Ohio Senate Race 2026: Leaked GOP Memo Calls Data Centers Husted's Anchor as Brown Leads 53-45

A leaked memo from the campaign arm of Senate Republicans says data centers are "the anchor hanging around Jon Husted's neck." That is not opposition research. That is the National Republican Senatorial Committee, in writing, to artificial intelligence companies. This week, Ohio politics ran through one issue: data centers, and who pays for them.

Host Radell Lewis breaks down the leaked NRSC memo, the OpenAI data center in Piketon, the tax exemption that missed its own state estimate by eleven times over, and the Ohio Attorney General race almost nobody is covering. Every figure is sourced on air.

WHAT IS IN THIS EPISODE:

OpenAI confirmed on August 17 that it is joining the PORTS Pike Technology Campus in Pike County, projecting roughly 35,000 construction jobs through 2032 and 2,500 long term positions. The power source is the story under the story: a $33 billion, 9.2 gigawatt on site natural gas facility.

The math that paused the tax break: Ohio's Department of Taxation estimated the data center sales and use tax exemption would cost about $136 million in 2025. The actual cost was about $1.6 billion, eleven times the estimate, plus $166.8 million out of local budgets. Governor DeWine paused new requests on May 27. The other side of the ledger is real too: exempted facilities reported $27.2 billion in capital investment in 2025.

Two Ohio Supreme Court energy rulings pointing opposite directions, Vivek Ramaswamy's nearly $700,000 private jet bill, the Utica police partnership with ICE, the Clermont County Flock camera case, and the absentee rule change that will cost Ohio voters their ballots. The four day grace period for ballots postmarked by Election Day is gone. Postmarked is no longer good enough.

The Ohio Attorney General race is an open seat: Keith Faber, Republican and current State Auditor, against John Kulewicz, Democrat and retired Vorys partner. What the office controls, including the power to certify or reject the summary language on a citizen ballot initiative before anyone collects a signature, and the sharpest split between them, the FirstEnergy corruption case.

And the marquee: the NRSC memo calls the Senate race a "dead heat," citing private polling it has not released. The most recent public poll, Fox News in the field August 6 to 10 with 1,008 registered Ohio voters, shows Sherrod Brown at 53 and Jon Husted at 45. Both cannot be right.

CHAPTERS:

00:00 - Preshow and Soundcheck 01:57 - Cold Open: The Leaked GOP Memo 03:20 - Welcome to the Purple Political Breakdown, Ohio Edition 03:46 - Today's Rundown 04:47 - Where We Left Off: Data Centers Go Statewide 05:03 - ALIVE Podcast Network 05:59 - OpenAI Confirms the Piketon Data Center 07:57 - DeWine Pauses the Data Center Tax Exemption 08:28 - The $1.6 Billion Miss: Eleven Times the Estimate 09:30 - Ohio Supreme Court Approves Out of State Wind 09:52 - Oak Run Solar Permit Vacated 11:08 - Ramaswamy's $700,000 Private Jet Bill 12:31 - DeWine's Prop Bet Ban Goes Nowhere 12:44 - Utica Police and ICE 13:24 - Flock Camera Case: Grand Jury Declines to Indict 14:11 - Fewer Than 10 Percent of Ohio Lawmakers Are Moms 14:22 - Absentee Ballot Grace Period Eliminated 14:52 - OH-9: Kaptur vs Merrin and the Data Center Ad 16:31 - Ohio Attorney General Race: What the Office Controls 17:50 - Keith Faber, Republican 19:12 - John Kulewicz, Democrat 19:45 - The FirstEnergy Split 20:00 - Senate Marquee: The NRSC Memo 21:05 - Fact Check: Dead Heat vs Brown Plus 8 21:40 - Closing Thoughts

SOURCES NAMED ON AIR: Axios, Signal Statewide, Ohio Capital Journal, Court News Ohio, Fox News poll, Office of Governor Mike DeWine, OpenAI, Reuters, WOSU, The Reporting Project, WVXU, Statehouse News Bureau.

CORRECTIONS: Local governments lost $166.8 million to the data center exemption, not $166.8 billion. Keith Faber's auditor record includes 229 findings for recovery totaling more than $20 million, not $20 billion, and 247 criminal charges against public officials. Those are his reported record as State Auditor, not campaign proposals.

FOLLOW AND CONNECT:

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RESOURCES FOR THIS EPISODE:

Equal Vote Coalition & STAR Voting: https://www.equal.vote/star Future is Now Coalition (FiNC): https://futureis.org/ r/PolicySolutions: https://www.reddit.com/r/policysolutions/ OtherWeb: https://otherweb.com/ Informed daily news text line: 844-406-INFO (844-406-4636), code "purple": https://informed.now CIVICS App: https://www.civicpolitics.com

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