Launch midterm campaigning

Obama to launch midterm campaigning this weekend

By EDWARD-ISAAC DOVER

Barack Obama will launch his midterm campaigning this weekend, following a speech on Friday meant to lay out the case against what he’ll call Donald Trump’s dangerous authoritarian politics.

And he’ll start by emphasizing the battle for the House.

The Friday speech will be at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, after which he’ll fly to Irvine, California, for an event on Saturday highlighting all seven Democrats running in districts currently held by Republicans, but carried by Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. All seven are part of Democrats’ path to taking the majority in the House.

Obama will then be in Cleveland next Thursday to campaign for Richard Cordray, his former head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Obama urged Cordray, who was previously the Ohio attorney general, into the race for governor, and has been eager to see him win.

Also on the schedule already, according to his office: an event in Pennsylvania, and a fundraiser for the National Democratic Redistricting Committee in New York City.

Since leaving office, Obama has been caught between Democrats desperate to see him take a more active role — and whose favorable feelings toward him have skyrocketed — while also worried about providing an easy foil for both Trump and other Republicans around the country to rally against.

He’ll be making more appearances through the fall, but keeping them limited, while also making many endorsements all the way down ballot to state races for state legislature and other local offices.