The Most Consequential Ohio Ballot in a Generation, Explained

Here is something to consider. Every single statewide executive office in Ohio is on the ballot this year, and not one incumbent is defending a seat. Governor, attorney general, secretary of state, auditor, treasurer, all of it wide open, because term limits cleared the building at once. Add a U.S. Senate seat, two Ohio Supreme Court seats, and a handful of congressional districts that could help decide which party controls the House, and you are looking at the most consequential Ohio ballot in a generation. On this week's Purple Political Breakdown Ohio Edition, I walked through the entire thing, then through the Statehouse news that tells you what kind of fight this is going to be.

The full statewide ticket

Governor: Amy Acton vs. Vivek Ramaswamy. U.S. Senate: Sherrod Brown vs. Jon Husted. Attorney General: John Kulewicz vs. Keith Faber. Secretary of State: Allison Russo vs. Robert Sprague. Auditor: Annette Blackwell vs. Frank LaRose. Treasurer: Seth Walsh vs. Jay Edwards. And two Ohio Supreme Court seats: Marilyn Zayas vs. Dan Hawkins, and Jennifer Brunner vs. Colleen O'Donnell. Brunner is currently the only Democrat holding a top statewide office in the entire state.

The competitive U.S. House races worth watching are OH-1, OH-9 (a Kaptur vs. Merrin rematch), and OH-13. Here is the full slate, with incumbents marked: OH-1 Greg Landsman (D, i) vs. Eric Conroy (R), OH-2 Jen Mazzuckelli (D) vs. David Taylor (R, i), OH-3 Joyce Beatty (D, i) vs. Cleophus Dulaney (R), OH-4 Joshua Kolasinski (D) vs. Jim Jordan (R, i), OH-5 Brian Shaver (D) vs. Bob Latta (R, i), OH-6 Elizabeth Kirtley (D) vs. Michael Rulli (R, i), OH-7 Brian Poindexter (D) vs. Max Miller (R, i), OH-8 Vanessa Enoch (D) vs. Warren Davidson (R, i), OH-9 Marcy Kaptur (D, i) vs. Derek Merrin (R), OH-10 Kristina Knickerbocker (D) vs. Mike Turner (R, i), OH-11 Shontel Brown (D, i) vs. Mike Kirchner (R), OH-12 Jerrad Christian (D) vs. Troy Balderson (R, i), OH-13 Emilia Sykes (D, i) vs. Carey Coleman (R), OH-14 Maria Jukic (D) vs. David Joyce (R, i), and OH-15 Don Leonard (D) vs. Mike Carey (R, i). The honest advice is to look up your own district, because awareness is the first step to everything that follows.

Who actually runs the Ohio GOP right now

There is an old saying that a state's governor is the real leader of his party. In Ohio right now, that may not be true. Vivek Ramaswamy has not won anything yet. He is the nominee, not the governor. But this month he acted like the man in charge, and the actual governor mostly reacted.

Ramaswamy called in a Cincinnati Enquirer op-ed for a constitutional amendment to lock Ohio's 2023 photo ID voting law into the state constitution. Within days, Speaker Matt Huffman and Senate President Rob McColley, who is also Ramaswamy's running mate, moved to put it on the November ballot. Having your ID when you vote is normal and fine. The thing to watch is whether this is the leading edge of something broader, the kind of citizenship-verification and paperwork regime that history shows creates real barriers. I want to see the actual language before I trust the intent.

Then Ramaswamy rolled out a Medicaid fraud plan, framed as cleaning up a problem he says grew on Gov. DeWine's watch. DeWine was not invited to the news conference. He answered the same day with his own anti-fraud package. When a nominee with no office is setting the agenda and the sitting governor is responding to it, you are watching a party reorganize itself in real time.

The attorney general seat changes hands early, and the FirstEnergy question hangs over it

Attorney General Dave Yost is resigning effective June 7 to join the Alliance Defending Freedom. It is unusual for an elected constitutional officer to leave midterm. DeWine appointed his public safety director, Andy Wilson, as a caretaker until the November winner takes office. Wilson was asked whether he would continue the office's high-profile bribery prosecution tied to the FirstEnergy scandal, the largest corruption case in modern Ohio history. He declined to answer. That silence is the story.

The money stories voters should hold onto

Ohio's sales tax exemption for data centers cost the state about $555 million in 2024 and roughly $1.6 billion in 2025, against the tax department's own forecast of about $136 million. The savings flow to Amazon, Meta, and Google. I have said before that AI is the future and that Ohio can lead on it, but it has to be a careful conversation. If residents' bills rise and jobs do not materialize while a few of the largest companies on earth pocket the break, then this stopped being about a better Ohio and became about a better quarter for a handful of shareholders.

County of the Week is Cuyahoga, where three homeowners lost their houses to tax foreclosure, one over a $620 debt, and the county kept the full value of the homes rather than returning the surplus. The Ohio Supreme Court agreed to hear the case, putting property taxes on the high court's docket in an election year. One county, two stories, one question: who does the system protect when the dollars get big, and who does it protect when the dollars get small?

Where I land

This is an open-everything ballot in a state where the last Democrat to win a statewide executive office did it in 2006. I am hard on the current Republican leadership because the record earns it: a corruption case nobody in charge will commit to finishing, a giveaway that ballooned to ten times its forecast, and a nominee steering the party before a single vote is counted. I am not carrying water for the other side either. I care about political solutions without political bias, and about whether the system actually meets people's needs.

We are working toward a better Ohio because we are working toward a better America. That starts with knowing your ballot. Look up your district, know your races, and vote.

Listen to the full episode here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-most-important-ohio-election-in-our-generation/id1626987640?i=1000769259490