The first time I met Tim Ryan, he was announcing his plans to run for the state Senate.

It was early 2000 and after listening to Ryan, who was 26 years old at the time, I wasn’t impressed.

Few gave Ryan a chance to win the Democratic primary, but he pulled off a victory and went on to win the general election.

When the area’s congressional seat opened up in 2002 after James A. Traficant Jr.’s convictions and subsequent expulsion from the U.S. House, Ryan asked me and others about his potential candidacy.

I told him it was a no-lose situation because he didn’t have to give up his state Senate seat to run, and if he lost, he’d have gotten his name out there.

During the Democratic primary, Ryan made an unintentional but large mistake when he had a former high school coach co-sign a $50,000 loan for his congressional campaign. That meant the coach gave him a $25,000 contribution under federal election laws — more than 10 times the allowable limit.

I wrote about the issue a number of times and because momentum was starting to swing Ryan’s way, his opponents capitalized on it. For a few weeks, Ryan refused to talk to me.

Ryan removed the coach from the loan, and years later, his campaign paid a fine.

As we know, Ryan defied odds again and won that primary and general election.

On the night of the primary, I was in downtown Youngstown waiting for incumbent U.S. Rep. Thomas Sawyer of Akron, favored to win, to give a victory speech that never was delivered.

After Sawyer’s concession, I quickly drove to Ryan’s event in Niles. Several in the crowd recognized me and let it be known I should leave. Things got a little crazy when Ryan gave his victory speech and a TV cameraman looking for a better shot threatened to hit me if I didn’t move, which was impossible to do in a packed space. Ryan saw what was happening and pulled me up on stage, delivering his speech with his arm around me.

I called him the next day — remember that he stopped talking to me a few weeks prior — and he picked up the phone saying we needed a strong working relationship.

It was a sign of great maturity.

Over the 20 years Ryan served in the U.S. House, his instincts often served him and this area well. Not everything worked out, but Ryan’s efforts have helped the Valley.

Those two decades in the House end Dec. 31 because Ryan chose not to seek re-election and instead ran for U.S. Senate. He lost that race by 6.11 percent to Republican J.D. Vance. Ryan wasn’t helped by a terrible Democratic statewide ticket.

Ryan brought integrity to a congressional seat that was filled with corruption and embarrassment for much of Traficant’s time.

Ryan used his political savvy to gain a spot on the powerful House Appropriations Committee and helped steer money and other federal resources to this area.

In the last few years, Ryan made a few political missteps, most notably his ill-fated attempt in 2019 to run for president.

Also, his constituents in Trumbull and Mahoning counties stopped supporting him as strongly as they had through most of his political career. That was primarily because voters here have become much more Republican. Ryan tried to react to that, but those voters continued to leave him and never came back.

In his 2020 re-election to the House, he lost Trumbull, his home county, for the first time.

The two counties rejected him in last month’s Senate race with Ryan losing Trumbull by 7.1 percent — a bigger defeat than his statewide loss — and Mahoning by 3.46 percent.

Ryan wouldn’t even have sought the Senate seat had Republican Rob Portman run for re-election. But with congressional redistricting that had Ohio lose one seat, Ryan would have had serious problems winning another House term as he likely would have faced an incumbent Republican in a safe Republican district.

During the campaign, I asked Ryan what he would do if he lost. He said there are headhunters who help former members of Congress find jobs.

I don’t know what the future holds for Ryan, but he certainly had an impact on the Valley.

Skolnick covers politics for The Vindicator and the Tribune Chronicle.

dskolnick@vindy.com