*** Election Night Livewire *** Trump-Backed Bernie Moreno Seeks to Crush Establishment GOP in Ohio

Former President Donald Trump already has the GOP nomination for president this year locked up, but he faces a key test of his intra-GOP strength as his pick for U.S. Senate in Ohio, businessman and political outsider Bernie Moreno, faces off against two far more establishment GOP candidates in state Sen. Matt Dolan and Secretary of State Frank LaRose.

Moreno has been running a campaign focused on deporting illegal aliens who entered the country during Democrat President Joe Biden’s administration and opposing sending more U.S. tax dollars overseas to be wasted by the Ukrainians in their war against Russia. Dolan, meanwhile, is a globalist establishment Republican who supports more Ukraine aid, and LaRose has been grilled for taking funding from leftist sources, including accepting cash from Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg to run elections in Ohio and accepting money from LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman.

Moreno has been fighting off vicious media attacks from the Associated Press in the final days of the campaign, and Trump stumped for him on Saturday with a massive rally in Dayton, Ohio. Whoever wins this race could determine a lot about the future of the GOP, and where things go from here.

Other states are having some primaries of note as well, with Illinois seeing two different sitting congressmen–a Republican and a Democrat–facing aggressive primary challenges. Rep. Mike Bost (R-IL) seeks to fend off conservative challenger Darren Bailey while Rep. Danny Davis (D-IL)–an 82-year-old longtime Democrat lawmaker–faces two serious challengers.

Out in California, too, voters will vote in a special election to choose who will succeed former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in his old Bakersfield-area House seat. Other states, including Florida, have presidential primaries on Tuesday but since the GOP and Democrat primaries have been decided — as Trump and Biden both have locked down the majority of delegates ahead of their respective conventions this summer — these are essentially perfunctory exercises. However, there may be interesting data points to glean from turnout numbers or vote totals and demographics that provide clues for what might happen in November’s general election.

Polls in Ohio close at 7:30 p.m. ET, and later in other states. Follow along here on Breitbart News for live results, breaking news, and analysis throughout the evening.

UPDATE 7:15 p.m. ET:

While it’s essentially irrelevant because Trump already is the presumptive GOP nominee for president, the results streaming in now from Florida look very strong for him. He’s higher than 70 percent and looks like he could be on par for around 90 percent. While Nikki Haley dropped out two weeks ago, and she was the last GOP candidate standing against Trump for more than a month before that, she and several others who dropped out earlier do still appear on the ballot in the Sunshine State so Trump’s dominant performance is impressive.

UPDATE 7:12 p.m. ET:

The Cincinnati area may decide the election in Ohio and could be an early indicator of it’ll be close or a Moreno blowout:

UPDATE 7:10 p.m. ET:

An emerging narrative in Ohio is that there are definitely some Democrats who crossed over to vote in the GOP primary:

Who they voted for, why, and more remains to be seen.

Broader exit polls are expected at 7:30 p.m. ET when the polls close.

UPDATE 7:07 p.m. ET:

The early vote numbers in Ohio–both in person and mail–amount to around 230,000 votes. Dolan will do well with these numbers, but Moreno is expected to clean up on election day totals. So, it may begin the night with a pro-establishment mirage of sorts where Dolan looks strong to start but then fades throughout the night. Margins are key in races like this and the question is whether Moreno can run up the score in key areas.

UPDATE 7:04 p.m. ET:

Polls have closed in most of Florida and will close in Ohio in under half an hour.

While we await results in Ohio, exit polls seem to suggest a very pro-Trump electorate:

That would likely bode well for Moreno over Dolan. We’ll see when the returns start coming in.