Trump rallies for Moreno during final days of heated Ohio Senate GOP primary

VANDALIA, Ohio — Former President Donald Trump parachuted into the final days of an increasingly vicious Senate GOP contest here to boost his preferred pick: Bernie Moreno.

Tuesday’s primary is a heated three-way brawl between Moreno, Secretary of State Frank LaRose and state Sen. Matt Dolan. Dolan, the scion of a family who owns the Cleveland Guardians baseball team, has been surging in the closing stretch, with recent polls showing the race as a toss-up.

That’s turned the race into a test of the former president’s clout in the state.

While Moreno has the backing of Trump and other MAGA figures, Dolan has the support of the Ohio Republican establishment, picking up endorsements in recent days from Gov. Mike DeWine and former Ohio Sen. Rob Portman.

Trump took aim at Dolan on Saturday, calling him “a weak RINO” who is “trying to become the next Mitt Romney.”

He revived a long-running complaint against Dolan’s family — that they changed the name of the baseball team they own from the Cleveland Indians to the Cleveland Guardians because they are “easily pushed around by the woke left-wing lunatics.” “It’s almost like they’re in charge of a trust fund,” Trump said, mocking the new moniker. He asked the crowd twice to cheer if they wanted to keep the original name.

The rally here near Dayton International Airport brought a who’s who of the MAGA movement to western Ohio: South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio), who himself was boosted by Trump out of a brutal primary in 2022. In his roughly 90-minute speech Saturday afternoon, Trump celebrated clinching the GOP nomination days earlier and besieged the crowd to help him “follow up our historic victory this week” and “add to it with Bernie Moreno.”

Praising the Ohio Senate candidate as a “fantastic guy” and a “hero,” Trump said voters need to elect Moreno to support his second-term priorities, including a crackdown on immigration.

“He’s getting some very tough Democrat fake treatment right now, and we’re not going to stand for it because I know this man. We all know this man. He’s a hero. He’s a winner,” Trump said. “You gotta win, Bernie. Don’t leave me alone. Don’t leave me alone, Bernie.”

The stakes for the GOP are extremely high. Ohio is one of two top states Republicans are looking to flip to retake the Senate. The state has gotten redder, and Trump won twice by wide margins, making Sen. Sherrod Brown among the most vulnerable of the Democratic incumbents. (Brown, the former president said, pretends like he’s Trump’s best friend — but is actually part of the “radical left.”)

But Moreno first has to get through a primary that’s turned into a barroom brawl, with a growing number of nasty attacks on the trail and in ads.

Moreno’s biggest competition is Dolan, who is running as a more traditional conservative and did not seek Trump’s endorsement. Dolan’s late endorsements from Portman and DeWine, along with a flood of ad spending, have fueled concerns among Moreno supporters that a late Dolan surge could push him to victory. (While LaRose remains competitive, he’s seen as less of a threat because he’s sought a MAGA-aligned lane that Moreno has dominated; on Saturday, Trump and other speakers did not even mention LaRose.)

Toward the end of his speech, Trump called Moreno to the stage. Moreno took a veiled shot at Dolan, who in both his previous and current Senate bids has sought to discuss conservative policies while distancing himself from Trump’s personality.

“I want to clear something up for everybody here: I am so sick and tired of Republicans that will say, ‘I support President Trump’s policies, but I don’t like the man,’” Moreno said, turning to point at Trump: “This is a good man. This is a great American.”

Trump has long been considered a kingmaker in GOP primaries, but he drew criticism in 2022 after several of his picks flopped in the general election, blowing key races and a shot at the Senate majority. National Republicans moved this cycle to clear primary paths in other states for candidates they consider the most electable, though the Senate GOP campaign arm has stayed neutral in Ohio.

Now the Ohio Senate race has heated up, and the bloodbath that erupted over the last week has spurred some fears among Republicans that Moreno could again be a candidate who wins a primary before costing the party a general election win.

Dolan, Moreno and LaRose and their allies have turned the race into a circular firing squad with heated debates, snarky tweets and unending attack ads. A report published Thursday by the Associated Press further roiled the race when it reported that Moreno’s old company email had been used in 2008 to create an account seeking “young guys to have fun with” on an adult website typically used to facilitate sexual encounters. Moreno strongly denies creating the account and said an intern did so as a prank. Charles Harder, a lawyer for Moreno, said in a statement that the email address was a public-facing one managed by staff, not Moreno’s personal email.

A super PAC supporting Dolan seized on the story, airing TV and radio ads quoting the article and calling Moreno “creepy” and “damaged goods.”

Democrats, meanwhile, appeared to view Moreno as the weakest candidate to take on Brown. The day before the AP story published, a super PAC tied to Senate Democrats began dumping some $3 million into producing and airing TV ads that boost Moreno.

Moreno has tried to move quickly past the AP report, not mentioning it on the campaign trail as he’s continued with his planned events. When asked by reporters Friday, Moreno dismissed the article as a “sick, last-minute attack by desperate people.”

At Saturday’s rally, Moreno didn’t address any of the attacks that have dominated the final week of the race. During a roughly 15-minute speech punctuated by standing ovations and cheers, he moved quickly through topics that are among Trump’s favorites: deporting all migrants who entered the country illegally, prioritizing U.S. interests over the war in Ukraine and bashing the World Health Organization for its Covid-era postures. His declaration that English is the official language of the nation drew screams of appreciation from the crowd.

Moreno also went directly for Dolan, bashing his support for providing Ukraine aid and for his endorsement by the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

“Is that embarrassing? Could you imagine being endorsed by the Cleveland Plain Dealer? Yikes,” Moreno said. “He says to them, ‘We have to stop being distracted by the problems on our border to fulfill our obligation to Ukraine.’ This flag on my lapel pin says that I have an obligation to America.” His statement elicited cheers of “USA” from the crowd.

Vance, who endorsed Moreno and urged Trump to do the same, pushed voters to support the “America First” candidate. He slammed ads attacking Moreno as “disgraceful.”

“You gotta ask yourself, why are they throwing everything at him in this final few days? Why are they throwing everything at Bernie Moreno?” Vance said. “Because they know he answers to you and not to them. It’s that simple.”

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this report contained a typographical error misidentifying the target of ads aired by a super PAC. Those ads targeted Bernie Moreno.