J.D. Vance, the Trump-backed Republican nominee for Ohio’s U.S. Senate seat going head-to-head against Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH) in November, slammed his opponent over the weekend for abandoning workers in Youngstown, Ohio, during the pandemic.

During a recent Turning Point Action (TPA) “Unite and Win” rally in Youngstown, Ohio, Vance slammed Ryan for forgetting about the families in Youngstown who wanted to work, earn a living, and put food on the dinner table of their children.

Vance said that President Joe Biden and Ryan’s plan required anyone who wanted to live their life and provide for their family to get big pharma’s vaccine. He added that Ryan “was kissing up to Nancy Pelosi” and “bending the knee to the Washington Democrats” when workers were begging the government to stop enforcing vaccine mandates.

“Where was Tim Ryan when workers were begging the government to stop enforcing this vaccine? Where was Tim Ryan when the workers at Youngstown were saying, ‘Don’t make us get this shot in order to provide for our families,'” Vance said.

“We got to change that. And ladies and gentlemen, we will. We are going to take back the Senate. We are going to take back the Congress. We are going to start changing the problems in this country,” Vance continued.

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“We do not have to live like this. We do not have to let the Chinese steal our manufacturing base. We do not let it have to let the pharmaceutical industry force a product on us in order for us to get a job,” Vance, who’s currently leading in the poll, added.

Last week, in the first poll since the unprecedented Mar-a-Lago raid, Emerson College Polling showed that Vance and Republicans had overtaken Democrats in the Buckeye State. Vance led Ryan by three points, 45 percent to 42 percent.

In fact, when the voters were asked, “regardless of whom they support, which candidate they expect to win,” a majority of the respondents (52 percent) said Vance would win, compared to the 48 percent who said Ryan.

“We do not have to throw open the southern border, killing tens of thousands of Ohioans with the poison that the cartels are bringing across; we can go in a different direction,” Vance finished.

Jacob Bliss is a reporter for Breitbart News. Write to him at jbliss@breitbart.com or follow him on Twitter @JacobMBliss.