GREEN BAY, Wis. _ With no prominent Wisconsin Republicans on hand, GOP nominee Donald Trump limped into Wisconsin on Friday and belatedly endorsed House Speaker Paul Ryan and 2008 nominee Sen. John McCain, trying to heal the wounds of a rough week of party infighting.
"I fully support and endorse Paul Ryan," Trump said Friday, prompting both cheers and boos from about 2,000 supporters here.
The real estate mogul has seen his poll numbers plummet this week as he feuded with the family of a fallen soldier and with Ryan, the most popular politician of his party in this potential battleground state. The difficult week for Trump has overshadowed potentially damaging news for Democrats and his rival Hillary Clinton, such as recent revelations about how the United States delivered $400 million to Iran as part of a nuclear detente deal.
After pointedly declining to do so earlier this week and being drubbed by Wisconsin Republicans, Trump endorsed Ryan as the Janesville Republican goes into a primary Tuesday with businessman Paul Nehlen. Such an endorsement, though a small win for Ryan, might come too late to fully undo the damage in Wisconsin.
Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, a Republican, wrote in a column Friday morning on the website Right Wisconsin that he was "heartbroken" to see Trump praising Nehlen and withholding support from Ryan.
"As we watch the news today about the visit of the GOP presidential nominee to Wisconsin, I have to ask myself, 'Am I proud of the GOP nominee lately?' The answer is so obvious it hurts. No. Actually, it's even worse. I'm embarrassed that he's leading our ticket ... Since the convention, his lack of judgment has got to concern even the most ardent Trump supporters," he wrote.
Trump made his first appearance in Wisconsin since his tough loss here in the April primary, and he brought vice presidential pick and Indiana Gov. Mike Pence. But fewer Republican leaders turned up Friday for Trump and Pence both than they did last week for just Pence, who made a pitch for the businessman as the right man for the country.
"I joined this campaign in a heartbeat," Pence said of becoming Trump's running mate. "He never quits. He never backs down."
Only two weeks ago, Trump was coming out of the Republican National Convention with enough of a surge to see a path to victory over Clinton. But since then his polling has dropped alongside concerns from some Republicans like Vos, raising questions about whether Trump would try to repair at least some of the rift with the Ryan wing of the party.
The race is likely to tighten again in the coming days once the media storm has dissipated. But to have a hope of carrying Wisconsin and the country in November, Trump will need to do well in blue-collar, swing regions like Green Bay and the Fox Valley.
But in the past week he's made statements that might test that, including his criticisms of Khizr and Ghazala Khan, the father and mother of Capt. Humayun Kahn, killed in 2004 by a suicide car bomb in Iraq. The Khans in turn had criticized Trump for his proposal to ban temporarily the entry of all Muslim immigrants into the United States.
The Ryan campaign said Friday it had no knowledge of a pending endorsement.
Ryan himself said he hasn't spoken to Trump since the GOP convention, has no plans to, and has no idea whether their differences are going to persevere through the campaign.
"Heck if I know ... I am not going to try to psychoanalyze this stuff," Ryan told Jay Weber of WISN as part of a lengthy slate of local radio interviews Ryan was doing Thursday and Friday in advance of next Tuesday's primary elections.
"I am just going to rise above this stuff," he said.
The potential switch to a Ryan endorsement didn't please Ron and Michelle Lovelien, small business owners who drove three hours from Eau Claire to Green Bay to see Trump on Friday.
"Paul Ryan has to go. I think he's a disgrace," said Michelle Lovelien, who with her husband runs four coffeehouses with about 20 employees.
"He's turned into a lifelong politician ... He's for open borders," said Ron Lovelien, giving a position that Ryan says he rejects.
"I don't believe anyone who's a career politician anymore," he said of Ryan.
The couple is frightened by the prospect of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton winning the White House over Trump. They see Clinton as and President Barack Obama as fundamentally untrustworthy, pointing to the recent reporting about the United States' $400 million cash payment to Iran as part of a larger nuclear detente deal.
Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke, a conservative Democrat who aligns himself with Republicans, fired up the crowd in Green Bay by lambasting GOP leaders who won't back Trump.
"My message to them is, are you really ready to have Obamacare baked fully into the pie and to have your gun rights taken away?" Clarke said. " ... Put your ego aside and put your country first!"
But statewide Republican officeholders were nowhere to be seen Friday in Green Bay _ Gov. Scott Walker and U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson were all attending events elsewhere.
Wisconsin Democratic Party spokesman Brandon Weathersby questioned whether state Republicans would withdraw their support from Trump.
"While Donald Trump continues his hateful and offensive rhetoric, Wisconsin's Republican leaders continue to stand behind him. The real question for voters: What will it take for Wisconsin Republicans like Scott Walker, Ron Johnson, and Sean Duffy to denounce Donald Trump and withdraw their support once and for all?" Weathersby asked.
Contrary to some rallies, Trump drew a small group of protesters here, about 20. Justine Pochel, carrying a sign that read, "Respect existence or expect resistance," said Trump's "long history of racism" would keep her from voting for him.
"He doesn't respect me as a human, not just because I'm Native American, but because I'm a woman," she said.
