Trump Keeps Lead in Ohio as Moreno Closes on Brown and Vivek Leads Governor’s Race: New Polls Signal National Realignment
BREAKING—A new poll shows Democrats on notice in the Buckeye state — and establishment Republicans. New data confirms Ohio on lock for former President Donald Trump but also outsider Republicans gathering strength in Ohio. With Ohio’s electorate consistently a signpost for America, the data could be an omen of America’s continuing realignment after 2024.
The data also offers startling new insights on Ohio’s crucial Senate race. Republican challenger Bernie Moreno has cut three-term incumbent Sherrod Brown’s lead down to 4.9%. Brown has consistently led Moreno by six to eight points.
The startling reversal of fortunes in the Senate contest, and 2024’s shocking developments, are a signpost for Ohio’s political establishment, and the country’s.
The realignment portrays an ascendant Trump coalition, bolstered by former Democrats like RFK, Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard — and polling shows GOP outsider Vivek Ramaswamy on the rise in Ohio.
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In a startling cycle that has seen the return of political violence to U.S. elections with two assassination attempts on Trump and a string of party defections and unexpected endorsements of Trump from Silicon Valley elites, former Democrats Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard, all bets on Ohio’s future are off.
A new report from Jefferson Rising shows Trump’s best polling lead in Ohio across his three bids, and Bernie Moreno cutting into Brown’s lead. Moreno’s significant reversal of fortune on the heels of Trump’s continued rise could spell an end to Brown’s three-term grip on the office.
“A new Alamo Lab’s survey of Ohio finds the former President Donald Trump leads Vice President Kamala Harris by 3.4% in a head-to-head matchup. These results include initially undecided voters who were then asked whom they would vote for if they had to choose,” the report said.
“In a multicandidate race, Trump is the choice of 48.7% and Harris 44.4%, while other candidates received 1.3% of the vote and undecided voters made up 4.7% of the vote.”
The report shows Moreno narrowing Brown’s lead to 4.9%, with 7.9% of voters still undecided. When forced to choose, Brown's lead shrinks to 1.5%.
Brown is one of a handful of Senators who has kept Democrats’ slim Senate majority alive, clinging to his seat in notoriously independent Ohio. Brown has had to keep quiet on the Biden-Harris’ administration’s border fiasco, and he chose to sit out this year’s DNC as the party lurched leftward amidst Harris’ anomalous nomination.
The Jefferson Rising report and Alamo Labs data show new developments among Ohio’s electorate could change the Senate’s makeup.
[READ: Can Sherrod Brown Unshackle Himself From the Biden-Harris Administration?]
Less than 40 days before the election, Donald Trump is favored to take Ohio by a wide margin, leading Kamala Harris by 3.4%. But Trump’s lead, and new analysis, shows a realignment putting Ohio’s political status quo on notice.
A month before the election in 2016, the former president trailed HIllary Clinton by two points in Ohio and went on to carry the state in 2016 by eight. Similarly in 2020, Joe Biden led Trump by three points, and Trump took Ohio by eight points again.
Trump’s quiet support behind the polls could spell a Senate shakeup in 2024 that sees Democrats’ tiny majority in the Senate, held in part by Brown’s seat, erased.
If Trump again outperforms polls in Ohio as he did in 2016 and 2020, he may well take Moreno with him.
[DATA: Brown’s lockstep support in Senate votes maintains Biden-Harris agenda]
Landmark Governor’s Race
The Alamo Labs insights could illuminate Ohio’s path after November, with a view to the Buckeye State’s 2026 race for Governor. Looking ahead, respondents reported a whopping 40.3% support among Republicans for Vivek Ramaswamy to lead the state in 2026.
“In the 2026 Ohio Governor’s race, Vivek Ramaswamy holds a significant lead among a crowded field of potential candidates with 40.3% of the vote. Other candidates include: Lt. Governor Husted with 15.9%, Attorney General Yost with 8.8%, Jim Renacci with 3.5% of the vote, and State Treasurer Sprague with 1.2% of the vote, 26% of voters are still undecided on the race,” the report said.
Ramaswamy, the GOP’s most formidable primary candidate in generations save Trump himself, enjoys strong favorability and support among Republicans and likely voters.
The fiercely independent Ramaswamy proved a force of nature on the debate stage and enjoys the favor of both Trump’s Independent-outsider coalition and favorability among MAGA voters.
While Ohio goes red in Presidential elections, the state is notoriously independent. Gov. Mike DeWine, as representative of Ohio’s moderate Republican and democrat electorate, has offered milquetoast leadership. The Jefferson Rising report and Alamo Labs data indicates the days of his kind could be numbered.
DeWine took the side of migrants in the remaking of struggling Springfield, Ohio through mass migration, amidst the city’s crisis. The flood of 20,000 Haitian migrants to Springfield became the nation’s top story, as eyes turned to the destruction of the city of 60,000, a transformation that took place in a heartbeat.
[READ: Apparent FBI, Ohio AG Investigation Into Human Trafficking In Springfield].
DeWine also vetoed a bill that would ban gender surgeries on minors. Ohio business mogul Les Wexner was a major donor to pro-DeWine PACs. Wexner and his wife, Abigail, are major boosters of Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus. The surgeries are major money-makers for hospitals.
Husted was dragged over his support for DeWine’s draconian COVID lockdowns and school closures, and eventually flip-flopping when he retconned his own record on the disastrous lockdowns.
DeWine is term-limited and cannot seek re-election. But with Husted only taking 15% support to Ramaswamy’s 40%, Republicans like DeWine may play a prominent role in Ohio politics no longer.
Ohio’s alignment with the Trump coalition offers a look at Americans’ distaste with the Biden-Harris administration’s handling of the border and the economy — and the United States’ continued realignment around the issues that first put Trump in office.
Follow ohio.news for updates.
