(WHTM) — Former President Donald Trump has endorsed more than a hundred candidates across the country, including in Pennsylvania. His pick for a U.S. Senate seat was victorious yesterday in Ohio. Although the Trump name will not be on any ballots in Pennsylvania this summer, the Trump brand will.
GOP candidates in Pennsylvania have been touting their ties to Trump.
Take Rick Saccone, Republican candidate for lieutenant governor, for example: “President Trump endorsed me when I ran for Congress, and I really appreciated that, and we both believe in the America First agenda, and I always said I was Trump before Trump, if you remember that.”
Or Lou Barletta, Republican candidate for governor: “I was one of the first in the country and Congress to endorse (Trump).”
Or Republican Senate candidate Carla Sands: “I am the only person in this race that was appointed by President Trump.”
Trump has endorsed Republican Mehmet Oz for U.S. Senate, but Oz’s top rival Dave McCormick has Trump flags in his TV ad.
Trump has also “unendorsed” his former U.S. Attorney Bill McSwain, a gubernatorial candidate, urging voters to snub him, but McSwain proudly embraced his Trump ties during a debate hosted by abc27.
“I am the only candidate who actually served in the Trump administration,” McSwain said.
According to AdImpact this week, commercials that mention Trump have had 16,185 airings in the commonwealth, costing nearly $6.5 million. None of the top five Republican Senate candidates would concede it is time to move on from the 2020 election.
“I have discussed it with President Trump, and we cannot move on,” Oz said.
“There’s no one who has brought more people to the Republican Party in the last decade, or decades, than Donald Trump,” said GOP gubernatorial candidate Jake Corman.
Corman hired former Trump advisor Kellyanne Conway and says it was a personal call from Trump that kept him in the race when he was about to quit.
“He wields a lot of power,” Corman said.