Americana

The mad scramble in Ohio to become Trump’s favorite Republican

THE SCENE

The story had been passed around for weeks, from Republican to Republican and reporter to reporter. On Feb. 22, LibsOfTikTok shared it with 2.9 million followers: “Bernie Moreno, a GOP Senate hopeful in Ohio, allegedly caught in AdultFriendFinder leak.”

That post, with a link to a 2008 profile seeking “young guys to have fun with while traveling,” was deleted within minutes. It took until Thursday night, 48 hours before Donald Trump arrived in Dayton to campaign for Moreno, for the story to get published — an Associated Press investigation that confirmed the profile’s existence, with an old Moreno intern saying he created it as a “prank.”

Trump, about to go on trial over hush money payments to an adult film actress after previously being found liable for sexual abuse in a separate case, did not seem too concerned about a casual hookup site from the aughties. His spokesman Steven Cheung called it “a slime job” that proved Moreno was “a threat to the entire swamp.” Moreno agreed: “Look at what they did to Judge Kavanuagh, look at what they did to President Trump.”

The former president’s response might matter more than anything Moreno says in his defense ahead of Tuesday’s primary vote. The story was just the latest beat in a smashmouth three-way campaign that’s largely revolved around Trump, just as so many primaries in the state have this year. The race between Secretary of State Frank LaRose, state Sen. Matt Dolan, and car dealer-turned-candidate Moreno has rippled with negativity, and accusations of dishonesty. Moreno, who Trump endorsed in December, accused his rivals of representing the “Liz Cheney, Mitt Romney wing of the party,” while they called him a phony who’d gone MAGA to get elected.

“This man can’t be trusted — he’s constantly shifting his views,” LaRose said last week, in their final televised debate.

“I didn’t have to delete my history about President Trump,” said Dolan, referring to pre-campaign tweets that showed Moreno criticizing Trump and blaming him for the Jan. 6 riot.

Democrats, eager to re-elect Sen. Sherrod Brown in a state where Republicans hold every other statewide office, have been pulling for Moreno. Their Duty and Country super PAC bought a last-minute ad on Thursday to boost the candidate (“too conservative for Ohio”) by highlighting his Trump support.

Moreno had girded for the attacks with a well-tested strategy — binding himself to Trump. He’d promised to work hand-in-glove with the former president to end aid to Ukraine and deport every migrant in the country illegally. At his final debate with LaRose and Dolan, Moreno claimed that the “same forces that for the last 14 or 15 or 16 months have tried to cancel the America First movement” were arrayed against him. Attacks from Trump’s enemies, he said, could not be trusted.

“He’s a good man, and we need more people to say that loudly and clearly,” Moreno said. “We’re so lucky to have a man like that, who’s so strong, who’s willing to fight for this country. It’s an inspiration to me.”

DAVID’S VIEW

Most competitive Trump-era Republican primaries have become about Trump, a departure from the previous gauntlet of ever-changing issue tests put forward by various conservative interest groups.

That ended some Republican careers in this month’s North Carolina and Texas primaries, and it’s driving this coming Tuesday’s races in Ohio. In Toledo, a front-runner for a winnable seat spun off course after he was taped criticizing Trump; in Appalachia, the candidates for a now-safe House seat call themselves “just like President Trump.”

But Trump himself has been most involved in the Senate race. Moreno, like Sen. J.D. Vance, is a former MAGA critic with the zeal of a convert. He dropped out of the crowded 2022 race after Trump endorsed Vance, and after he met personally with the former president about how to consolidate the vote. For this race, he tapped Trump allies like Kellyanne Conway and Andy Surabian to advise him. His daughter Emily married Rep. Max Miller, a former Trump aide, at Trump National Golf Club Bedminster.

Years earlier, Moreno had been publicly critical of Trump. He’d recanted, but the record was so public that both Dolan and LaRose used it to build the case that Moreno would say anything to win. Moreno’s response was simple: Trump had endorsed him. Pro-Trump validators assured voters that Moreno was one of them.

“It matters who wins this primary, because Donald Trump is a rock star in Ohio,” South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem said at a Moreno campaign stop this week. “You’ve gotta elect Bernie, because Donald Trump wants Bernie, and Donald Trump is going to make sure that Bernie wins this Senate race.”

Down the ballot, in Ohio, support for and from Trump is a defining issue in every Republican race. In the 2nd district, where Rep. Brad Wenstrup is retiring, one candidate’s campaign is built around his amicus brief in the Colorado ballot access case: “Larry Kidd went all the way to the Supreme Court to protect President Trump.” His rivals compare themselves to the former president, calling themselves “Trump conservatives” who can carry on his policies because they, too, are outsiders.

The Trump brand means something else — that you cannot trust bad things you hear about this candidate. Moreno is walking a well-trod path here, citing Trump as his character witness when he’s accused of flip-flopping, self-dealing, or anything else. The larger threat, says Moreno, is that the “Liz Cheney, Mitt Romney” wing of the party will not enact the Trump agenda.

“Congress did not pass his budgets,” Moreno has said, when asked how his support for Trump squares with his hope to reduce the deficit. “We’re going to change that all in 2025.”

THE VIEW FROM DEMOCRATS

Brown’s campaign declined to respond to questions about the GOP race. Other Ohio Democrats were optimistic about how the Republican primaries had turned out, teeing up the sort of candidates that they were able to beat in some close 2022 races.

“I think these campaigns speak to a very broken Republican Party here in Ohio and nationwide,” said House Minority Leader Allison Russo. “It no longer matters what is truthful, factual, or meaningful to the real needs of everyday Ohioans. These are primary campaigns focused on appealing to hate and extremism, regardless of the consequences to our communities and democracy. I think most voters are sick of it.”

NOTABLE

• In Politico, Ally Mutnick and Burgess Everett capture the Republican angst about the Senate primary, and fear that it “could produce lasting damage to the eventual nominee and threaten their chances of flipping the seat.”
• For NBC News, Henry J. Gomez has the full story on the Democrats’ primary meddling, and why Moreno’s campaign thinks it’s a mistake: “Many thought Trump would be the easiest Republican for Hillary Clinton to beat in the 2016 presidential election.”

California. Ten days after Super Tuesday, as the slow mail ballot count continues, a few more races have been called. In east Los Angeles, city councilmember Nithya Raman defeated a million-dollar campaign challenge from an opponent who blamed her for rising crime and homelessness — in a part of the city where homelessness had been declining. It was a victory for the city’s politically active left, as was the success of tenant lawyer Ysabel Jurado, who got into a runoff with councilmember Kevin de Leon, a target of activists ever since he was caught on tape making fun of a white colleague with an adopted black child.

Washington. Vote-counting isn’t finished for the March 12 primary, either; all Washington elections are conducted by mail, and an estimated 10% of ballots have yet to be tabulated. The “uncommitted” protest vote may reach the threshold for a delegate in Seattle, where it ran strongest, reaching 13% of the vote so far in King County. Donald Trump’s suburban weakness showed up there, too: He won 76% of the statewide vote, but just 64% in King County, where the defunct Nikki Haley campaign won 31%. It was a similar story in Georgia, the same day: Trump won 85% of the statewide vote, but less than 60% in the three counties covering Atlanta and its closest suburbs.

Club for Growth Action, “Unfit.” Two years ago, as he campaigned for J.D. Vance, Donald Trump called Matt Dolan “not fit to serve” in the Senate because his family presided over the Cleveland Guardians’ name change: “The team will always remain the Cleveland Indians to me!” That’s the hook for the Club for Growth’s pro-Moreno, anti-Dolan ad buy, dubbing the candidate a “RINO” who earned his non-endorsement by telling the party to “move on” from Trump.

Merrin for Congress, “Ohio’s Conservative Fighter.” Nudged into the race after Craig Redel was caught on tape criticizing Trump, state Rep. Derek Merrin positions himself here as not just MAGA, but more conservative than Gov. Mike DeWine. He “overrode DeWine to protect women’s sports,” a reference to how the GOP legislature enacted a comprehensive anti-trans bill — the Saving Adolescents from Experimentation Act — after the governor killed it in favor of his own gender critical executive order. Both ended up going into effect.

Reggie for Congress, “Trump was Right.” Trump carried Ohio’s vacant 6th district by 29 points in 2020, and state Rep. Reggie Stoltzfus’s spot is mostly about the former president. “Cutting taxes and standing up to China had our economy booming,” Stoltzfus says, walking through his roof truss business. There’s no mention of Stoltzfus’s five-year legislative career, just that he is a “small businessman” and “pro-Trump conservative.”

Since January, before any votes were cast in the presidential primaries, Biden has benefitted from growing economic satisfaction by losing a little bit less to Trump. “Double haters,” voters who dislike both nominees, went heavily for Biden in 2020. They’re now split three ways, with 25% supporting Trump, 21% supporting Kennedy, and 18% supporting Biden. Trump benefits from a nostalgia that Democrats haven’t been able to erase, and 49% of voters say they approved of his performance in office, more than ever supported him in this poll in real time.

For three years, Georgia voters have seen, heard, and read about the repercussions of Trump’s attempt to overturn their 2020 election. It fueled a 2022 primary challenge to Gov. Brian Kemp, whose approval rating here is 68%, far above Trump’s. It led to the indictments of Trump and his allies Fulton County, which led to the Trump mugshot now available at MAGA T-shirt stores. Aided by the county prosecutor’s messy personal entanglements, Trump’s had some success in muddying views of that case. A plurality of voters, 43%, say that the charges against him are “politically motivated,” compared to 36% who say they’re legitimate. But just 11% of the Black electorate agrees that the charges are political, refuting a theory that those voters would sympathize with Trump.

Democrats have stepped up their campaign against third party candidates, challenging Kennedy’s reliance on a super PAC and going to war with No Labels. But in some polls, splintering the “double hater” vote helps Biden. He benefits slightly if Kennedy’s an option in Pennsylvania, where Trump leads Biden on “the economy” (by 12 points) and “immigration” (by 16 points), but trails him on abortion, health care, and climate. Given more options, nearly a fifth of the anti-Biden vote abandons Trump.

White House. No Labels moved forward with its plan to nominate a third party presidential ticket this year, after downscaling its in-person convention into a delegate Zoom meeting instead. “If we find two candidates that meet our high threshold,” No Labels co-chair Joe Lieberman said on Thursday, “we will recommend that ticket to No Labels’ delegates for a nomination vote at a national nominating convention that will be held later this spring.” Former North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory, another co-chair, quit the group the same day.

The best-known Republicans and Democrats courted by No Labels, including West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin and former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, have all rejected a presidential bid. Georgia Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, who left that office after one term as a prominent Trump critic, hasn’t turned the group down.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who continues to out-poll every other current or theoretical third party candidate, scheduled a March 26 rally in Oakland to announce his running mate. He’s confirmed only a few possibilities, telling the New York Times that he’d approached former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura and New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers about the role. That brought intense new scrutiny on Rodgers — starting with a CNN reporter’s story that the quarterback had shared conspiracy theories about the Sandy Hook massacre in their 2013 conversation.

“He’s been hammered by the press, he’s stood up for things he believes in, and I like that part of his character,” Kennedy told Fox News, in an interview that didn’t touch on the specific Sandy Hook story.

To understate the matter: Tom Schaller and Paul Waldman were sick of MAGA voter safaris. In “White Rural Rage,” their New York Times bestseller, the authors rebuke media coverage that portray the “heartland” voters as the beating heart of democracy. They argue that democracy’s biggest threats are there, over-represented in the House and Senate, and growing more cynical about government even when it’s helping them.

The brashness of that pitch has grabbed a lot of attention, and denunciation, but that’s not new for Schaller — 18 years ago, in “Whistling Past Dixie,” he argued that the South was so far gone that Democrats needed to build a majority without it. Schaller talked about both books with Americana, and this is an edited transcript of the conversation.

Americana: What has changed since you wrote “Whistling Past Dixie?” In 2006, you were very skeptical about Democrats competing in the South; since then they’ve gained ground in Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia. So how does that experience inform this one?

Tom Schaller: When that book came out, I told people that I think I’m right in the short term, but I hope to be wrong in the long term. I hope Democrats can come back in parts of the South. And of course, that’s what’s happened. Northern Virginia now looks a lot more like Maryland. Georgia is the recent surprise. Maybe Latinos will flip Texas blue.

So, I’m happy for “Whistling Past Dixie” to reach its obsolescence. Paul and I are hoping we’re wrong about white rural rage. We’re hoping that there is a Democratic renaissance. We’re hoping that progressives figure out ways to reach rural Americans of every color, and that even white rural Americans back away from Trumpism.

 Americana: Why’d you take this tack this time — saying outright that rural voters are more inclined to conspiracy theories, to support violent action against the government? Not to get too meta but it’s already gotten another backlash.

Tom Schaller: I recognize that this book could possibly be used as a tool to further incite people and say, look, liberals in the cities hate and demean you. Steve Bannon basically told me that this is the book of the cycle, and he’s going to use it to that end. He gave it to Viktor Orbán! I don’t know if it’s going to end up on stage at a Trump rally, but I don’t want that to happen. We’re not trying to scare away rural white voters who may be lured back by rural progressives.

But we wrote it because you cannot solve a problem if you’re not willing to identify it, and pretending this is not a real phenomenon. It does a disservice to what’s going on in America. We think our democracy is under siege, and the guardrails barely held in 2020 and on January 6, 2021. The MAGA movement isn’t randomly distributed across the country. It’s whiter than the rest of the country, and it’s more rural than the rest of the country. I don’t think anybody disputes that, because rural white voters voted 71% for Trump in 2020. They only voted for him 62% in 2016. We’re not trying to objectify people; we are trying to identify people.

Americana: You don’t write about structural change, which would change how rural voters are represented. But how locked into our current institutions are you? What would you change if you could?

Tom Schaller: If I were king for a day or dictator for a day, I would eliminate the Senate with a wave of my hand, because the distortion is so perverse there. In the House, even though more people live in a city than in a rural area, the rural voters are represented two to one. It’s insane. White rural voters are declining, which I think is why the Great Replacement theory gains traction. The 1920 census was the last one where most Americans lived in rural areas. But their power is still inflated, even if it’s getting smaller. At every level, it continues to be inflated.

You’re never going to get rid of the Senate. But I would be for something where states are grouped into three categories — the big states get six, the medium-sized states get four, and the smaller states get two. That would still be malapportioned, but California would at least have three times the senators of Wyoming.

Americana: Is it worth it for Democrats to head back out and campaign for these voters? How should they do it?

Tom Schaller: They can certainly run on this massive increase in manufacturing jobs. Not all of that’s ending up in rural America, but some of it is, and it’s putting people back to work, particularly downscale white voters and downscale black and brown voters. Number two, Biden created a program to literally save the voters who are least likely to vote for him: Mass vaccinations targeted to rural communities. He intentionally didn’t message on it because he didn’t want to scare people away from it. That is selfless leadership. The man literally created a program, took his fingerprints off it, to save the people who voted for him at the lowest rates. It’s not like Trump cutting the SALT tax to screw over blue states.

Third thing: Medicaid expansion, which Republicans blocked in red states. Texas has 254 counties. Most of them are rural. There’s like 40 Latino-majority rural counties in Texas alone; but most of the rest of them are majority white. Ted Cruz doesn’t care about saving them. Republicans aren’t trying to save them. I think Biden should say what he’s done to save lives because the media would finally have to report on it.

Americana: In the book, you briefly mention the rise of some inter-state secession movements, people who want their red counties to leave blue states. An idea I’ve seen more on the right, in the entertainment/podcast space, is a “national divorce,” of just giving up on D.C. and New York because red states can’t coexist with them. What’s your take on that?

Tom Schaller: What if there’s a grand bargain where certain counties — say, eastern Oregon and Washington want to join greater Idaho, some of western Maryland wants to join West Virginia? I’m going to coin this term right now: Double partition. We can make a deal where counties can move to whatever states they want, but in exchange, we eliminate the Senate.

• four days until presidential primaries in Arizona, Florida, and Kansas, and all primaries in Illinois and Ohio
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