Vol. 38, No. 18

11-5-2008
By:

Ask the Expert, 11/6/08

What makes Ohio such a battleground state politically?
There are more registered Democrats than Republicans in Ohio, but the majority of Ohioans are registered as unaffiliated. One of the things that makes Ohio a competitive state is that each political party has its own base in the electorate with Democrats stronger in the urban areas and Republicans stronger in the rural areas and in the ring counties surrounding the major urban counties. It’s also the case that Ohio is a very diverse state economically, ethnically and religiously. The one group under-represented in Ohio in comparison to the national average is Hispanic voters. Ohio has a very diverse economy — new manufacturing, old manufacturing, service, high tech and agriculture. Ohio is going through a wrenching transformation as sectors of the old industrial economy face severe challenges. It’s a hotly contested state and if you start off with a core group of Democrats and Republicans in relative balance, then the swing voters become absolutely critical. In 2004, the pundits said as Ohio went, so went the election and that turned out to be the case. Ohio was critical this year. Not as critical perhaps as four years ago, but you can see how important we are by the time, the effort and the money that the candidates put into the state.

Will Ohio maintain its importance in national elections in the future?
What we’ll see as time goes by is that our numbers in the Electoral College will continue to decline as other parts of the country grow. In earlier decades, Ohio had 21, 23 and 24 electoral votes. This year we have 20. For the 2012 election we could be down to 18 electoral votes, not because our population is declining, but because it’s not growing as rapidly as it is in southern, southwestern and western states. But any states that are competitive will remain important in a relatively close national election. If four years from now we’re down to 18 electoral votes and it’s a reasonably close election, Ohio will be very important once again.

In terms of Ohio, is there anything from this election that will leave an imprint with you?
Another interesting set of elections in Ohio this year were the contests for seats in the US House of Representatives. There are four to five districts currently held by Republicans that Democrats were challenging very seriously. Also important are the elections for the Ohio House of Representatives. Republicans controlled the House by a margin of 53-46 before the election and both parties were locked in a fierce battle to win control of the Ohio House. The Ohio Senate is currently controlled by the Republicans and will remain so after Nov. 4.

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