Many Mahoning Valley candidates quit races

March 6, 2026

It’s not that difficult to get on the ballot — though plenty of candidates over the years struggle to qualify. It’s even easier to get off it. All a person who qualifies for the ballot needs to do is submit a letter of withdrawal and they’re no longer a candidate. There’s already been four people who turned in valid nominating petitions to run for seats in the Mahoning Valley and who qualified for the May 5 primary election who then changed their mind and withdrew. This is a relatively small election, if you don’t include the central committee races for both political ...

Changing political parties has become commonplace

February 27, 2026

With the changing political climate in the Mahoning Valley, it didn’t come as a major shock that Trumbull County Common Pleas Court Judge Cynthia Westcott Rice, a longtime Democrat, switched political parties and filed as a Republican. But after pledging her allegiance to being a Republican, Rice withdrew from the race Tuesday, about three weeks after she filed. Having an incumbent change political parties when seeking reelection was uncommon in Trumbull and Mahoning counties. It isn’t so much anymore as Mahoning County Sheriff Jerry Greene did it in 2024, going from a Democrat to ...

Sizing up Mahoning Valley’s court of appeals elections

February 20, 2026

Tired of losing courts of appeals and Ohio Supreme Court races, Republicans changed the rules starting with the 2022 election — and have largely benefited. The Republican-controlled state Legislature passed a law in 2021, which took effect with the 2022 election, requiring party affiliation on the ballot for those running for seats on courts of appeals and the Supreme Court. Before that, candidates ran in party primaries and then didn’t have party affiliation in the general election. During the 2018 and 2020 elections, Democrats won three of four Supreme Court races and continued ...

Congress candidates face struggle to beat Rulli, Joyce

February 13, 2026

Those challenging the two incumbents who represent the Mahoning Valley — U.S. Reps. Dave Joyce, R-Bainbridge, and Michael Rulli, R-Salem — face tremendous odds to beat them. Defeating a sitting member of the U.S. House is very difficult. With the power of incumbency comes name recognition and a considerable amount of money, largely provided by political action committees who know the reliable votes of those already serving in Congress, particularly for a long time. OpenSecrets, a website that provides data and analysis of money in politics, also tracks the reelection rate of U.S. ...

Trumbull County Democrats’ viability continues to nosedive

February 6, 2026

The Trumbull County Democratic Party is seemingly in free fall, failing to field candidates in races that were winnable just a few years ago. Before the 2020 election, Democrats held every elected executive branch seat in the county and most of the judicial positions. Also, the county’s two state representatives and Ohio senator as well as its congressman were Democrats. In the 2022 and 2024 elections, every single Republican on both ballots in contested races won. The Democrats currently hold just two county executive branch positions — prosecutor and coroner. No Republicans ...

DeWine regrets he signed sports gambling legislation

January 30, 2026

While Frank Sinatra sang about “regrets, I’ve had a few, but then again, too few to mention,” Mike DeWine was quick to mention his biggest regret during his seven years as governor: signing the bill to legalize sports gambling. In a 60-minute interview earlier this week, DeWine said: “On the negative side, I’ve been pretty open about saying that if I had to do it over again I would not have signed the gaming bill. I don’t think I fully appreciated how many millions of dollars these gaming companies would spend coming into the state of Ohio to get more and more people ...