Zach Montellaro, state politics reporter at Politico, joins Cheddar Politics to discuss primary election season, including how endorsements from President Trump in Republican primaries have shaped races across the country.

Cheddar Politics

The Power of a Trump Endorsement

we're going to enter politics. Former President trump remains the biggest and most popular figure in the Republican party and candidates in GOP primaries all over the country often trip over themselves all to win his coveted endorsement. Knowing that could be the difference between winning and losing the nomination. Trump has mostly endorsed a few winners, but there are a few endorsements of candidates with some pretty checkered past that raised questions about just how far his endorsement can go. So joining us now is Zach Montilla Rose State political reporter over at politico, Zach great to have you here as always, let's start with trump's overall record here. Is it sort of safe to say that trump's endorsement does make a difference for most candidates. He endorses like a J. D. Vance out there or is the high wind percentage more due to him just endorsing a lot of strong incumbents out there. It's a little column, a little column b if you're a candidate in an open race, especially a Republican candidate, obviously you would much prefer to have donald trump's endorsement than to not have it. But uh it's not invaluable as we saw in Nebraska last week or earlier this week. Rather his loss there was when he picked a candidate who ended up not winning the nomination. Um You know, I think it's notable that none of the republicans who have won so far this year running as anti trump republicans. Those candidates have gotten blown out of the water just about every chance they have had But it means his endorsement is not a silver bullet and yes he has picked 45 winners, but many, many, many of those races were not competitive, you know, you can he's definitely paying Oh it looks like we yes, yes, exactly, exactly, Zach it looks like, you know, trump has a tendency sometimes to pick really unsavory characters at times. I mean you mentioned herbs stir in Nebraska, you got Sean parnell in pennsylvania who then dropped out. There's been rumors for a while, he might endorse eric Greitens in the in the in the Missouri Senate race there. Why does trump pick these candidates? Is there a reason why he goes behind them? I think for some of these candidates it's really, you know, as we've seen with the former President, loyalty to him is, above all else, what he values and star power is another thing. Uh Charles Herbst er the candidate he picked into prayer esca recently who lost has been a long time ally of ally of the former president, I think he was literally there when trump came down the golden escalator in 2016. Uh you know, same for sean parnell in in pennsylvania who had dropped out, he was a close ally of his son of the former President's son, so trump values loyalty and trump values celebrity. Uh you know that that is basically that that that's at the root of many of his endorsements. Yes, he wants a candidate who's going to win, but he wants a candidate who's going to win and then give him all the credit for it too. So zack, let's move to pennsylvania because they also think this is sort of a fascinating study of all three candidates are sort of different iterations of trumpism, but trump's only endorsed one of them, and that would be dr Oz. But then you have David McCormick who was essentially hired almost everybody from trump's orbit. And then you have this new dark horse Kathy Barnett, who is the ultra mag a candidate out there, she didn't even get trump's endorsement. So how much does that sort of play in all of this? And if she ends up winning, does she then get trump's endorsement? Even though he endorsed dr Oz, it's like a heads, I win tails. You lose situation for trump there right? Like he's behind Dr Oz and that's celebrity to the highest degree that dr Oz, I would say, arguably is the most famous Senate candidate I've seen in several years reporting on this, that's just like regular people know who dr Oz is, you don't have to be into politics and dr Oz is. Uh So that's celebrity first and foremost there. But the two candidates running against dr Oz or not now, suddenly anti trump McCormick is, as you mentioned, he hired just about every trump staffer that he could and Kathy barnette is trying to embody the movement maybe more than any other candidate in that race. Uh So, you know, trump trump can you know, at some point, you know, he he wants Dr Oz to win. And there's there's definitely frustration among some, among the space as many outlets, including political was reported that he picked someone like Dr Oz who doesn't have a long history of Republican politics will say. But all these candidates are modeling themselves after trump. So even if trump's endorsement is not the silver bullet, the shine of trump being is, you know, rhetorical, you know, how he speaks or, or, you know, affiliating yourself with staffers. Like trump shows that like he's still the most powerful figure in the Republican Party, even if his endorsement is not 100% win rating at this point, Zack, I have about 40 seconds left with you. How do you see the Pennsylvania race shaking out next week? Who do you see winning this? Uh, anybody's guess. I if you maybe right, when we were about to get I think we just lost zack as he was about to give him his projection on all that. That was Zac mont. Ilario, state political reporter over at politico