The next phase of the fight for dominance of the Republican Party will be decided Tuesday in a key House contest in West Virginia and the gubernatorial primary in Nebraska, where former President Donald Trump is backing a candidate facing allegations of sexual misconduct.
Trump’s influence is felt throughout May’s GOP primaries as candidates clamor for his support, especially after his pick won in the Ohio Senate race last week. The candidates he’s backed in Tuesday’s marquee contests have stood beside him throughout his baseless campaign to raise doubts about the 2020 presidential election.
West Virginia, a state Trump has twice won overwhelmingly, will test the significance of his support in the first incumbent versus incumbent matchup of the cycle. Rep. Alex Mooney, whom Trump has backed, is facing off against Rep. David McKinley for the new 2nd Congressional District after the Mountain State lost a district in the post-census reapportionment process.
Mooney won Trump’s endorsement in part because he objected to the Pennsylvania electoral count as Congress was certifying Joe Biden’s 2020 victory.
Not only did McKinley vote to certify Biden’s win, he also backed the formation of an independent commission to investigate the January 6, 2021, insurrection — an effort that was ultimately spiked in the Senate but nonetheless earned Trump’s wrath. He also supported the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure law, which Trump railed against.
As Mooney has attacked McKinley as “a liberal” who supported that bipartisan legislation, there has been no subtlety in his ads as he’s touted the former President’s endorsement as the centerpiece of his campaign.
One of them framed as a “MAGA Alert” accused McKinley of supporting “Pelosi’s anti-Trump, January 6th witch hunt.” And a radio ad running throughout the district in the closing days featured Trump calling Mooney “a warrior.”
McKinley has the backing of Republican Gov. Jim Justice, a former Democrat who switched his party registration to the GOP in 2017, and West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, a Democrat who took the unusual step of cutting an ad for McKinley, praising him for opposing “reckless spending” that could harm the people of his state.
McKinley has attacked Mooney as a newcomer to the state who does not grasp the depth of its concerns, drawing attention to the fact that Mooney previously served as a state senator in Maryland. Manchin alluded to that carpetbagger attack the ad, stating that Mooney and his “out-of-state supporters” were spreading the “outright lie” that McKinley supported Biden’s Build Back Better plan, which Manchin had killed, citing concerns about the inflation and spending.
“Alex Mooney has proven he’s all about Alex Mooney. But West Virginians know David McKinley is all about us,” Manchin said in the ad.
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Source: www.cnn.com