Republicans fight over Trump

WELLINGTON, Ohio — It could get even more mean by Saturday when Donald Trump returns to the stage in America's heartland to rally his base at the Lorain County Fairgrounds. Who he picks to be on stage with him could be a deciding factor in Ohio's senate primary election next year. Candidates already are fawning for his attention and fighting for his endorsement. Jane Timken, the former state party chairwoman, appeared to be claiming she already has Trump's endorsement in the race. In an email, Timken's communications director, Mandi Merritt, said Timken was the "Trump-endorsed former chair." Merritt said she did not mean to imply that Trump had endorsed Timken. "We're not at all claiming that she is the endorsed candidate," she said. Timken's far from the only Republican candidate with a claim on Trump: Josh Mandel, the former state treasurer who dropped out of a 2018 senate race, says he was the first statewide officeholder to endorse Trump in 2015. Mike Gibbons, an investment banker, served as co-chair in Ohio for Trump. Timken says Trump picked her to be party chair in 2017 and she delivered the state to him in the election. Trump has not endorsed a candidate in the race but he seems sure to be a deciding factor when he does as he ponders his own political future and the 2022 and 2024 elections. And it seems assured that both elections are likely to be as mean and nasty as 2016 and 2020 when Trump was on the ballot. But Trump hasn't endorsed anyone in the Senate race, according to one of his favorite media outlets. "People close to the president are not happy," a Trump aide told Breitbart News, the alt-right news outlet that is unreliable, citing Timken's claim Trump endorsed her. In that case, the campaign had placed a photo of Timken and Trump together in an area on a campaign website that suggested she had been endorsed by Trump. Timken's campaign also told Breitbart she was never trying to give off the impression Trump had endorsed her. Come to Lorain County The rally location was picked for its proximity to U.S. Rep. Anthony Gonzalez's 16th Congressional district. Trump is targeting Gonzalez to defeat his re-election bid because he was one of 10 Republican House members who voted in favor of impeachment in January. Timken, Mandel and Gibbs were not immediately available to respond to questions about whether they intend to be at Trump's rally or about the status of their efforts to gain his endorsement. Since announcing earlier this year, she has refused to respond to direct questions about Trump's false claims he continues to make about the election being rigged or stolen. She and other Ohio Republicans also have refused to repudiate Trump's role in inciting the violent mob attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. Local lawmakers state Sen. Theresa Gavarone, R-Bowling Green, state Rep. D.J. Swearingen, R-Huron and state Rep. Dick Stein, R-Norwalk, all have repeatedly refused to answer similar questions. It's unknown if any of the three plan to attend the rally. They also refuse to comment about whether they're concerned Trump will again incite violence at the rally on Saturday or at other future rallies. At times in the 2016 and 2020 campaigns, and prior to the Jan. 6 insurrection, Trump called for violence. Jordan ducks, again U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan, perhaps the most intense of Trump sycophants, also won't say if he plans to be with Trump this coming weekend. He flew with the president on Air Force One during the campaign last year to the presidential debate in Cleveland just before Trump was diagnosed with COVID in October. Although he was exposed, Jordan ignored Centers for Disease Control guidelines not to potentially expose others after that encounter although he got a written waiver from a government-provided doctor on Capitol Hill to go against the guidelines. There are no Republicans in the senate primary race willing to refute Trump on any of his false claims or call him out for the violence. There are few statewide. Ohio's primary election is in May 2022. * Note: This story has been changed to clarify wording related to whether Timken had claimed to have Trump's endorsement and whether Timken answered questions about that.