Republicans sweep Ohio raising questions about whether its a swing state

Ohio voters made a clear choice in this year's election: They want Republicans in charge.

GOP candidates swept the statewide offices, picked up all three seats on the state Supreme Court and are on track to expand their supermajority in the state Senate.

"We have a mandate for continued Republican leadership in Ohio for the next four years," Ohio Republican Party Chair Bob Paduchik told a jubilant crowd at the GOP watch party Tuesday night.

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Democratic candidates were more circumspect, saying the fight for what they believe in must continue.

"We can keep working to pass common sense gun reform, and make all of our communities more safe," former Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley said in a statement after losing the race for governor. "We can keep working to raise the minimum wage, pass universal pre-k, and every other common sense policy that working families need in this state."

But whether Demo0crats will have any influence over state government remains to be seen.

Republicans will control how the next set of maps for state and federal districts get drawn. They will decide whether those boundaries are constitutional. Whether abortions should be outlawed from the moment of conception and whether all school children deserve a voucher for private school.

Is Ohio a swing state?

In 2004 presidential election between George W. Bush and John Kerry, Ohio was one of the most-contested states in the country and neither presidential candidate thought he could win without the Buckeye State. That turned out to be true, for without Ohio, Bush would not have won reelection. For more than 50 years, Ohio voters correctly chose the leader of the free world.

The streak of Ohio siding with the winner of the White House ended in 2020 when Joe Biden became president without taking Ohio.

"Ohio is older, whiter and has less education than the rest of the country," University of Cincinnati political science professor David Niven said. "That’s why it's redder."

But that's a big shift because Ohio's blue-collar voters used to pick Democrats. They were part of the Democratic base in Ohio and a key constituency for U.S. Rep Tim Ryan in his quest to win Ohio's open U.S. Senate race this cycle. Ryan lost the race to Republican J.D. Vance.

"They made Ohio a swing state in the past," Niven said. "Overwhelming success with the blue-collar base."

Now, it appears, those voters support Republicans. Ryan lost his home county of Mahoning 52% to 48%, according to unofficial election results.

"Ohioans have sent a clear message to Washington Democrats that we will not tolerate their policies that are bankrupting our families and destroying our nation," Republican Auditor Keith Faber said in a statement after winning reelection.

The suburbs: Where Democrats go from here

Just up the road from Columbus sits Delaware County. Once considered a farming community, the area is now the fastest-growing county in the state. Its population quadrupled during the last four decades from 54,000 to more than 220,000, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau.

And the number of Democratic voters is also on the rise.

President Barack Obama won about 36,600 votes (40%) in 2008, but President Biden got nearly 58,000 (47%) in 2020. Ryan did about the same as Biden, according to unofficial election results.

Hamilton County is seeing a similar pattern. The bedroom communities around Cincinnati are getting a little bluer each election cycle and this year it finally culminated in the unseating of longtime Republican U.S. Rep. Steve Chabot. Democratic Cincinnati City Councilman Greg Landsman scored one of the few Democratic wins in Ohio Tuesday.

"You have to wonder if those high education, high-income places that were once ruby red are purpling," Niven said. "If that were to happen it would be based on an entirely different premise than what made Ohio a swing state in the past."

Ohio's Democratic Party, he said, would then be shifting from one that "used to win with people who never ordered a latte in their lives to a party whose future depends on people who order lattes every day."

Anna Staver is a reporter for the USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau, which serves the Columbus Dispatch, Cincinnati Enquirer, Akron Beacon Journal and 18 other affiliated news organizations across Ohio.

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Republicans sweep Ohio raising questions about swing state status