Campaign Report — GOP jockeying ramps up in Senate primaries

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Republicans look to unify in crowded Senate races

With primary dates rapidly approaching, Republicans in crowded — and sometimes heated — primaries are looking to consolidate support as the jockeying ramps up.

Max has a great read up today on the North Carolina Senate race, where Rep. Ted Budd (R), former President Trump’s chosen candidate, appears to be shoring up support.

Budd for months trailed former Gov. Pat McCrory in the GOP primary, but now, on the backs of Trump’s endorsement and an advertising blitzkrieg by the conservative Club for Growth, polls have shown him turning the tides and staking out a lead.

One survey from The Hill and Emerson College from earlier this month showed him with a 16-point edge over McCrory, while a WRAL-TV/SurveyUSA poll out last week put him up by 10 points.

Not safe yet: Still, Budd has his work cut out for him in trying to put McCrory away and clinch the 30-percent support marker in the May 17 primary to avoid a runoff. Former Rep. Mark Walker, a staunch Trump supporter, also looms as a potential primary spoiler.

“He’s in a pretty good position with a 10-point lead a month before the primary, but you can’t say the race is settled,” Carter Wrenn, a veteran Republican strategist in North Carolina, told Max. “They also show there’s a pretty big undecided vote out there. It’s like everything in politics. It could change.”

Bucking the polls in the Buckeye State: Trump upended the Ohio GOP Senate primary Friday when he threw his support behind “Hillbilly Elegy” author JD Vance.

Vance has consistently been in the middle of the pack or at the bottom of the top tier, but Trump’s endorsement hands him an opportunity to vault to the top of the crowd.

The endorsement, however, came on both Good Friday and the first night of Passover and just over two weeks before the primary on May 3 — sparking a mad dash to make GOP primary voters aware of the imprimatur.

Vance will also appear at a campaign event with Donald Trump Jr. Wednesday followed by a fundraiser and will stand alongside the former president himself at a rally on Saturday. Peter Thiel, the billionaire tech investor, also dumped $3.5 million into Vance’s super PAC, bringing his total contributions to the group to $13.5 million.

Operatives say the Trump endorsement for Vance immediately puts him toward the top — but Vance’s ability to pull off a come-from-behind win in the primary will hinge largely on his ability to make the support saturate among primary voters.

Keying in on Oz in the Keystone State: Trump’s endorsement is also looking to pull a candidate over the finish line in the Pennsylvania GOP Senate primary, with the former president backing celebrity surgeon Mehmet Oz.

Oz has been polling neck-and-neck with former hedge fund manager Dave McCormick in what could be the Senate race that decides control of the upper chamber. Scant polling has been released since Trump endorsed Oz on April 10.

Pennsylvania’s primary date is May 17, and Oz has hit the trail touting Trump’s backing. However, there are not yet any rallies in the Keystone State planned for Trump just yet.

Meanwhile, McCormick is still tying himself closely to Trump and painting Oz as a closet liberal over past stances on hot-button social issues. Just as in Ohio, the Pennsylvania GOP primary could be determined by if Oz is able to make voters aware of Trump’s backing or if McCormick’s messaging campaign will fend him off.

COUNTDOWN

202 days until the 2022 midterm elections

DeSantis vs. Disney

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has fueled speculation over possible presidential ambitions in 2024 by diving headfirst into some of the nation’s fiercest culture wars — and this week was no different.

DeSantis, who is mired in a debate with Disney over the company’s opposition to legislation strictly curtailing the discussion of sexual orientation and LGBTQ+ issues in schools, said the state legislature will consider ending the special status of the Reedy Creek Improvement District that administers much of Walt Disney World.

The special status essentially lets Disney govern the land on which it operates — but DeSantis said Disney has “alienated a lot of people now” over its opposition to Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill and that terminating the status is “very important.”

The feud allows DeSantis to wade into two culture war issues simultaneously – the fight against “Big Tech” and debates over public schooling.

Beyond implications for 2024, DeSantis’s latest moves could also impact his reelection this year, possibly endearing him to conservatives but also risking a tax increase on some Florida residents.

Meanwhile: In yet another instance of DeSantis flexing his political muscles, the Florida governor will appear at a Nevada rally alongside Senate candidate Adam Laxalt, who also has Trump’s endorsement. Max has more here.

AD WATCH

Vance put out a 30-second statewide ad Monday, seizing on the Trump endorsement from Friday.

Given that Friday was a holiday heading into Easter weekend, Monday marked the first day to highlight the support — and Vance’s campaign was ready.

“JD is the conservative outsider who will continue Trump’s fight to secure our borders, protect the unborn, get rid of the corrupt politicians and stop Joe Biden,” a narrator says in the ad after video of local news coverage of Trump’s endorsement.

“Trump fought back and so have I,” Vance adds in a statement to the camera. “Now, I’ll take our fight to the U.S. Senate.”

Fetterman fights: Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. and Democratic Senate candidate John Fetterman released a 30-second ad Tuesday running in the Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Wilkes-Barre/Scranton markets hitting back at primary rival Rep. Conor Lamb for a misleading attack ad from an outside group.

A pro-Lamb super PAC rolled out an ad this week knocking Fetterman as a “self-described democratic socialist,” swiftly prompting rebukes from fact checkers who noted that Fetterman never described himself that way.

In Fetterman’s response, a Pennsylvania resident casts the lieutenant governor as “honest, he’s real, he’s the salt of the earth.”

“When you take on the powerful, you get a few enemies along the way. That’s why billionaires and Washington insiders are lying about John Fetterman. Because he’ll take them on in D.C. John ain’t perfect, but he’s real, and he’s Pennsylvania. And a heck of a lot more than all these politicians running,” the narrator continues.

The back-and-forth marks the latest escalation that remained civil for months before recently becoming more contentious.

GOP House headaches

Cawthorn complications: The GOP is grappling with a number of headaches in the House as the party barrels toward the November midterm elections with high hopes of taking control of the lower chamber.

The first source of pain is freshman Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.), who has come under fire from Republican colleagues in recent weeks after making controversial comments. In the latest headline-making moment, a former district staff member for the congressman — who is now working for a GOP challenger to the lawmaker — accused him of wrongly firing her after she was denied family and medical leave in a secretly-recorded and released phone call with the president of an anti-Cawthorn PAC. She also said his office had “more liquor bottles than they do water bottles.”

Cawthorn’s spokesman called the allegations “verifiably false,” writing that they “potentially amount to defamation of character.”

The freshman Republican is embroiled in an eight-way primary set for May 17, and while he has received rebukes from within the party, he only needs to secure 30 percent of the vote to avoid a runoff.

Tennessee tosses pro-Trump candidate: The Tennesse Republican Party laid down the gauntlet Tuesday night when it voted to dismiss three House candidates from the ballot: Trump-endorsed Morgan Ortagus who worked as State Department spokesperson during his administration, Baxter Lee and Robby Starbuck.

The decision came after GOP legislators and activists pushed to have Ortagus tossed from the ballot because she recently relocated to the Volunteer State, according to NBC News. Ortagus said she was “deeply disappointed” by the decision, and that her team is evaluating their options. The move serves as a major hit to Trumpworld, after the former president gifted Ortagus with a preemptive endorsement.

That’s it for today. Thanks for reading and check out The Hill’s Campaign page for the latest news and coverage. See you next week.