President Donald Trump is making a final multi-million-dollar investment in Tuesday’s statewide elections in New Jersey and Virginia, in an effort to turn out MAGA voters who tend to sit out off-year elections when Trump isn’t on the ballot.
Trump’s political team is making a withdrawal from the president’s massive political war chest, with New Jersey and Virginia each receiving roughly $1 million for get-out-the-vote microtargeting efforts, Fox News confirmed this weekend.
“What you’ve seen just in the last couple of days is the president and all of our Republican forces have put even more money behind our efforts to turn out our votes because that’s what it’s gonna come down to,” Joe Gruters, chairman of the Trump-aligned Republican National Committee (RNC) said Saturday on Fox News’ “The Big Weekend Show.”
While Trump lost New Jersey and Virginia in last year’s presidential election, he made major gains in both states.
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New Jersey and Virginia are the only two states to hold gubernatorial contests the year after a presidential election, and the two contests typically receive outsized national attention. The elections are also seen as a key barometer ahead of next year’s midterms, when the GOP will be defending its slim House and Senate majorities.
This year’s elections are also seen as the first major ballot box test of Trump’s unprecedented and explosive agenda.
The new infusion of cash from Trump’s political coffers, which was first reported by Axios, is fueling the RNC’s 72-hour program aimed at turning out GOP voters in the final stretch leading up to Election Day.
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Republican operatives are tracking down low-propensity GOP voters, and then reaching out to those voters through phone-banking efforts, or through digital and social media targeting ads.
“We have to have Republicans show up on election day if our candidates are gonna have a chance,” Gruters said.
While Trump hasn’t made any campaign stops in New Jersey or Virginia, he reached out to supporters in both states.
Trump held a tele-rally Thursday evening with term-limited Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin of Virginia, to boost GOP turnout in the state’s races for governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general.
Last weekend, on the eve of the kick-off of early voting in New Jersey, Trump headlined a tele-rally with GOP gubernatorial nominee Jack Ciattarelli.
Trump is likely to headline another tele-rally for Ciattarelli ahead of Tuesday’s election, sources told Fox News Digital.
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Meanwhile, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) has dished out over $7 million – a party record – for get-out-the-vote and organizing efforts this summer and autumn in New Jersey, Virginia and Pennsylvania, where Democrats are fighting to retain three state Supreme Court seats.
“I’ve always taken the position that every election matters, whether it’s an on-year, off-year, whether it’s a local election, a federal election, every inch of ground that we gain here adds up,” DNC chair Ken Martin said last week in a Fox News Digital interview.
The latest public opinion polls indicate former Democratic Rep. Abigail Spanberger has a solid lead over Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears in Virginia’s gubernatorial race.
Surveys point to Democratic Rep. Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey with a slight edge over Ciattarelli in the race to succeed term-limited Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy.
“I do expect that we’ll win those elections in New Jersey and Virginia,” Martin said. “We feel pretty bullish about our chances.”
Fox News’ Bryan Llenas contributed to this report