Trump's weight in the GOP is at stake in Tuesday's elections

President Donald Trump is not on the ballot, but he has invested time, energy and political capital in a list of primary competitions across America that will test again his influence within his own party.

Voters vote on candidates in seven states on Tuesday, but the competition that matters most for Trump is South Carolina, where he participated in a rally to help Governor Henry McMaster hours before the opening of offices of vote. The Republican governor, one of Trump's early supporters, is fighting for his political life against millionaire John Warren in an election that may embarrass the White House if McMaster fails. "Henry was for me from the beginning, there was nobody else," Trump said Monday night before giving an order to his audience: "Take out your donkeys tomorrow and vote."

The race for the governorship of South Carolina was the latest in a series of primary competitions that took place Tuesday in New York, Utah, Colorado, Oklahoma, Maryland and Mississippi. With the general election in November taking place in four months, more than half of the states will have chosen their candidates in the general election after counting the votes of the day.

History suggests that the Trump Republican Party, like the political party of virtually every first president since Ronald Reagan in 1982, will face heavy losses this fall. Still, it remains to be seen whether the Democrats' demonstrated enthusiasm in the early months of the Trump presidency will be enough to take control of Congress and key governor offices nationwide. .

It is clear, however, that Trump will be an active participant in the GOP's struggle to maintain power.

As he has done in other states with mixed success last year, the president also injected himself on Tuesday in New York, where a convicted felon is fighting for his old job , and in Utah, where the 2012 Republican presidential candidate, Mitt Romney, is seeking a political comeback as a 71 year old freshman.

Last month, Trump entered a disordered congressional primary in New York's only Republican stronghold, Staten Island, calling for the re-election of GOP Representative Dan Donovan. Standing on his way: Michael Grimm, who held the seat until 2015, when he pleaded guilty to knowingly hiring immigrants to the country without legal permission to work in his Manhattan restaurant and cook books to hide his income and escape taxes.

Grimm, who served seven months in prison for the offenses, was also known for his harsh speech in Congress, where he threatened, in camera, to smash a journalist in half "like a boy" and throw him from a balcony. .

Elsewhere in New York, a handful of incumbent Congress members could lose their jobs. They include MP Joe Crowley, considered a candidate to become the next speaker in the House if Democrats win the majority. He is locked in his first serious Democratic primary in more than a decade.

Political newcomer Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, 28, former aide to Massachusetts senator Ted Kennedy, hopes to bring down the Democratic leader. While Crowley is supported by many unions, Ocasio-Cortez has been endorsed by a handful of influential Liberal groups, including MoveOn.

Over 2,000 miles (3,200 kilometers) away in the dark red Utah, Trump also endorsed Romney, who once served as the face of the "Never Trump" movement, but has since warmed to the Trump presidency.

The former Massachusetts governor faces the little-known state Rep. Mike Kennedy, who questions Romney's conservative references and his ability to work well with the president. Kennedy conquered right-wing conservatives at the state's GOP convention early in the year, but he should fight more moderate Republican voters – including many Trump critics – around of the state.

In a rosary published in The Salt Lake Tribune, Romney wrote that Trump's administration policies exceeded his expectations in his first year, but he promised to "keep talking when the president says or does something that divisive, racist, sexist, anti-immigrant, dishonest or destructive to democratic institutions. "

Do not forget Tuesday: races to determine candidates for governorship in Maryland, Colorado and Oklahoma. Oklahoma also decides to legalize the cultivation, possession and use of marijuana for medicinal purposes.

But the most significant test of Trump's influence is found in South Carolina, where McMaster – raised to the forefront of the state last year when Nikki Haley became the ambassador of the United States – is in danger. Two weeks ago, the governor-in-office failed to win the Republican Party's primary victory, demanding a second round of elections this week with Warren.

Warren, a millionaire businessman and a sailor, argued that his outsider candidacy made him, not longtime, the figure of McMaster, closer to Trump. McMaster shocked even his closest advisers when, as Lieutenant Governor in early 2016, he became the first elected official nationwide to support Trump's candidacy for the White House.

The White House has made everything available to save McMaster. Trump visited the state for a fundraiser last year. Vice President Mike Pence appeared at a campaign rally with McMaster over the weekend.

Trump only dedicated a few minutes of his hour – long discourse to the Republican governor that he was there to support. But McMaster got the picture he wanted by kissing Trump as they briefly shared the scene.

"He's a fighter," said McMaster's Trump. "He is tough and he is strong."

McMaster, in turn speaking, called Trump "a true force of nature".