COLUMBUS, Ohio — Vice President Mike Pence is planning to make at stop at the Muskingum County Fairgrounds Tuesday for a “Workers for Trump” event, according to a press release from the campaign.
“The choice is clear for voters in the Buckeye State: President Trump and Vice President Pence will spur new growth while Joe Biden would destroy jobs and businesses,” the campaign wrote in the release.
Doors to the fairground will open at 9 a.m. and the event will start at 11 a.m. Tickets are available to purchase, but participants must sign a waiver understanding they are at risk for exposure to COVID-19.
Pence’s visit to Ohio comes during pushback from some state Republicans.
On Sept. 10, some former state Republicans announced they’re building a following to back Biden, saying Trump doesn’t represent the party’s views and ideologies. The group includes former officeholders, party officials and military veterans.
“A lot of folks, particularly Republicans, you want to have some stability with policy and with management and what we’ve seen in the last years is constant turnover of appointees and unfilled positions and I’m not sure that’s what we bargained for with this guy,” said Columbus attorney Charles “Rocky” Saxbe, a founding member of the group and a former Republican state lawmaker.
Their effort is called Operation Grant, which is named after Ohio-born Republican Ulysses S. Grant, a Civil War general whom the group says “rose to the moment” to unite the nation as president after the war.
However, the Ohio Republican Party says they feel the opposite.
“No one cares about these former Republicans,” spokesperson Evan Machan said in a statement. “Ohio stands firmly behind President Trump.”
Trump holds a narrow lead over his Democratic competitor Joe Biden in Ohio, according to FiveThirtyEight as of Sept. 9. For months, it was the opposite; between April to August, Biden held the lead by no more than 3 percent. Now, Trump has the lead by less than 1 percent.
However, according to Real Clear Politics’ poll on Sept. 2, Biden has a more than 2 percent lead over Trump in the buckeye state.
The tight race has brought much attention to Ohio, especially from the Trump campaign.
On Sept. 9, Donald Trump Jr. visited Lima to rally for his father. Instead of focusing on policies, Trump Jr. took it as a chance to try to dismantle Biden’s campaign.
“Joe Biden has single-handedly killed more American blue-collar jobs than any politician alive,” Trump Jr. said.
In early August, Trump traveled to Northeast Ohio to hold a fundraiser in Cleveland, and then spoke at the Whirlpool plant in Clyde, trying to drive home is “buy American” initiative.
Throughout history, no Republican candidate has captured presidency without first winning Ohio. As polls have shown Biden with a tight lead over Trump, the campaign decided to try to make their footprint even larger in the state by buying $18 million worth of television advertising leading up to the election, according to Medium Buying, a firm in Columbus. Most of the advertisements will target Ohio’s largest cities — Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati.
The only other state he’s investing more advertising in other than Ohio is Florida, with more than $33 million.
Trump won all six swing states in 2016, but in Ohio, he had the largest victory with an 8-percentage lead.