President Donald Trump is back on the campaign trail Monday, this time visiting Nebraska, which he won by a wide margin two years ago.
It’s another state where Republican candidates find themselves in surprisingly competitive races, reflecting the GOP’s struggles this year.
The president is hoping he can motivate his core supporters to vote, but sometimes the president has been sending mixed messages.
With four weeks to go before Election Day, Trump is voicing confidence, saying Republicans have a lot to campaign on.
“When I go there, they win, and that’s what I’m doing,” the president said Monday.
But some Republican candidates are reading from a different playbook.
“There’s more work to do. We need to lower prices on groceries, gasoline,” Sen. Jon Husted, R-Ohio, said. “There’s no doubt about that.”
“With these high diesel costs, some of these farmers are just going to have an outrageously difficult time making it,” said GOP candidate for U.S. Senate in Michigan, Mike Rogers.
The president campaigned in Ohio over the weekend and bear-hugged data centers for artificial intelligence, despite polls showing voters are skeptical.
“We want them, look, there’s so much money to be made for Ohio, you can’t just turn them off,” Trump said on Saturday in Ohio. “They’ll go to China.”
Husted’s opponent, former Sen. Sherrod Brown, has made criticizing data centers a top issue.
“Jon Husted has been, you know, the face of data centers,” said Brown, Ohio’s Democratic candidate for Senate.
Several times over the last month, the president has not been on the same page as some Republicans.
He recently had a warm visit with Democratic Socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani in New York City as Republicans warn of socialists taking over the Democratic Party.
And the president has talked up his pricey White House renovation projects at a time when Republicans are telling Americans they share their everyday concerns.
Vice President JD Vance defends Trump’s approach, including his decision to air taxpayer-funded ads touting himself and his agenda.
“It’s not like we’re advocating for a particular candidate,” Vance said. “We’re trying to sell a story, I think, about how great the United States of America is.”
By the end of this week, President Trump will have campaigned in at least seven states as part of his midterm blitz. Six of them are states he won by double digits in 2024.
Source: spectrumlocalnews.com
