In Nebraska, a Trump-Inspired Candidate Cracks Open Divide in the G.O.P.

WAHOO, Neb. — In his run for governor of Nebraska, Charles W. Herbster is doing his greatest imitation of former President Donald J. Trump.

His 90-minute stump speech is full of complaints about unlawful immigrants, tales boasting of his enterprise triumphs, a conspiracy idea connecting China, the coronavirus pandemic and the 2020 election, and denials of the current accusations that he’s groped ladies at political occasions.

He even vows to wash up the “swamp” — however he means Lincoln, the state capital.

Like his political function mannequin — and chief backer — Mr. Herbster is proving to be a one-man political wrecking ball. In a state lengthy recognized for genteel, collaborative politics and, for the final 24 years, one-party rule, Mr. Herbster’s bid has cracked his social gathering into three camps, with Trump supporters, institution conservatives and business-friendly moderates battling for energy. A significant donor for years to conservative candidates, Mr. Herbster has been deserted by longtime political allies and seen his working mate stop his ticket to run for governor herself. The allegations of groping are coming from fellow Republicans.

Behind all of the drama is a query with resonance far past Nebraska. Mr. Trump’s endorsement of Mr. Herbster, a serious donor to Mr. Trump’s political profession, isn’t simply the first-time candidate’s prime credential — it’s his marketing campaign’s total rationale. Mr. Trump’s title is on Mr. Herbster’s garden indicators, adverts and billboards. Mr. Herbster spent Friday stumping across western Nebraska with Stephen Moore, the previous Trump financial adviser who’s a minor Trumpworld superstar.

Mr. Herbster is about to seek out out if a Trump endorsement alone is sufficient to win a serious Republican main.

“This can be a proxy conflict between your entire Republican institution in America in opposition to President Donald J. Trump,” Mr. Herbster, who campaigns carrying a white cowboy hat and a black vest bearing the emblem of his cattle semen enterprise, stated in an interview Thursday. “Anyone who the institution can’t management, they’re frightened of.”

Mr. Herbster, a longtime Trump ally who was with members of the Trump household through the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol, is working in opposition to Jim Pillen, a College of Nebraska regent who’s backed by the state’s highly effective Ricketts household political machine, and Brett Lindstrom, a youthful state senator who has consolidated assist from the social gathering’s remaining moderates and Democrats. Greater than 8,000 Democrats and independents have switched their registration in current weeks to have some affect on a governor’s contest in an overwhelmingly Republican state. Polling within the remaining days earlier than Tuesday’s vote exhibits the race is a three-way lifeless warmth.

If Ohio’s current Senate main is a information, the three-way race is working in Mr. Herbster’s favor. The Trump-endorsed candidate for Senate, J.D. Vance, gained in a crowded discipline, taking lower than one-third of the vote. (There’s precedent for this in Nebraska. Eight years in the past, Gov. Pete Ricketts gained the nomination with simply over 1 / 4 of the vote.)

However Mr. Trump’s contact is trying much less golden in different states, significantly in two-way contests for governor. In Georgia, former Senator David Perdue, Mr. Trump’s selection, is lagging far behind Gov. Brian Kemp in polling, main Mr. Trump to distance himself from that marketing campaign. In Idaho, the previous president has backed Lt. Gov. Janice McGeachin’s problem in opposition to Gov. Brad Little. Ms. McGeachin has struggled to achieve traction, and Mr. Trump hasn’t talked about her since his endorsement in November.

Mr. Trump has thrown his full weight behind Mr. Herbster. On Sunday, he traveled to Nebraska for a rally and appeared on a convention name for Herbster supporters Thursday evening, the place he forged Mr. Herbster’s rivals as “Republicans in title solely.”

“Charles was a die-hard MAGA champion,” Mr. Trump stated on the decision. “Once you vote for Charles within the main, you may give a stinging rebuke to the RINOs and sellouts and the losers who’re so poorly representing your state.”

Like Mr. Trump within the 2016 Republican presidential main, Mr. Herbster is going through accusations that he has mistreated ladies and tried to make use of that truth to achieve assist. Two ladies, together with a state senator, publicly accused him of groping them at a political occasion in 2019. Mr. Herbster has denied the claims and broadcast a TV advert slamming his accuser.

“Any allegation that was despatched my approach is 100% completely false,” he stated in an interview.

He has repeatedly blamed the accusations on Mr. Ricketts, a conservative two-term incumbent who can’t run once more due to time period limits. The Ricketts household has feuded with Mr. Trump. It spent tens of millions on a last-ditch effort to dam Mr. Trump from profitable the Republican presidential nomination in 2016; Trump then stated the household higher “watch out.”

Mr. Ricketts, who tried speaking Mr. Trump out of endorsing Mr. Herbster final 12 months, is blunt about his opposition to Mr. Herbster’s bid. He considers the groping allegations disqualifying. Ought to Mr. Herbster win the Republican nomination, Mr. Ricketts is not going to endorse him except he “apologizes to the ladies he’s accomplished this to,” he stated in an interview.

Mr. Herbster was going through criticism effectively earlier than the allegations. Some Republicans bristled at his concentrate on the type of divisive cultural points that don’t usually dominate the political conservation within the state. He campaigns on eliminating intercourse training in Nebraska’s public colleges, cracking down on unlawful immigration and curbing China’s affect.

In July, his working mate, the previous state senator Theresa Thibodeau, stop the ticket and later jumped into the race herself. She stated Mr. Herbster had little curiosity in something aside from making an attempt to emulate Mr. Trump.

“If you wish to lead the state, it is best to get your data up on insurance policies that have an effect on our state,” she stated on Thursday. “He had no initiative or willingness to do this.”

However Mr. Herbster’s message resonated with Trump conservatives, and shortly one in all his rivals adopted go well with. Mr. Pillen, a 66-year-old former defensive again for the College of Nebraska’s soccer workforce with a grandfatherly demeanor, promised to ban essential race idea on the College of Nebraska and bar transgender ladies from collaborating in ladies’s sports activities or utilizing ladies’s loos.

“Each the Pillen and the Herbster campaigns have centered on nationwide problems with which they’ve little management over and they need to have been extra centered on state points,” stated former Gov. Dave Heineman, a Republican who was on Mr. Herbster’s payroll after leaving workplace. He hasn’t but made an endorsement.

Mr. Pillen downplayed Mr. Trump’s affect within the race.

“Nebraskans, we prefer to determine issues out and clear up our personal issues and suppose for ourselves,” he stated.

Mr. Lindstrom, a 41-year-old state senator who additionally performed soccer for Nebraska, is working a marketing campaign transported from the pre-Trump period. He highlights cooperation with Democrats in Nebraska’s unicameral legislature and, whereas he stated he had no regrets about voting twice for Mr. Trump, stated he’d desire “a brand new face” in 2024.

Whereas Nebraska’s Republican primaries are usually determined by conservative rural voters who’re deeply loyal to Mr. Trump, Mr. Lindstrom, a wonky monetary adviser, is betting his marketing campaign on interesting to city professionals round Omaha — the place Mr. Trump misplaced one of many state’s Electoral School votes to President Biden.

“The model and model that’s happening within the Republican Occasion proper now has created lots of wedges,” Mr. Lindstrom stated. “That isn’t actually wholesome.”

At a Wednesday fund-raiser for Mr. Lindstrom at an upscale Italian restaurant in Omaha, about half of the 2 dozen folks interviewed stated they voted for Mr. Biden in 2020. A handful had switched events to vote for Mr. Lindstrom within the main.

Allen Frederickson, the chief govt of a well being care firm who turned a Republican to vote for Mr. Lindstrom, stated electing Mr. Herbster would make it laborious to recruit staff to Nebraska’s booming financial system, which has the nation’s lowest unemployment price.

“Trumpism would affect our inner and exterior picture as a state,” he stated. “We’d like Nebraska to be an interesting state from a enterprise perspective.”

Mr. Herbster makes little effort to enchantment outdoors of the Trump constituency. He begins his speeches, whether or not to Trump-hatted supporters in Wahoo or bankers within the Omaha suburbs, by providing “greetings from the forty fifth president of america of America, Donald J. Trump.”

Like Mr. Trump, Mr. Herbster casts doubt on the legitimacy of American elections. In Wahoo, he posited an outlandish idea in regards to the former president’s loss.

“That is the reality,” he advised supporters. “The pandemic got here from China. It was timed completely to guarantee that they might rig the elections so Mark Zuckerberg might put $400 million into the toll the final 4 months of the election. As a result of whether or not you prefer it or not, they didn’t need Donald J. Trump to be president for 2 phrases, that’s precisely what occurred.”

Mr. Herbster has little use for or curiosity within the traditions of Nebraska politics. He referred to as for ending the state’s system of nonpartisan elections, eliminating the state board of training and stated that, on his first day in workplace, he’d demand the tourism bureau change its quirky slogan: “Nebraska. Actually, it’s not for everybody.”

The query Nebraska’s Republican main voters will decide on Tuesday is whether or not any of that issues — or issues greater than Mr. Trump’s stamp of approval.

“It’s every part,” stated former Consultant Lee Terry of Omaha, a Herbster supporter. “There’s lots of Trump folks in Nebraska.”