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Ohio is the competitive Senate primary coming up the soonest, in about 2 months.
Since Trump will endorse pretty soon (he mentioned a couple months ago that he is definitely going to endorse in the race, and has made steps recently that suggest he is planning to do so soon), I decided to break down my thoughts on who he might endorse.

Dolan: He's a Trump critic, has publicly feuded with him and Trump reportedly is determined on making sure he doesn't win this. Definitely not getting it (in fact the reason Trump's endorsing anyone may be to try and make sure he doesn't get it).

Timken: Originally I thought she might get it, but I don't think so. Apparently Trump planned on endorsing her last year but Don Jr talked him out of it (rightfully so). Her campaign has been terrible, making her being a woman a central component of her campaign, and despite her millions of dollars from SuperPACs (her fundraising has been terrible) and her plethora of endorsements, she's polled the worst out of any "major candidate" and is not improving at all. Her endorsements might also work against her, as many people who endorsed her are prominent Trump critics or people Trump have called RINOs (Sen. Portman, Capito) and her prominent defense of Anthony Gonzales (which is a "betrayal" more recent than any of the other Senate nominees' "RINO moments") will not be forgotten just because she hired Kellyanne Conway. Apart from Mandel she has been the most publicly desperate to get the endorsement, but I honestly don't see it happening at this point. Don Jr managed to talk him out of an endorsement once, so clearly he sees problems in her. Oh, and also Timken literally said she "didn't know whether she would impeach Trump" IN 2021 AFTER HIS SECOND IMPEACHMENT!!!

Gibbons: Mike Gibbons's biggest "appeal" is to libertarian-leaning conservatives. Rand Paul is his most notable backer who has appeared in many ads for him, and he seems to be in Rand Paul's mold. He's a pretty generic Tea Party-ish Republican, and is one of the nominees in this race who have clearly not tried to appease the Trump base at all, apart from general attacks on covid restrictions and calling his opponents never-Trumpers. Gibbons also has said he would not have voted to object to the election results, which Trump might see as him failing a litmus test for his support. Trump has not shown any interest in Gibbons unlike other candidates which I will mention later, which suggests to me that even though Gibbons may not be toxic to Trump like other candidates, he doesn't inspire the same potential loyalty that others might, he's mediocre.

Vance: J.D. Vance's biggest thing working against him is the stuff he said back in 2016 against Trump, but I don't think this is too much of a problem for Trump given that all the other candidates similarly harshly criticized Trump in the past (many more recently), Trump has endorsed people who have more harshly denounced him in 2016 before, and Trump told Club For Growth to stop showing ads talking about Vance's never-Trump history a few months back, showing that Trump clearly knows about what he's said and he doesn't mind. The reason why what he said in 2016 is a problem for him though is that it's causing him to not gain much in the polls. He's still stuck in the 8-14% zone he was in a few months ago, mostly because of the millions of dollars in ads all his opponents have put forth accusing him of being a never-Trumper. The only reason I see Trump not endorsing Vance is that he's too low in the polls for Trump to feel comfortable endorsing him, ironically even though the reason he's not doing well is that people don't think he and Trump are on good terms. It is notable that Vance has spent $0 on TV advertising and has barely spent any of the 10 million dollar warchest from Peter Thiel, while other candidates have already spent quite a lot. This next month (which is when Vance should start spending his money) is make or break for him, if he doesn't improve he's gonna lose, if he starts to gain that's a good sign.
A reason Trump may like him as well is that he's clearly the closest to Trump on policy. For all the imitation Mandel does of Trump's insane tweets and personality, his policies are identical to Matt Dolan's. Vance has come under fire publicly (which Trump would notice) for being neutral in the Ukraine conflict and is the only candidate in the race who has made illegal immigration and fair trade deals a major priority of his campaign. Vance consistently appears with Tucker, Bannon, Breitbart, etc. and is by FAR the most media-attacked candidate in the race which might make him appeal to Trump, as well as him being endorsed by MTG and Trump friend Peter Thiel. I think the odds are about 50-50 on Trump endorsing Vance, with the other 50 going to the candidate I will discuss next.

Josh Mandel: Current/former frontrunner, anyone can tell Josh Mandel is courting Trump's endorsement like no one else. He's trying to make the most controversial statements he can, making 2020 being stolen a central part of his campaign and mentioning Trump every other sentence. He's slipped quietly into second place behind Mike Gibbons in the last few weeks, as like I predicted on this forum a while back, his campaign is very poor and is currently relying on name recognition and media attention. He is endorsed by Club For Growth though and should have quite a bit of money for ads. The problem Trump has with Mandel however is that Trump finds him weird and creepy. Trump has reportedly been fixated on unfounded rumors about Mandel's sex life, gossiping about him and calling him "ing weird". Trump said to those in his close circle that he thinks Mandel doesn't have a "TV look", that he lacks charisma and there's something in his personality that rubs him the wrong way. I think that were another Trumpy candidate polling around his level, Mandel would not be endorsed, but the fact that Mandel is a frontrunner (or a strong second place) and is positioning himself as a loyal supporter of '45 may be enough to do it. I think Trump's attraction to "winners" will help Mandel's case, but this advantage might disappear if Mandel loses too much support over the next few weeks/month to people like Gibbons who have been overtaking him.

The most important information on who Trump will endorse however comes from a brief passing mention on a recent Politico article propping up media-generated candidate Jane Timken. It was mentioned that Trump has very recently had one-on-one meetings with Vance and Mandel (not any other candidate). This suggests that Trump WILL endorse pretty soon and that it will be between those two candidates. I think that whichever of them he does endorse will end up winning the primary and the general election, but it will definitely be interesting who he chooses.

Given all this information, who do you think he will endorse?

No one

I doubt he won't endorse anyone. He recently met with candidates to discuss a possible endorsement, pressured someone to leave the race to benefit "Trumpy" candidates and has had a recent obsession with stopping Matt Dolan from winning the primary.

Trump is fundamentally a coward who is loath to endorse in primary races where the winner doesn’t appear set in stone.

This is factually incorrect given how many endorsements he has given out to people who are current underdogs (e.g. McGeachin).

There is an exception to every rule

But when there are many exceptions, whether it is a rule at all is cast into doubt. Candidates like Ted Budd, Sean Parnell and even Herschel Walker were not at all guaranteed their nomination when they were endorsed, even if some now are heavily favored. In open seats Trump has been quite liberal (in the non-political sense) with his endorsements.

Herschel Walker and pre-scandal Sean Parnell are/were titanium Safe locks to win their primaries. Trump’s even on the verge of switching his endorsement from Brooks to Britt b/c he’s afraid he might have backed a losing candidate.

Not when they were first endorsed. There was no polling done in those races pre-Trump endorsement.
And that "Trump may be switching his endorsement to Britt" story is fake, literally has no evidence and has been proved wrong multiple times.

I now accept my accolades

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