The leading edge of Hillary Clinton’s campaign is slicing through Ohio as Donald Trump scratches the surface.
Since the last states held primaries on June 7, Clinton has aired more political ads in Ohio than anywhere. According to the Sunlight Foundation, the former secretary of state’s campaign has made 249 political ad buys in Ohio as part of a swing-state blitz launched last week. Florida TV stations received 225 contract deals and Virginia, in a distant third, got 117.
Team Trump made 31 commercial ad buys, none in Ohio.
A campaign stop Monday in Cincinnati, where she’ll talk about the economy with Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., will be Clinton’s third Ohio visit in as many weeks.
Trump has not returned to Ohio since before he lost its primary to Gov. John Kasich. On Friday, he was in Scotland showing off his renovated golf course and congratulating Great Britain on leaving the European Union.
Borrowing room in mostly union halls, Clinton opened offices in Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati and Toledo before the March primary. She’s kept up a staff here since the state’s Democratic shot-callers backed her in February.
In contrast to the organized Clinton campaign, disarray ensued this week when Trump fired campaign manager Corey Lewandowski after a series of missteps that rattled donors and allies. Lewandowski quickly took a job commenting for CNN. Trump took to Twitter to criticize the “Clinton News Network.”
Public tweets and texts to sworn supporters remain Trump’s primary outreach vehicles. Clinton — at least her campaign — is cozier with the media. It prefers regular daily press emails from multiple staffers.
On the fundraising front, there’s more bad news for Trump.
With loyal Democratic donors bankrolling outside groups that support her, Clinton alone had $42.5 million cash on hand at the end of May, nearly 33 times more than Trump had a month after clenching the Republican nomination with a win in Indiana.
And Clinton isn’t out of the primary. Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent socialist who beat Clinton in more than 20 states primary contests, has vowed to actively campaign into the Democratic National Convention next month, only admitting for the first time this week that — if he had to — he would vote for Clinton.
Clinton — who’s faced far fewer primary rivals — has raised nearly four times more than Trump this election.
Company they keep
The Ohio Democratic Party and labor unions glue together the campaigns of Clinton and former Gov. Ted Strickland, who is running for U.S. Senate.
AFL-CIO canvassers are supporting both Democrats, who endorsed each other early and share donors. Strickland introduced Clinton in Columbus last week. The attention offsets Strickland’s lack of campaign cash or the volunteer army his opponent, incumbent Sen. Rob Portman, has mustered.
Portman has endorsed Trump without often saying his name. Strickland reminds voters of the tepid endorsement each time the brash businessman raises eyebrows, which he does a lot.
Portman too has capitalized by associating Strickland’s support with what Clinton says. When in southern Ohio Clinton made an ill-conceived remark — for which she later apologized — about “putting coal companies out of business,” Portman released a video casting the Democrats as soldiers in President Barack Obama’s tacit “war on coal.”
The right help
Portman, who will hold his own events a half-mile from the Trump-approved Republican National Convention in July, has been looking for ticket splitters — voters who might support a Democrat for president and Republican for Senate.
That was before Trump locked up the nomination. Now they and Ohio Republicans must work together.
That could get awkward.
Lacking leadership in swing state Ohio, Trump reached out to the Ohio Republican Party this month for help hiring one. Ohio Republican Chair Matt Borges previously had cautioned that Trump could hurt down-ticket candidates like Portman.
Still, the party came through, finding Robert Paduchik to help Trump in Ohio. A veteran campaign manager, Paduchik delivered Ohio twice for George W. Bush and once for Portman in 2010. Paduchik knows Ohio and its Republicans, having worked on Attorney General Mike Dewine’s successful U.S. Senate campaign 22 years ago then for Gov. Bob Taft.
Paduchik, 49, maintained political connections between campaigns by lobbying for clean coal. In 2003, he launched Agincourt Consultants, a political consulting firm headquartered in Columbus with an operation near Washington, D.C.
Paduchik could not be reached through his consulting firm Friday.
Asked if Trump has some catching up to Clinton in Ohio, the Westerville resident told the Columbus Dispatch: “I think we’re in a good place. I’ve done this before and I don’t know that we’re getting a late start. We’ve got plenty of time to get the job [done] in Ohio for Mr. Trump.”
Corry Bliss, Portman’s campaign manager, said he has a “good relationship” with Paduchik, who could benefit from the ground game Portman has mounted in the past 18 months.
“We have a program that will help all Republicans … from the top of the ticket on down,” Bliss said, counting 10 Portman campaign offices spread across Ohio, 2.4 million voters they’ve contacted so far and thousands of unpaid volunteers who blanket the state for the Senate candidate when he asks them to.
Doug Livingston can be reached at 330-996-3792 or dlivingston@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow on Twitter: @ABJDoug.