By The Daily Caller (U.S.) | Created at 2026-10-07 19:16:45 | Updated at 2026-10-08 22:57:08
1 day ago
President Donald Trump kicked off October campaigning in states where Republicans don’t usually need the help: Oklahoma, Alabama, Nebraska — and Ohio, a state he won by 11 points less than two years ago.
But Republicans involved in the midterms say the Buckeye State isn’t nearly as red as outsiders assume.
“It’s pink,” one GOP official involved in the midterms told the Daily Caller.
Despite trailing in recent polling, party officials say they’re cautiously optimistic about both the governor’s and Senate races.
A Marist University poll released Wednesday showed Democrat Amy Acton ahead of Republican Vivek Ramaswamy 50-44 in the governor’s race and Democrat Sherrod Brown leading Republican Jon Husted 51-43 in the Senate race.
Part of what makes Ohio competitive, the GOP official who described the state as pink said, is its political geography. The official argued that Ohio’s competitiveness can’t be chalked up to any one issue, affordability concerns or Trump’s national standing alone.
“We have Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland, three major league cities. I say that because when you have major league sports, you have major clumps of Democrats,” the official said. “If the Democrats can turn out their base in the three cities, then they end up being pretty competitive in this state. That’s what I think is happening.”
Ohioans also have a history of splitting their tickets, a second official noted. In 2018, Republican Mike DeWine won the governor’s race while Democrat Sherrod Brown won reelection to the Senate.
Republicans say they are seeing signs of improvement for Ramaswamy in the governor’s race.
The second official also told the Caller that Democrat Amy Acton’s apparent decision not to debate Ramaswamy has hurt her, pointing to ads hammering her over the decision across the state. The official said the message appears to be landing with voters.
“Acton has largely been doing the Biden basement playbook,” the source said.
The official acknowledged that Ramaswamy had made his share of unforced errors but said Republicans believe the race has tightened and are cautiously optimistic about his campaign.
Across both races, the official said, the biggest issues are the economy, tariffs and data centers.
The official said some Ohioans are watching their cost of living rise while seeing data centers built nearby and drawing a connection between the two.
For Husted, that broader economic anxiety has converged around data centers.
“He hasn’t been on the ticket in a while and hasn’t been defined independently of DeWine,” the source said, describing Husted’s vulnerabilities with the Republican base.
As backlash to data centers gained steam, national Republicans began sounding the alarm.
In August, the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) sent a memo to artificial intelligence companies warning that the backlash could hurt Husted politically.
“If he loses and data centers get the blame, politicians across the country will take notice — and they will not go near the next one,” the memo said, urging the companies to help blunt the backlash. “This has become a sleeper issue for the entire election cycle.”
The second official told the Caller that critics are “laying it at the feet of Husted.” The senator was lieutenant governor when Ohio aggressively courted major technology investments, including Intel’s decision to build a massive semiconductor manufacturing project in the state.
In the official’s view, that history has helped make Husted the face of large-scale technology development in Ohio — including data centers — in part because voters don’t have a clear picture of him otherwise.
The official who described Ohio as pink called the data center issue “a real one,” pointing to anxiety in rural parts of the state where Republicans have traditionally run up the score. The official said Republicans could ease some of that anxiety by reassuring their base that GOP leaders won’t allow data-center development to overwhelm local communities.
Husted’s camp rejects the idea that the senator should be defined by the data-center backlash. A source close to the senator pointed to the Ratepayer Protection Act, which is aimed at preventing infrastructure and electricity costs created by large data centers from being passed on to ordinary ratepayers. The source accused Senate Democrats of blocking the legislation to deny Husted a political win against Brown.
“The Senate Democrats, led by Chuck Schumer himself, who’s buddy-buddy with Sherrod Brown, they’ve been fighting and stopping Senator Husted at every turn because they know it’s a political win for Husted,” the source said. “They would rather see these utility costs pass on to the consumers rather than having the data centers own it themselves, and it’s really a shame.”
A third official involved in Ohio’s midterms told the Caller that affordability is central to the Republican campaign message, which has leaned heavily on the Working Families Tax Cut, particularly its provisions eliminating taxes on tips, overtime and Social Security. (RELATED: Republicans Rebrand Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill Ahead Of Midterms)
Higher gas prices amid the conflict in Iran have compounded broader affordability concerns for Trump and the White House heading into the 2026 midterms. Republican candidates are now trying to defend their party’s economic record while convincing voters they can bring costs down.
The source close to Husted pointed to Ohio’s recent ranking as the top state in the country for business and an average tax refund of $3,500 as central pieces of the senator’s affordability pitch.
Husted has also put some distance between himself and the president on the Iran war, telling Politico in September that “the war needs to come to an end as quickly as possible so that we can lower gas prices.”
Republicans are backing Husted’s message with a ground operation. The RNC and affiliated groups have knocked on more than one million doors on Husted’s behalf, the third official said, including in all 88 Ohio counties during the final weekend of September.
Even as candidates occasionally put distance between themselves and Trump on policy, officials say they still view the president as crucial to turning out the Republican base.
“The president won Ohio by 11 percentage points less than two years ago. I understand people want to stay home. There are some affordability issues. There’s always going to be some slippage in the midterm. But he fires up the people we need fired up,” the source said.
Trump’s Saturday rally was part of that turnout push. Ramaswamy and Husted both joined Trump on stage at Butler High School in Vandalia, just north of Dayton.
During the rally, Trump made the case for data centers and echoed Husted’s argument that Democrats were blocking the Ratepayer Protection Act. He urged Ohioans to act like he is on the ballot in November and argued that the state’s economy is “booming.”
“We want them. Look, there’s so much money to be made for Ohio, you can’t just turn them off. They’ll go to China,” Trump said of data centers.
The rally is also unlikely to be Trump’s last Ohio stop before Election Day.
A source familiar with the president’s October plans told the Caller that, while nothing is yet booked, Trump and Vice President JD Vance are expected to return to Ohio multiple times before Election Day.
Trump could return as soon as next week, according to The Hill, for another rally with Husted.
By the end of June, Vance had visited Ohio twice, while Cabinet officials had made 19 visits.
“This is a chance to turn out the vote and get the base excited,” the source close to Husted said of Trump and Vance’s visits. “Low propensity voters are the target. We want to get people who don’t normally vote in the midterms out there to support the senator because that’s really what it’s going to come down to.”
The second official was blunter: Husted’s core problem, the official argued, is that much of the Republican base still doesn’t know him well, making appearances by Trump and Vance particularly valuable.
“When I run, we win,” Trump said Saturday. “When I don’t, there are … less people [that vote]. What I’m going to do is ask you to just pretend that I’m running.”
