MILWAUKEE — Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) is planning an aggressive travel schedule that includes campaign stops for the slate of Republicans running for Senate this year, according to GOP senators who met with him on Thursday.
Following a meeting with Vance at a Milwaukee brewhouse outside the Republican National Convention, just days after former President Donald Trump chose him as his running mate, GOP senators and candidates told the Washington Examiner he would appear on the trail in the coming days.
Vance will travel to Fort Wayne, Indiana, next week, said congressman Jim Banks. A second source confirmed the event will be a Wednesday fundraiser.
“We’re going to see a lot of J.D. Vance on the campaign trail,” said Banks, who is running for Senate in ruby-red Indiana.
“He is not just focused on getting Donald Trump back in the White House, but at the same time, we’ve got to win all these Senate races,” he added.
Vance will also be traveling to Oklahoma, according to Sens. James Lankford (R-OK) and Markwayne Mullin (R-OK). Mullin said the event would be a July 26 fundraiser.
The travel, much of it in the planning stages, marks an attempt to get Vance out early and often. He already had plans to rally with Trump in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Saturday, the first since an attempt on the former president’s life almost a week ago.
Vance was named as Trump’s vice presidential nominee two days later, at the start of the GOP convention.
He will also headline his first solo rally in Middletown, Ohio, on Monday, an event nodding to the importance of the Rust Belt to Trump’s campaign. Vance was raised in the town, the subject of his best-selling memoir Hillbilly Elegy.
The campaign travel was not the focus of the meeting, several senators told the Washington Examiner. Instead, it was a congratulatory meeting for Vance organized by Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY), the chairman of the Senate Republican Conference.
Roughly a third of Senate Republicans attended the meeting, as did most of the Republicans running for Senate. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who has disagreed with Vance on policy, was absent from the meeting. The only member of the Senate’s GOP leadership is attendance was Barrasso.
Senators described a short, informal gathering in which Vance noted the awkwardness of appearing before them as Trump’s running mate. He is the junior senator from Ohio, arriving in Washington only 18 months ago.
But on Thursday, he arrived accompanied by a heavy security detail that included a police motorcade and Secret Service agents.
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“I mean, honestly, he talked about how surreal it was that he was there,” said Mullin. “He said this is by far the most awkward meeting I’ve had, because, you know, just Monday, I was your colleague and now he’s supposed to represent the presidential ticket, he says it’s pretty tough.”
Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MO) noted the meeting was short because it had been arranged at the last minute.