GOP senators warn Trump is hurting Republicans with independents

Senate Republicans say President Trump has become increasingly toxic with independent voters critical to winning Senate races in battlegrounds such as North Carolina, Ohio, Iowa and Alaska.

Some GOP senators are warning Trump to stay away from key Senate races, cautioning that his presence would likely turn off independent voters.

But vulnerable incumbents such as Republican Sens. Roger Marshall (Kan.) and Jon Husted (Ohio) want Trump to visit anyway, hoping he’ll boost lagging enthusiasm among MAGA and GOP base voters.

Trump has urged Republican voters to “pretend” he’s on the ballot in the midterm elections, but some GOP senators say that’s a risky move that could backfire with independent voters, whom they view as critical to keeping their Senate majority.

“Forty percent of our electorate is unaffiliated. You can’t win with just a pure MAGA base,” said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), whose seat in North Carolina is a big prize on the Senate battleground map.

Tillis, who is retiring, said Michael Whatley, the Senate Republican candidate in North Carolina, shouldn’t campaign with Trump before Election Day.

“I don’t think it benefits him. I haven’t seen any poll where [Trump] is going to help us with unaffiliateds,” he said.

Tillis said Whatley and other GOP candidates in toss-up races would be “smart” to create some distance from Trump, who registered a 24 percent job approval rating among independent voters in a nationwide Fox News poll conducted Sept. 11-14.

“If you’re going to be smart, you got to let the candidates be who they are,” the retiring senator said. “If they are concerned with the progress of the war in Iran, which most members are, or if they’re concerned with affordability … I think there are votes to be had by saying, ‘We got to work on this.”

An AARP-sponsored poll of 1,115 likely voters in North Carolina conducted by Fabrizio Ward and Impact Research from Sept. 17-20 found that only 26 percent of independent voters give Trump a favorable job performance rating.

The Hill reached out to the White House for comment.

Trump is planning to stump in several Senate battleground states before the Nov. 3 election, including Ohio, Iowa, Nebraska, Alaska, Texas and Florida.

Trump is planning to visit Ohio on Tuesday to support Husted, the embattled Senate GOP incumbent.

But some Republican senators think that Trump’s visit could backfire on candidates such as Husted or Iowa’s GOP Senate candidate Rep. Ashley Hinson, who has recently stepped up her criticism of the Iran war and its impact on gas and food prices.

One Republican senator, who requested anonymity to comment on Trump’s plans to stump in Senate battlegrounds, argued it would be a mistake to campaign in Midwestern states where higher costs caused by the Iran war and Trump’s tariff policies are fueling voter anger.

“He will energize our base, and that’s important. We need our voters to turn out, but the ones that are making the decision, really, are those independent voters. And right now, they’re not looking favorably at President Trump,” said the GOP lawmaker.

The senator said the number of independents who are likely to be put off by Trump campaigning in a swing state are likely larger than the number of Republican voters who would be spurred to vote because of his visit.

“We need those independents,” the senator warned.

But two vulnerable Republicans in Midwestern swing states told The Hill that they view Trump’s presence as more of an asset than a liability.

Husted said that he wants Trump to campaign for him, noting the president soundly defeated former Vice President Kamala Harris in Ohio during the 2024 election, 55 percent to 44 percent.

“He won Ohio by 11 points,” Husted said.

Marshall, who faces a surprisingly tough challenge from charismatic megachurch pastor and Democratic candidate Adam Hamilton, said he would “love” it if Trump stumps for him in Kansas.

Marshall told reporters last month that he views Trump as critical to turning out GOP votes.

“There may be 200,000 people in Kansas that only vote when President Trump is on the ballot,” he said. “Certainly he needs to communicate to them that he is on the ballot, that if we lose the House it will just be one impeachment after another — his agenda is over with.”

Ford O’Connell, a GOP strategist and former Trump campaign surrogate, argues that candidates who do a better job of turning out core supporters will win in November.

“Trump is the best person at lighting a fire under the backsides of Republican voters to turn out votes. He is a one-man get-out-the-vote machine particularly among Republicans,” he said.

“The problem is making sure you get Republicans to be fired up if you want to hold many of these seats, particularly the ones that are in more traditionally red territories,” O’Connell added.

Trump is scheduled to travel Tuesday to Nebraska, where Sen. Pete Ricketts (R) is in a tough race with Independent candidate Dan Osborn, who has hit the GOP incumbent over data centers and his profitable stock investments.

Trump is also scheduled to visit Republican strongholds in the next few days, such as Oklahoma, Alabama and Texas.

“The president’s own numbers are not what they used to be, even in ruby-red Texas. And so making the election about him, pretending that his name is not on the ballot is not necessarily helpful if you’re downballot,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas).

“The usual argument is in circumstances like this you need to localize the race, not nationalize it. But the president seems determined to make the election about him at a time when you got $6-plus diesel prices and high gas prices,” he said.

Cornyn’s seat is up for grabs in the Lone Star State’s heated Senate contest between Texas state Rep. James Talarico (D) and state Attorney General Ken Paxton, the Senate GOP nominee.

Paxton, who defeated Cornyn in a primary earlier this year, was recorded telling a group of conservative donors and lobbyists last week that September’s GOP-held midterm convention in Dallas — which starred the president — hurt his poll numbers.

Asked if Trump is a drag on his candidacy, Paxton acknowledged: “When we did that convention — it dropped our numbers. Everybody’s numbers dropped. Right now, yeah, not good.”

The audio recording was reported by The New York Times.

A spokesperson for Paxton, however, disputed the notion that the Texas attorney general thinks Trump is weighing down his candidacy as “manipulated nonsense.”

Several recent polls show Talarico leading Paxton, even though Trump carried Texas with 56 percent of the vote in the 2024 presidential election.

A Marist University poll of 1,139 registered voters in Texas conducted from Sept. 17-20 showed that only 29 percent of independents in the state have a favorable impression of the president.

The same poll showed Trump with an overall approval rating of 41 percent and Talarico leading Paxton by 6 points, 50 percent to 44 percent.