BOARDMAN — The Mahoning County Republican Party reelected Tom McCabe as its executive committee chairman and returned him to head the central committee after a yearlong experiment to split the two positions.

The committee unanimously elected McCabe as chairman of both committees at a Thursday night meeting.

McCabe, who is also director of the county board of elections, was first elected party chairman in February 2019 to fill the remainder of an unexpired term after the retirement of Mark Munroe, who led the party for nine years.

McCabe was elected in 2022 to a full four-year term. But the party decided in 2025 to split the chairmanship with McCabe leading the executive committee and electing Drew Carchedi as central committee chairman.

Carchedi decided to not seek reelection and the party selected McCabe on Thursday to lead both committees.

“Drew had family and work obligations,” McCabe said. “It’s a lot of work and a lot of time. We split it in 2025 because it’s so much work. As the party grew over eight or nine years, the thought in 2025 was to split the workload.”

McCabe said he asked a few people to replace Carchedi, but they all declined.

“I wasn’t going to put someone in there just to have a name,” McCabe said. “It’s not a big deal for me to run both committees. I did the work before, and we have a lot of good people to help out.”

The party also reelected state Rep. Tex Fischer of Canfield as the central committee’s first vice chairman and attorney A. Ross Douglass as first vice chairman of the executive committee.

As chairman, McCabe selected Tracy Clemente as secretary of the central committee and is still considering candidates for secretary of the executive committee.

The party has one treasurer and McCabe reappointed Sandra Barger to that position.

With McCabe heading the party, Republicans in 2024 won four of the six contested county executive branch races and control six of the 11 positions.

The races won by Republicans in Mahoning County in 2024 — a county commissioner seat, prosecutor, clerk of courts and recorders — were by less than 2% in every race but recorder, which was by 3%.

Democrats had dominated Mahoning County government for decades, but saw that change primarily because of President Donald Trump, whose presence on the 2024 ballot greatly helped down-ticket Republican candidates.