Battle of primaries to test Trump hold on Republicans
Fate of ex-president’s preferred candidates will reflect his chances of another White House run
A series of bruising May primary contests will test former United States president Donald Trump’s grip on the Republican Party as voters weigh his preferred candidates ahead of November’s midterm elections, starting yesterday in Ohio.
A dozen states were holding nominating contests, with a particularly brutal battle playing out on the Republican side among hardline right-wingers adopting the Trump’s scorched-earth campaign style.
Trump has made endorsements in most of the contests, making them a litmus test of his influence 18 months after being defeated by President Joe Biden, and of his prospects for another run at the White House in 2024.
Across the key battlegrounds of Ohio, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Alabama, nearly four in 10 Republican 2022 Senate primary adverts mentioned Trump, according to an AdImpact analysis provided to Punchbowl News.
“The results of the primaries will test whether the Republican base is still the Trump base,” Alexander Heffner, host of PBS’s long-running The Open Mind and co-author of the forthcoming A Documentary History of the United States, said.
“If Trump-endorsed candidates do not perform favourably, the trajectory to the 2024 presidential nomination will appear different, with the potential for independent wings of the party to re-emerge.”
In Ohio, the former reality TV star picked bestselling author and venture capitalist J.D. Vance as he bids to be a Senate candidate in one of the most-watched races.
Vance, whose 2016 memoir Hillbilly Elegy became an Oscarnominated Netflix movie, was plucked out by Trump over more popular rivals in a wide-open primary to replace retiring Republican Senator Rob Portman.
Trump could not get Vance’s name right at a rally in Nebraska on Sunday.
“We’ve endorsed J.P., right? J.D. Mandel,” Trump said during the rally, confusing Vance with one of his competitors, Josh Mandel.
The former president’s backing has nevertheless proved a huge boon for Vance, who once called his new patron “America’s Hitler” but moved from obscurity in the race to a five-point lead after successfully courting Trump’s endorsement.
While Ohio is on course to reaffirm Trump’s role as Republican kingmaker, the 75-year-old has also banked much of his political capital in contests that hint at the limits of his post-presidential clout.
On May 17 the primary season takes in the crucial battleground state of Pennsylvania, which has generated headlines with a Trump-backed celebrity Senate candidate of its own.
Trump’s support for Mehmet Oz – known to his legion of fans on The Oprah Winfrey Show as Dr Oz – seems to have helped the TV surgeon leapfrog his closest rival, former Treasury official David McCormick.
But while Oz has built a small lead, the polling did not show him clearing the field with a Vancesized bounce.
The stakes are high in Georgia in November, a state which voted Democrat last time around but could change the balance of power in the Senate if it swings back Republican.
Trump has repeatedly berated Republican Governor Brian Kemp for certifying the 2020 results, which the governor was required to do by law after Biden’s victory in the former Republican stronghold.
In a direct appeal to Trump followers who continue wrongly to question the validity of the election, Trump-backed former senator David Perdue has made false claims about fraud a centrepiece of his campaign.
Yet Perdue’s fortunes are markedly worse since Trump’s endorsement, with the gap behind Kemp widening from seven points to a massive 25.
The clearest threat to Trump’s kingmaker status has come in Alabama, where he enthusiastically backed Congressman Mo Brooks, a prominent speaker during the January 2021 Washington rally where Trump fired up the mob that stormed the Capitol, for the Senate.
Trump revoked that endorsement in an embarrassing aboutface last month, however, with Brooks trailing badly. Brooks has since turned on Trump, claiming that the former president asked him to illegally “rescind” the results of the 2020 election and help remove Biden from office.
The results of the primaries will test whether the Republican base is still the Trump base ALEXANDER HEFFNER, TV HOST AND AUTHOR