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Republican support was split between two candidates prior to the endorsement, but polls show it has coalesced behind Cox.
The president’s endorsement “sent a strong signal to Republicans across California that John Cox was their candidate,” Matt Shupe, Cox's communication director, told ABC News in a statement.
![\"PHOTO:](\"http://a.abcnews.com/images/Politics/john-cox-ap-jt-180602_hpEmbed_4x3_384.jpg\")
A Republican in the general election would all but guarantee the competing Democrat will become the next governor.
Democratic challengers like Villaraigosa have accused Newsom of trying to bolster Cox’s poll numbers by running ads against the Republican, tying Cox to Trump and the NRA, which may push GOP voters to turn out in his favor.
Newsom is working in tandem with @realDonaldTrump and helping Republican John Cox. That tactic jeopardizes Democratic efforts to take back Congress. Stand up to cynical politicians like Gavin Newsom. #BlueWave #CAGov pic.twitter.com/0wdiKoIehv
— Antonio Villaraigosa (@antonio4ca) May 24, 2018
Villaraigosa's campaign did not respond to ABC News' request for comment.
“The ‘top two’ primary forces people to develop these complicated strategies that in another state would seem extremely strange,” Raphael Sonenshein, executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at California State University, Los Angeles, told KABC. “The real debate in the Democratic Party is whether it would be better for Democratic turnout in the fall, for the house races, to have two Democrats on the ballot or one Democrat and one Republican.”
WATCH LIVE TUESDAY: You can watch livestreaming coverage of all the primary action starting Tuesday at 10 p.m. Eastern/7 p.m. Pacific on ABCNews.com or on the ABC News app available on the Apple App Store, Google Play Store, Apple TV App Store, and Roku Channel Store.
Don’t forget to sign up for Midterm Elections Alerts to get more coverage of this year’s election season from our powerhouse politics team.
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