A Republican senator with a family fortune is losing Trump voters in his own deep-red state to a blue-collar challenger.
Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-NE), worth more than $200 million, faces a stiff test from independent Dan Osborn, an industrial mechanic who has turned the senator’s inherited wealth into the centerpiece of his campaign, The New York Times reported Thursday.
Ricketts is an heir to the TD Ameritrade fortune built by his father, Joe Ricketts. Osborn’s ads and social media posts paint the senator as a pampered rich kid whose dad bought him his seat in Washington. Osborn, by contrast, reported making about $108,000 last year at a heating and air conditioning company.
“Nebraska has to make this decision and tell the rest of the country we’re not for sale,” Osborn said after a town hall in Tekamah earlier this month.
That message is landing with some voters who backed President Donald Trump. Sean Dell, a machinist in Seward, voted for Trump twice but told The Times a hard look at his own finances pushed him toward Osborn. Politicians who treat workers like they aren’t worth it are “what gets me going,” he said.
Angel Chavez, a plumber in Columbus who calls himself a conservative, also voted for Trump in 2024. Raising five children has squeezed his household so hard that he said his family has “had to step down to the lower class.” He plans to back Osborn.
Michael Nguyen, a machine technician in Lincoln, has never cast a ballot. He plans to vote for the first time this year, for Osborn. Of wealthy politicians like Ricketts, he asked, “Why would they care about what I’m going through?”
The Ricketts campaign is hitting back. “Senator Ricketts delivers for Nebraskans; Dan Osborn lies to them,” spokesman Max Oberg said. The campaign has attacked Osborn on border security and accused his family of pocketing more than $500,000 from his campaign, though his latest financial disclosure showed he and his wife took in roughly $61,000 from the campaign and his super PAC.
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