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The state senator readily embraced the president Saturday, pledging to be a vote for Trump administration priorities should he be elected to Congress.

\"I'm going to fight alongside [Trump] to continue this economic success, I promise,\" Balderson said, adding that protecting Social Security and Medicare were among his additional priorities.

Saturday’s event 20 miles north of Columbus, was Trump’s third campaign stop of the week after a Tuesday visit to South Florida to boost gubernatorial candidate Rep. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., and a Thursday trip to Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, to stump for Rep. Lou Barletta, R-Pa., who is aiming to unseat the state’s Democratic Sen. Bob Casey.

But neither of those races, which will both be decided in November, has the urgency of the Ohio special election taking place Tuesday, a fact apparent in Trump’s remarks.

\"PHOTO:
Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images
PHOTO: President Donald Trump gestures as he speaks during a "Make America Great Again" rally in the Columbus suburb of Lewis Center, Ohio, August 4, 2018.
>

While the president made the requisite sales pitch for each candidate at their events, his focus on the midterms was also notably brief as he instead chose to harp on subjects from border security to the voter identification laws and his distaste for the media, in a potential preview of what could become 2020 re-election talking points. Like those in Florida and Pennsylvania before it, the stop to campaign in Ohio shared the dual-benefit of providing Trump an opportunity to proactively connect with his own swing state voters.

Regardless of the focus of his campaign stops, the president continues to draw large crowds of his most ardent supporters, some of whom in Pennsylvania drove from as far as two states away and waited in line for hours for the experience, despite being unable to vote for the Senate candidate. Though on Thursday, while the president’s campaign moved Saturday’s event from the town of Delaware to here in Lewis Center, claiming it was “to accommodate more Ohioans,\" the suburban high school gymnasium was vastly smaller than his usual arena-sized crowds.

While Balderson and O’Connor will spend another three days campaigning ahead of Tuesday’s special election, following Saturday's event, Trump is scheduled to return to his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, to continue his weeklong summer vacation.

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