While billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy was launching his 2026 campaign for Ohio governor in West Chester Monday night, President Donald Trump was busy typing away on his Truth Social site.
What Trump wrote was just the rocket fuel Ramaswamy needed to solidify his frontrunner status for the GOP gubernatorial nomination — a full endorsement of Ramaswamy, much of it typed in Trump’s signature capital letters.
"He’s Young, Strong, and Smart! Vivek is also a very good person, who truly loves our Country," Trump wrote. "He will be a GREAT Governor of Ohio, will never let you down, and has my COMPLETE AND TOTAL ENDORSEMENT!"
This, much to the chagrin of Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost, who trails Ramaswamy badly in both campaigns’ internal polling.
Yost had his own take on Elon Musk’s X, formerly Twitter.
“Vivek’s position is just a sugar rush,” Yost wrote. “And a crash is coming when voters know a little bit more.”
Vivek’s position is just a sugar rush—and a crash is coming when voters know a little bit more.
— Dave Yost (@DaveYostOH) February 21, 2025
2026 Ohio Governors Race: Dave Yost, Vivek Ramaswamy Face Competitive Race https://t.co/evRA3qicVc
How much an endorsement from Donald Trump could mean for Ramaswamy depends on how much — if any — “buyer’s remorse” develops among Ohio’s Trump voters in the next 14 months before the primary election.
Elon Musk taking a chain saw to the federal government, along with the impact tariffs could have on farmers in Ohio’s reddest counties, might not look very appealing by the time 2026 rolls around.
When Ramaswamy announced his candidacy at a West Chester tech firm Monday night, he painted a rather grim picture of the state of affairs in Ohio.
"The movement starts today of Ohioans: Black or white, man or woman, urban or rural, even Democrat or Republican,” he said. “If you care about economic excellence and educational excellence, then join us, because we're going to be working together to take our state to new heights."
"We don't have to be a state in decline,” he said.
Ohio Republican leaders, whose party has controlled the governor’s office for the better part of the past 35 years, may not be very happy to hear Ohio described by as a “state in decline.”
Yes, Ohio has given its electoral votes to Trump in three straight presidential elections.
But, for nearly two generations now, Ohio voters have been electing more traditional, center-right Republicans to the governor’s office.
The late George Voinovich is one — the most popular Republican governor in recent history. John Kasich, who challenged Trump in the 2016 GOP presidential primaries, is another. The present governor, Mike DeWine, who passed over Ramaswamy for JD Vance’s Senate seat, continues the tradition of center-right governors.
Not a rhetorical bomb-thrower or fire-starter among them. Three steady-as-it-goes governors.
On his announcement tour, Ramaswamy has made it clear he intends to shake up Ohio government the way Trump and Musk are shaking up the federal government with their Department of Government Efficiency.
Ramaswamy, a billionaire tech entrepreneur from Cincinnati, was briefly teamed with Musk on DOGE, before Musk pushed him aside, forcing Ramaswamy to find a new landing zone.
He found it in the 2026 Ohio governor’s race.
Ramaswamy is calling for merit-based pay for teachers, universal eligibility for publicly funded vouchers for private schools, and the elimination of the state income tax — without saying what would replace that revenue source for the state.
Yost is the only serious competition for Ramaswamy at this early state of the game.
It could get even more interesting if Ohio Lieutenant Governor Jim Tressel, the popular former coach of the Ohio State Buckeyes football team, were to jump into the contest.
There is only one announced candidate so far on the Democratic side — former Ohio Department of Public Health director Amy Acton, who has been drawing big crowds traveling around the state.
Acton had plenty to say about Ramaswamy’s entry into the race.
“Where (Ramaswamy) sees an opportunity to gut Medicare, Medicaid and attack a woman’s right to choose, I know my job as governor will be to stand up for Ohioans against powerful billionaires and bad actors who don’t have our best interests at heart.”
Ramaswamy’s campaign team — from his pollster to his strategic advisors — are borrowed from Vice President JD Vance, all of whom worked on Vance’s 2022 Senate campaign.
The only time Ramaswamy’s name has been on any kind of election ballot was in the 2024 Iowa Republican caucuses, when he was one of a large field that included Donald Trump.
The result was not very good.
After months of Ramaswamy practically living in Iowa, only 8,449 Republicans there managed to defy the snow-covered highways and the 20-below wind chill in January 2024 to make it to a caucus site to cast their votes for him.
He took 7.7% of the vote in Iowa, miles behind frontrunner Trump, who had more than 50% support.
The next day, Ramaswamy went off to New Hampshire, where he joined Trump on stage and endorsed him for the GOP nomination.
So, he lost and lost big his first and only time out as a candidate.
But looking inside the numbers of his performance as a presidential candidate from April 2023 to January 2004 revealed what could be a fatal flaw in his new-found desire to run Ohio’s government.
The flaw is this: The more Republican voters in Iowa knew about Ramaswamy, the less they liked him.
The polling website 538 shows that clearly. The longer he campaigned in Iowa, the less liked he became. His favorable/unfavorable rating grew worse as voters learned more about him.
It’s way too early to tell, but if his experience in Iowa were to repeat itself in his home state, Ramaswamy has 14 whole months to go from frontrunner to also-ran.
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