super PACs have spent millions trying to present themselves as Trump's favored option and paint one another as insufficiently loyal to the former president, who remains deeply popular with the GOP base, despite being impeached twice, and won the state in both 2016 and 2020.
But Vance, in particular, has also come under fire for old audio and since-deleted tweets in which he called himself a “never-Trump guy,” called Trump an idiot, and said he might have to hold his nose and vote for Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016.
Vance has since changed his tune, saying he regrets his past comments. In the race, he has closely aligned himself with the former president, making frequent appearances on Fox News and former Trump strategist Steve Bannon's podcast, where he has echoed Trump's rhetoric on issues including immigration.
Trump, in his statement, acknowledged that Vance “may have said some not so great things about me in the past.” But he said that Vance, with whom he has been in frequent touch, “gets it now, and I have seen that in spades.”