Vance leans into Ohio ties to make a sale for GOP candidates

CINCINNATI — Vice President JD Vance hopes his native ties to Ohio can help save Republican candidates in the state’s most competitive races.

During a three-stop Oct. 21 swing through the Buckeye State, including a surprise, private drop-in to a Cincinnati Bengals practice session, Vance forcefully defended Republican gubernatorial nominee Vivek Ramaswamy.

Two weeks before Election Day, Ramaswamy, who, on average, is in a margin-of-error race with Democratic opponent Amy Acton in the polls, came under fire for his decision to spend $4 million on a deeply personal attack ad against her featuring Acton’s estranged mother calling her a “liar.”

The ad does not mention that Acton has not had a relationship with her mother since she was 12, after she was removed from her mother’s custody following her stepfather’s indictment on allegations that he raped her.

Vice President JD Vance walks at the conclusion of a campaign event at the Sharonville Convention Center in Sharonville, Ohio, on Oct. 21. (Jacquelyn Martin/POOL via AP)

“I have to admit that I’m a little bit disgusted when I see Republicans across the country who are whining more about that advertisement than they are about what the congressional Democrats and other Democrats want to do to the United States of America,” Vance told reporters during his first stop on Oct. 21, a press conference at the Cincinnati FBI Field Office in Kenwood, Ohio, for the White House Task Force to Eliminate Fraud.

“So I would say to Ohio Republicans: Do you actually think that Amy Acton is unfit to serve as governor of the state of Ohio? I do,” he said. “Do you actually think that [former Democratic Sen.] Sherrod Brown should not be given a 50th year in public service to ship American jobs overseas and to bring men into women’s sports? Because I do.”

The strategy surrounding Vance and Ohio is grounded in the argument that the vice president can appeal to people in his home state, after he grew up in Middletown, with voters recognizing themselves in him, having home-state pride in him, or simply considering him a trusted messenger.

Ohio Republican gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, (left) and Sen. Jon Husted (R-OH) applaud as President Donald Trump speaks during a midterm election rally in Vandalia, Ohio, on Oct. 3. (Mark Schiefelbein/AP)

Vance’s average favorability rating is also 10 percentage points higher than Trump’s, according to RealClearPolitics.

When asked by the Washington Examiner how he could specifically help Ramaswamy and Sen. Jon Husted (R-OH) in Ohio, Vance said he has “a lot of friends here, a lot of people who I love and who love me.”

“I do think I understand this state probably instinctively better than I understand most states because of my connection to it,” Vance told the Washington Examiner during the press conference. “And I just do not think the state of Ohio wants to give Sherrod Brown a 50th year when he didn’t do anything with his first 49 years in public service. I don’t think that they want to give the governorship over to a person who lies about every single one of her positions, who pretends that she’s a reasonable moderate when, her entire life in public service, she’s been a far-left Democrat. So I think I could make that argument in a pretty compelling way.”

Vance added a “very simple” message to the people of Ohio: Compare Republicans and Democrats.

“The far Left has run and taken over the Democratic Party,” he said. “Don’t give these people power. They’re going to cause more of the very problems that we’ve been fighting against. That’s going to be my message, and I think ultimately it’s going to carry the day in the state of Ohio.”

On the sidelines of his second stop, a midterm election rally for Ramaswamy, with whom Vance went to Yale Law School, and Husted at Cincinnati’s Sharonville Convention Center, Derek White, 63, agreed that “everyone loves JD.”

Democratic Ohio gubernatorial candidate Amy Acton (left) former President Barack Obama (center), and Ohio Democratic Senate candidate Sherrod Brown (right) attend a campaign rally in Cleveland, Ohio, on Oct. 24. (Sue Ogrocki/AP)

“He’s our favorite son,” the Cincinnati resident, who works in sales, told the Washington Examiner.

Sheila Salyer, 70, whose children went to school with Vance in Middletown, said the vice president “means what he says.”

“He worked really hard,” the now-West Chester retiree told the Washington Examiner. “He took every opportunity, and that’s the problem with people today: They don’t want to work for the opportunity.”

Vance’s appeal, however, is not universal, with Republican-turned-independent Sue Bradley telling the Washington Examiner after a voter town hall organized by Democratic congressional candidate Brian Poindexter in Ashland, Ohio, that the vice president is “a liar” and “flips his opinion.”

“I liked him before when he said, ‘I was a Never Trump guy,’” the Ashland County retiree, 62, said. “Now he’s pretty much for it. So he completely changed his viewpoint from one way to the other. So to me, he’s just untrustworthy.”

But with only hours before polls close, the Ramaswamy and Husted campaigns are concentrating on turnout as opposed to persuasion amid concerns, even expressed by Vance, that Republicans may not be motivated to vote on Tuesday.

Left to right: Democratic candidate Brian Poindexter and Rep. Max Miller (R-OH) (Nate Manley/AP; Amanda Andrade-Rhoades/AP)

“It’s important for everybody to remember that sometimes these polls actually have this demotivating effect on our voters,” Vance told reporters as he departed Cincinnati. “I talk to people, and I do think they have the effect of demotivating our voters, which is why I encourage people to ignore the polls, run like we’re down, and try to make the best case that we can.”

White conceded that “there’s a lot of people still there on the fence.”

“I think the war in Iran has something to do with it,” he said. “The gas prices. People are tired of that. I’m tired of that. But I also realize it’s probably short-term, and the long-term benefit is going to be worth it.”

Bev Moore, who also attended the Vance rally, told the Washington Examiner that she, too, knew of people who are “swaying” toward Democrats.

“I think mainly the economy and the inflation” are swaying voters, the Liberty Township retiree, 74, said. “I’d rather pay a little bit more at the gas pump. I want my freedom and to be safe.”

Criticism of Ramaswamy has simultaneously increased, with Gov. Mike DeWine (R-OH) on Oct. 22 calling for the tech billionaire to take down the Acton ad.

“The ad, on its face, is deeply, deeply troubling,” DeWine told reporters. “It’s wrong to run this ad.”

Husted earlier told the Associated Press, “I would not have run that ad.”

Regardless, White remained optimistic about Ramaswamy’s and Husted’s prospects before Trump returned to Ohio on Oct. 28, his third trip to the Buckeye State in as many weeks, in an attempt to help as well.

“I’m still confident that they can pull it out,” he said.

Slashing closing-days politics in Ohio

Across Ohio, knife-edge gubernatorial and House races are cutting deep personally, as candidates and their opponents point to their respective pasts as they ask Buckeye State voters to entrust them with their future. The race for Ohio’s 7th Congressional District has taken on national interest as Rep. Max Miller’s (R-OH) private life has become a campaign issue. Miller is accused of physically and emotionally abusing his daughter and ex-wife and has also been accused of drug use. Miller’s ex-wife is the daughter of Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-OH). Miller has denied the allegations, and his campaign did not respond to requests for comment on this story.

Brian Poindexter, Miller’s Democratic opponent, downplayed the importance of the personal drama surrounding the GOP lawmaker in an interview with the Washington Examiner, even though their race only became competitive after it spilled out into the open.

At the same time, the race for Ohio’s 7th Congressional District has taken on national interest as Rep. Max Miller’s (R-OH) private life has become a campaign issue. Miller is accused of physically and emotionally abusing his daughter and ex-wife and has also been accused of drug use. Miller’s ex-wife is the daughter of Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-OH).

A union ironworker and former Brook Park city councilman, Poindexter, 47, said he was trying to give voters “something that they can believe in and something they can rally behind.”

That “something” is economic issues, according to Poindexter.

“Even Republican voters are having a hard time right now,” he said. “It’s not the only nonpartisanship that we have in this country right now; it’s the fact that we’re all having a hard time with an economy that’s out of balance. Democrat voters, independent voters, and Republican voters are all feeling this, the pinch of this economy that’s way out of balance, and I hope to be a voice to that and help bring it back into balance and make it rewarding for working people again.”

It remains to be seen whether the argument will work. For now, at least, Democratic groups are heavily focusing on ads highlighting Miller’s abuse allegations rather than the difference on economic issues between the two.

“In my situation, I’ve never gone negative at all,” Poindexter said of the ads paid for by aligned groups, not his campaign. “I just tell people, what, you know, ‘It’s not Brian Poindexter accusing Max Miller of these atrocious acts.’ It’s the people that know him best who accuse him, and I just want to make sure people know the facts about who their representative is.”

Yet Poindexter has personal drama of his own that has become a factor in the race as Republicans argue that Miller is not the only flawed candidate in the contest.

GOP groups are running ads highlighting Poindexter’s own allegations of misconduct. Those include a 1998 police report that accused him of swallowing a “rock of suspected crack cocaine” during a traffic stop and a 2013 arrest for slapping a stranger at a Cleveland Indians game.

Poindexter is responding to the negative barrage by running ads with his family, setting up a contrast with Miller.

“I want to make sure that people know who I am,” Poindexter said. “That’s why I’m running my ad with my daughters because … the best title I’ll ever have in my life is ‘Dad,’ and I want to highlight that. I want people to know that I’m a real person, just like them, who wants to raise my family in peace and build a brighter future for my girls and working people in general.”

The strategy does appear to be resonating, at least with Democratic voters, including Joanne Bender, 70, an Ashland retiree.

“There’s definitely a reason to be concerned about … just who he is,” Bender told the Washington Examiner of Miller on the sidelines of a Poindexter town hall on agriculture issues.

Bradley, who also attended the town hall, said it encouraged her to conduct her own “research and figure out if there’s anything that’s true with it.”

“My sister even had the same issue about, ‘Oh, Brian Poindexter or Max Miller? They both have negative things against each of them,’” Bradley said. “And I said, ‘Did you ever see what really what the issue was about?’”

Republican Barbara Mathews agreed, arguing after attending the Ohio Republican Party’s bus-tour launch in Strongsville, which is in the state’s 7th District, that it is important to compare a “fact on record” and an allegation.

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“I definitely think he has PTSD,” the Broadview Heights retiree, 66, said of Miller. “I don’t know what to think about some of it. I voted for him. I’m a little bit troubled about some of it, but I think it’s how they contextualize it and how they can make things look as bad as possible they way they say it and how they frame it.”

Her husband Sam, 59, a fellow retiree and Persian Gulf veteran with PTSD, added, “I think he’s a good person. Has he done something here or there? He might have. I don’t know, but everybody’s done something. I mean, everybody has done something, have they not?”

Naomi Lim (@naomitlim) is a White House reporter at the Washington Examiner.

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