There are a few Republicans trying to leverage those numbers in their races. Steve Chabot here in Ohio keeps running an ad that makes me both laugh and get very angry at the same time. It touts how unemployment and economic numbers have steadily improved over the past 10 years, and of course claims credit goes to Chabot, then goes on to warn that Aftab Pureval would raise taxes by 50% (LOLWHUT?!) and “supports Nancy Pelosi and the Liberal Mob” (while showing pictures of both BLM protesters marching and immigrants crossing the border…aka the “liberal mob”).
The combination of taking credit for Obama’s 8 years of economic gains (during which Chabot was a Senator, and basically did everything he could to vote against anything the Obama Administration attempted to pass, so him trying to take any credit for anything that happened those years is a complete joke) and blatant fearmongering/racism makes me want to throw shit at my television.
Sadly, it looks like Pureval’s candidacy just never took off in your district. Siena/NYT polled it twice in the last month, and Chabot has to feel good about the results.
Aftab is popular with Democrats here, but the Conservative PACs have been spending heavily to defend Chabot’s seat, and as blue as the urban areas in the district are, we probably can’t overcome the bright red majority of the district without Obama 2008 levels of turnout, which is unlikely to happen in a mid-term election year. It helps Chabot considerably that his ads are careful not to ally him with Trump, in fact, they don’t mention Trump at all really. That means Trumpsters will vote for him because he’s the white Republican candidate, while non-Trumpster Republicans can feel OK voting for him because he’s not personally attaching himself to Trump’s more distasteful policies and actions. Chabot’s been a senator forever, so he can run on name recognition and the nebulous fear of the liberal boogeyman and it will be enough to put him right back in Washington doing nothing for Ohio once again.
Certain,y evil, but I don’t think it’s why many think he’s doing it. I think Trump is getting a lot of heat from Israel and Republican Jews for his tacit acceptance of anti-semitism in the wake of Pittsburgh. So now he’s gonna go hard-line on Iran to give them cover for voting R on Tuesday.
