Trump parachutes to KY to stump for Republicans in safe seats, give GOP nod in ‘tight race’

HIGHLAND HEIGHTS — President Donald Trump returned to Northern Kentucky for the second time this year in hopes of swaying GOP voters in the commonwealth to back Republicans at the ballot box. 

Despite gaining attention from the Cincinnati area media market, the Saturday rally at Northern Kentucky University focused heavily on Republican seats in Kentucky. Signs for two Trump-endorsed candidates in Kentucky— U.S. Rep. Andy Barr in the Senate race and Ed Gallrein in the 4th Congressional District — lined the roads around the arena. Dates for Kentucky voting flashed on the arena’s jumbotron, such as the Oct. 20 deadline to request an absentee ballot and the start of early voting, Oct. 29. The only Ohio Republican candidate to address the crowd was Eric Conroy, in the Buckeye state’s 1st Congressional District. 

In addition to again promising $5,000 checks to adults if the GOP wins control of Congress this fall, Trump also had a Kentucky-specific promise.

“The Department of War will be investing $100 million in the pharmaceutical company Antheia to revitalize a gigantic drug manufacturing facility in Winchester, Kentucky,” Trump said. The Kentucky Lantern reached out to the U.S. Department of Defense for clarity but they did not respond as of publication.

Scottie Ellis, a spokesperson for Kentucky Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear’s office said his office “has no information on this.”

“And if investments from the Department of Defense — or Trump’s ‘Department of War’ (DOW) — are conditioned on the outcome of an election, it’s time for the Department of Justice to investigate the DOW,” she added. 

Also in his remarks, which lasted for more than an hour and a half, the president encouraged voters “to pretend I’m on the ballot,” saying it helps Republicans pick up “a tremendous number of seats.” 

Trump used some of his time to talk about other political foes, like criticizing Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper, who is running for an open U.S. Senate seat against former Republican National Committee chairman Michael Whatley in North Carolina. He later called James Talarico, the Texas Democratic Senate candidate, a “freak” that should lose to Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton because he’s a “vegetarian,” despite Talarico eating meat this campaign cycle. 

“You don’t mind if I talk about other people,” Trump said to Barr. “Andy is doing so well, I think we can talk about other people.” 

A person, who was promptly booed by the crowd and removed by security, interrupted Trump’s remarks shortly after he took the stage. The president said to take the person “back home to mom” and claimed they were a paid protester. 

“They get paid. We have them all over the place… but then they have to suffer because they go back home and the mother, especially if she’s a Kentucky mother, she slaps the hell out of him,” Trump said to cheers in the arena. “Slaps the hell and says, ‘I voted for that man. Don’t you ever do that again.’”

Kentucky’s most competitive race on the ballot this cycle — the Central Kentucky 6th District, currently held by Barr — was briefly mentioned by Trump, Barr and Gallrein and, as they encouraged voters to back Trump-endorsed candidate Ralph Alvarado. NKU is about a 90-minute drive from Lexington. 

Alvarado is “in a tight race with a lunatic,” Trump said, referring to Democrat Zach Dembo.   

“He is really a good guy, and I think he’s going to do very well,” Trump said of Alvarado. Winchester, where Trump said the Department of Defense investment would be pending the outcome of the midterms, is in the 6th Congressional District. 

Alvarado’s campaign manager Andy Westberry previously told the Lantern the candidate had conflicting events scheduled during the rally as part of the Court Day Festival in Mt. Sterling, “with long-standing commitments and speaking roles at GOP events with supporters from breakfast until evening.”

Throughout their speeches, Trump, Barr and Gallrein argued that Democrats have become engulfed by socialism, like GOP candidates around the country have done this election cycle. As he has done before, Barr likened his Democratic opponent, former state Rep. Charles Booker, to New York Mayor Zorhan Mamdami. Trump, too, attacked Booker, calling him “a communist lunatic.” Gallrein said he’d defended America from “socialists, communists, tyrants and terrorists” in other countries while serving as a Navy SEAL officer.

“I’ve seen firsthand the devastation that communists and socialist agenda caused: food and gas shortages, high prices, long lines as families struggle to obtain life’s basic needs but live in utter misery,” Gallrein said. “If they like that so much why don’t those radical Democrats move there?” 

Barr blamed high gas prices in the U.S. on Iran and said Iran’s military capabilities have been diminished. The strait was closed earlier this year after U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran. 

“The Ayatollah is dead, and its nuclear infrastructure is under rubble,” Barr said. “Thank you, President Trump, for making America and the world a safer place.” 

Republican Party of Kentucky Chairman Robert Benvenuti was first in the speaker lineup and encouraged GOP voters to cast ballots in upcoming elections and push back against the left, which he said “now tries to convince our friends and neighbors that not enough has been done to clean up their handspun destruction, and in some twisted way, they deserve your vote.”

“Folks, that’s bull—-,” he added. 

Trump previously came to Hebron in March to stump for Gallrein against U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie. Gallrein later defeated Massie in the Republican primary. 

What Dems say

While No Kings protests against the Trump administration had already been planned across Kentucky on Saturday, ahead of the November election, a few protesters did make it on campus to oppose Trump. Before arena doors opened to the public, a few protesters held signs near an entrance. One read, “I miss Obama.” 

Kentucky Democrats didn’t give Trump a warm welcome either. Ahead of the rally on Friday, U.S. Rep. Morgan McGarvey, the state’s lone Democrat in Congress, argued the president should “explain why he has been lying to the American people and answer to the impact that it’s had on Kentucky.” McGarvey pointed to rising gas and grocery prices and GOP-backed cuts to Medicaid. 

Many Democrats, including candidates in Kentucky, have echoed McGarvey’s sentiments on the campaign trail this year. Asked if focusing on affordability issues would move voters, McGarvey said Kentuckians are “watching this happen.” 

“It doesn’t matter what politicians are saying. It’s what people are seeing. They are seeing the gas prices. They are seeing the grocery prices. They are seeing healthcare prices. They’re watching the corruption in this administration,” McGarvey said, recalling reports such as the U.S. accepting a plane as a gift from the Qatari government. 

As for the 6th Congressional District, McGarvey felt good about Dembo’s chances. Asked about Alvarado’s absence, the congressman said “just because somebody doesn’t go to a rally doesn’t mean they can run away from this president and his policies, which they have always supported.” 

Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 3.