According to certain pollsters, Trump’s standing among voters has dropped to record lows in recent days, with support on issues like the economy, the Iran war and international trade hitting troubling levels for the administration and the GOP. This has coincided with a number of Republicans, including many of Trump’s longtime backers, publicly breaking with him on key areas of policy. The president has told voters and members of his party to "pretend that I’m on the ballot" when campaigning in what looks to be a challenging election for Republicans.
But many of those running on the GOP ticket across the country appear to be taking the opposite approach. By comparing current and archived versions of campaign websites using the Wayback Machine, Newsweek can reveal that a number of those in toss-up races have downplayed their relationship with the commander in chief, as well as their support for his national agenda, while shifting the focus to local issues and those—like affordability—that remain top of voters’ minds going into November. Newsweek has contacted the candidates and the White House via email for comment, and will update this article if a response is received.
Newsweek focused on House and Senate races that are currently considered competitive by pollsters and analysts such as the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. Comparing older versions of candidates' websites with current iterations reveals a clear absence of Trump as the respective campaigns enter their final stretch. Until at least June 6, the campaign page for Michael Whatley, running against the Democratic former Governor Roy Cooper in the North Carolina Senate race, had the former Republican National Committee (RNC) chair standing alongside Trump as the main image on the website.
This has since been replaced with a picture of Whatley exiting a plane, with the Trump picture downsized and shifted to the bottom of the homepage. Ohio Senator Jon Husted, the incumbent Republican locked in a tight race against Democrat Sherrod Brown, previously featured a "gallery" section on his main page that was topped with images of Trump and him together. This section, visible on his website in January, has now been removed.
Last month, House candidate Michael Bouchard, running to represent Michigan's 10th Congressional District, had a photo of himself and the president at the top of his website’s "Meet Mike" introduction. This has since been directly replaced with an image of Bouchard alongside his mother and father, Oakland County Sheriff Mike Bouchard. The "Endorsed by President Donald J.
Trump" sticker which until early August featured at the top of Bouchard’s website has now been swapped out for the more-neutral "Republican Nominee for MI-10." Florida House candidate Mike Beltran has likewise removed what was a prominently placed image of Trump from his website—visitors are now instead greeted by a picture of Beltran and his family. Direct references to Trump have also dropped from four to zero, with "Mike Beltran has stood with President Trump every step of the way" among the deleted statements. As well as the image change, the slogan at the top of the main page—“Fighting for Florida.
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