Former President Donald Trump claimed that he – not President Joe Biden – would protect Social Security and warned of a “bloodbath” if he lost his campaign for Senate candidate Bernie Moreno in Ohio in November.
Trump, speaking Saturday at a windswept airport outside Dayton, praised his chosen candidate in the race as “America’s first champion” and “a political outsider who has spent his life building community in Ohio.”
“He will be a fighter in Washington,” Trump said, days after securing enough delegates to secure the 2024 Republican nomination.
Moreno will face Secretary of State Frank LaRose and state Sen. Matt Dolan in Tuesday’s Republican primary. LaRose and Moreno have aligned themselves with the pro-Trump faction of the party, while Dolan is backed by more establishment Republicans, including Gov. Mike DeWine and former Sen. Rob Portman.
Saturday’s rally was hosted by Buckeye Values PAC, a group supporting Moreno’s candidacy. Trump, nonetheless, used the stage to deliver a profanity-laced version of his usual rally speech that when again painted an apocalyptic picture for the country if Biden wins a second term.
“If I don’t get elected, it will be a bloodbath… It will be a bloodbath for the country,” he warned, talking about the impact of offshoring on the domestic auto industry and his plans to boost tariffs on foreign-made cars.
Trump later stated that “if this election isn’t won, I’m not sure there will ever be another election in this country.”
Trump has repeatedly reported difficulty reading teleprompters, which was clearly visible in wind gusts of as much as 35 miles per hour.
Moreno, a one-time Trump critic and a wealthy Cleveland businessman, supported Marco Rubio in the 2016 GOP presidential primary and once tweeted that listening to Trump “is like watching a car crash that makes you feel sick, but you can stop looking.” ” In 2021, NBC News reported an email exchange around the time of Trump’s first presidential campaign in which Moreno called Trump a “crazy” and a “maniac.”
But on Saturday, Moreno praised Trump as a “great American” and criticized members of his party who’ve been critical of the former president, who this week became his party’s presumptive nominee for a third straight election.
“I’m tired of Republicans saying, ‘I support President Trump’s policies, but I don’t like the man,’” he said, joining Trump on stage.
Trump also dismissed the recent allegations against Moreno, comparing them to attacks he has faced over the years, including criminal charges. Trump has been charged in 4 separate cases that include using secret documents and attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
“He’s being treated very harshly by the Democrats right now,” Trump said. – And we can’t tolerate it.
The Associated Press reported on Thursday that in 2008, someone with access to Moreno’s work email account created a profile on an adult website searching for the term “Men for one-on-one sex.” The AP could not definitively confirm that it was created by Moreno himself. Moreno’s lawyer said the account was created by a former intern and provided a statement from the intern, Dan Ricci, who said he created the account “as a juvenile prank.”
Questions about the profile have swirled in GOP circles over the past month, raising frustration amongst senior GOP operatives over Moreno’s potential vulnerability in the general election, in line with seven individuals with direct knowledge of discussions about tips on how to resolve the issue. They requested anonymity to avoid conflict with Trump and his allies.
Trump also accused Biden in his remarks of endangering Social Security after he continued to delete comments from an interview earlier this week in which he appeared to precise openness to cuts.
“Your Social Security will be gone,” he warned ahead of Biden’s second term, whilst Biden pledged to guard and strengthen Social Security in the face of a projected budget shortfall. “You won’t be able to have Social Security while this guy is in office because he’s destroying our country’s economy. And that, by the way, also includes Medicare, and American seniors are going to be in big trouble.”
“I promised I would always pay into Social Security and Medicare. We will always keep them. We will never limit them,” he said.
The comments came after Trump responded to a question on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid in an interview on CNBC by saying that “a lot can be done on entitlements, cutting, and also theft and mismanagement of entitlements, tremendous mismanagement of entitlements.” There is a huge amount of stuff and a lot of things you can do.”
Trump continued to criticize Biden for his handling of the border and the migrant crisis. And he lashed out at Dolan, calling him a “weak RINO” — a Republican in name only — and accusing him of “trying to become the next Mitt Romney.” He also criticized the Dolan family, which owns the Cleveland baseball team, for changing its name from the Cleveland Indians to the Cleveland Guardians.
Trump was joined at the rally by Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, who’ve had a falling out with Moreno and are considered potential vice presidential candidates.
Trump’s decision to support Moreno was a major blow to LaRose, who took several steps to realize his favor. Just days after entering the Senate race, LaRose endorsed Trump for president, reversing his earlier stance that the state’s elections chief should remain politically neutral. The following month, he fired a longtime trusted adviser after old tweets in which he criticized Trump surfaced.
The winner of Tuesday’s primary election will face third-term Senator Sherrod Brown in November, considered one of the weakest Democrats in the country.
Brown, first elected in 2006 and unchallenged in the primary this 12 months, managed to carry on to his seat whilst the state moved to the right. In his last re-election in 2018, he defeated then-Rep. Jim Renacci by almost 7 percentage points. Two years later, Ohio voted for then-President Trump by 8 points.
