Trump Jr. to campaign with J.D. Vance in Ohio after his father’s endorsement

CLEVELAND – Ohio Senate candidate JD Vance – new out of a endorsement from Donald Trump – is expected to campaign this week with the former president’s son of the same name.

Donald Trump Jr will headline a town hall-style forum with Vance Wednesday afternoon in the Cleveland suburb of Independence, according to campaign details shared with NBC News.

“I am proud to join my father in supporting my friend and America First champion J.D. Vance for the United States Senate,” Trump Jr. said in an emailed statement. “JD is the right choice for Ohio and I look forward to joining him on the campaign trail this week.”

Elder Trump has a rally on Saturday planned in Delaware, Ohio, where he is expected to talk more about his endorsement of Vance. By backing venture capitalist and “Hillbilly Elegy” author, Trump swayed an already chaotic and crowded Republican Senate primary. Other candidates have declared more loyalty to the former president and called attention to Vance’s past criticisms of Trump. But Vance, a Marine veteran and Yale Law School graduate, impressed Trump with “brains and courage,” according to the endorsement statement the former president gave.

Trump Jr. signaled a preference for Vance last month with a series of supportive tweets following the first GOP Senate debates but stopped approving him so as not to be exposed in front of his father.

Polls conducted prior to Trump’s endorsement have shown Vance has gained ground. One Trafalgar Group survey published last week showed Josh Mandel, the former state treasurer, leading the GOP field with 28% of the vote, followed by Vance with almost 23%. Earlier polls had shown a close race between Mandel and investment banker Mike Gibbons. But Vance recently started spending money on TV commercials, and the wealthy Gibbons, who spent millions of his own on ads, came under fire for comments in the past that the middle class doesn’t pay its fair share of taxes.

On Monday, Vance’s campaign released a New TV commercialsbacked by about $500,000 worth of airtime, boosting Trump’s endorsement.

“Trump fought back and so did I,” Vance said in the ad. “Now, I will take our fight to the United States Senate.”

at Blogtuan.info – Source: nbcnews.com – Read the original article here