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For decades, Mahoning and Trumbull were reliable Democratic counties.
If Democratic candidates didn't get at least 60% of the vote in Mahoning and at least 55% support in Trumbull, they stood no chance of winning Ohio. Even with those vote totals, Democrats sometimes would be disappointed in the results from the two counties.
I recall during a post-2000 presidential election forum that an Ohio Democratic Party official specifically criticized the results in Mahoning and Trumbull as being a key reason why Democrat Al Gore lost the state to Republican George W. Bush by 3.51%.
Gore received 60.65% of the vote in Mahoning, his highest percentage in the state, while he got 59.9% in Trumbull, the third-highest percentage for him in Ohio. In a presidential race, Democrats expected more from the two counties.
Democrats got it in 2004 when Democrat John Kerry received 62.6% in Mahoning and 61.65% in Trumbull against Bush. But it wasn't enough as Bush won Ohio by 2.1%.
During the 2006 election, Democrat Sherrod Brown got 73.5% of the vote in Mahoning for the Senate and 73.1% in Trumbull as he defeated Republican Mike DeWine, the incumbent. Brown won Ohio by 12.3% so the landslides in Mahoning and Trumbull were key.
In the 2008 presidential election, Democrat Barack Obama received 62.24% of the vote in Mahoning and 59.8% in Trumbull - lower percentages than Kerry four years earlier. But Obama won Ohio by 4.61%.
In Brown's 2012 reelection bid, he beat Republican Josh Mandel by 6% in Ohio. Brown received 66.4% of the vote in Mahoning and 62.6% in Trumbull in that election.
Then along came Donald Trump in 2016. He became the first Republican running for his first term to win Trumbull County since Herbert Hoover in 1928, before the area became blue. Trump lost Mahoning by 3.28% that year in a race far closer than many expected.
Suddenly, Mahoning and Trumbull weren't so reliable for Democrats anymore.
Republicans did well in the two counties in 2018 though they only picked up a couple of seats. They did better in 2020 with Trump on the ballot and him winning both counties. Republicans improved on that in 2022. With Trump again on the ballot in 2024 and winning both counties, his coattails helped elect several Republicans in the area that year.
Not a single Republican in a contested race in Trumbull County lost in 2022 or 2024. Also, 2024 was the worst performance for Democrats in Mahoning in decades though the signs were there in 2022 with every statewide candidate - including Tim Ryan, who represented much of the Valley in Congress for two decades, losing Mahoning and Trumbull in his U.S. Senate bid.
Having Trump on the ballot also hurt Brown, who lost Mahoning County by 0.2 of a percent and Trumbull by 5.71% - the first time he was ever defeated in either county.
But with Trump not on the ballot this year and a controversial ad hurting Vivek Ramaswamy, the Republican candidate for governor, along with the increased costs of gas, utilities and groceries, Democrats have an opening in the two counties of which they once so heavily relied.
Looking to boost the campaigns of Ramaswamy and U.S. Sen. Jon Husted - who are facing Democrats Amy Acton and Brown, respectively - Trump rallied in Youngstown on Oct. 12. It was the second of three rallies the president had in Ohio.
Coming to Youngstown was no coincidence.
This area is pivotal when it comes to the statewide races.
During a Sept. 30 event at Mahoning County Republican Party headquarters, U.S. Sen. Bernie Moreno, the Republican who beat Brown in the 2024 Senate race, said that if he looks on election night and sees Republican candidates winning in Mahoning and Trumbull, he doesn't need to look any further because he knows they've won the state.
David Pepper, the Democratic lieutenant governor candidate, told me Oct. 15 that the race will likely be decided by results in Mahoning and particularly Trumbull.
Pepper said: "Trumbull County is almost the perfect bellwether these days for how you can do in Ohio. If it's close to even or blue that candidate will win the state if they're a Democrat. So we view this area as sort of really center to winning the state."
Pepper said: "We know they went red in the Trump era, and our hope and goal is to win them back. If you see a blue Trumbull County, that's a very good sign for the entire state."
It's also personal for Acton, a Youngstown native who graduated from Liberty High School.
Acton said Tuesday: "These counties have been a part of my campaign from the very beginning. I'm a Youngstown, Ohio, girl through and through. It's a deep part of who I am."
Earlier this year, Husted and Brown told me their connections to the Mahoning Valley would make them the best candidate to serve the area.
Husted said he's focused his political career on "the stuff that matters to people (in the Valley) - jobs infrastructure. I have been involved with the Mahoning County Career (& Technical) Center expansion and the additive manufacturing movement in the Mahoning Valley and the businesses that create jobs. I also have the same values as people there."
Husted added: "They're for us, and we will win. But I never take them for granted. I will work to earn every vote."
Brown vowed to win Mahoning and Trumbull, saying, "The fact that you saw me almost once a month for 18 years, I have a rapport with the Valley (that's) unusual for a politician in either party that doesn't live there. I would not assume, because I'm going to earn it, that many, many of those voters are coming back."
David Skolnick covers politics for the Tribune Chronicle and The Vindicator.