WASHINGTON, D.C. — “For a New Yorker, he’s got a lot of Cleveland heart. And I’m proud to say that he’s my president.”
Cleveland, Ohio native Ja’Ron Smith, the most senior African American aide in the White House, made his case for President Donald Trump in the closing night of the Republican National Convention.
“Every issue important to Black communities has been a priority for him: prison reform, re-building broken families, bringing jobs back to America,” Smith said.
While the president made his own case for reelection in a speech outside the White House Thursday, Ohio Republican lawmakers spent the week arguing Trump has earned a second term, even as the coronavirus presses on and one week after the president urged a boycott of Ohio-based Goodyear.
“I mean, I don’t know how anyone could think a president could do more than what President Trump has done to try and address this virus,” Rep. Bill Johnson (R, 6th Congressional District) said in a virtual interview this week.
“I think if you go talk to rank and file workers for Goodyear, they’re tired of big government and big corporations and the left telling you what’s appropriate and what’s not,” Rep. Jim Jordan (R, 4th Congressional District) said in an interview last Saturday.
Many Ohio Republicans point to the economy—pre-pandemic—as the reason why the president deserves to be reelected. And though a lot of those victories have been erased by coronavirus, the GOP is still convinced voters want what they call Donald Trump’s vision for America versus Joe Biden’s.
“I think the contrast could not be more clear,” Johnson said. “We’re talking about what makes America great, how to get America back on the right track, how to continue to keep America great. And the Democrats are talking about everything that is wrong, and they’re part of the reason why it’s wrong.”
Jordan, who was one of the four Ohioans to speak at this week’s convention, attended the president’s speech at the White House Thursday night.
