WARREN, Ohio, Oct 14 - A decade after Republican Donald Trump peeled away working-class and union voters who had long been a cornerstone of Democratic support in Ohio, Democrats and labor leaders see an opening to win back some of them in the November 3 US elections.
Now midway through his second term, the president's magic appears to be losing at least some of its luster with blue-collar men and women as rising prices, the Iran war and concerns about his rhetoric prompt some voters to reconsider their support.
The state's reputation as a leading swing state began to fade in 2016 when Trump won strong support from working-class voters who felt their economic concerns were being heard, helping turn Ohio into a reliably Republican state.
Almost overnight, Ohio became rock-solid Republican. Ohio voted for the eventual winner in 14 straight presidential elections from 1964 until 2020 when Democrat Joe Biden won nationally but Ohio backed Trump.
A shift in Ohio toward Democrats could matter in elections that will help determine whether Republicans retain control of Congress during Trump's final two years in office or hand new leverage to Democrats over his agenda.
The stakes are high in Ohio, where Republicans are defending a US Senate seat and the governor's office. Two House races are rated "toss-ups." One, in northwestern Ohio, has long been held by a Democrat and the other, in northeastern Ohio, is Republican-held.
Trump is not on the ballot this time but has told supporters to act as if he is. It remains to be seen whether that could end up helping or hindering Republicans running in tough races.
Republican Senator Jon Husted is in a tight competition with Democratic former Senator Sherrod Brown, while Democrat Amy Acton is challenging Republican Vivek Ramaswamy for an open governor's seat.
Trump campaigned with Husted and Ramaswamy in Youngstown on Monday to try to energize the Republican base.
'GOD KNOWS WE DIDN'T VOTE FOR THIS'
Paul Ringold, a 48-year-old steel hauler and pastor of the mostly Black congregation at the Shalom Church of God and Christ in the city of Warren, embodies the uncertainty that Democrats hope could help them make inroads with working-class voters.
Ringold voted for Trump for president in 2016, Democrat Joe Biden in 2020 and Trump again in 2024, but said he remains undecided about whom to support for the US Senate, governor and other offices this year.
"I'm in the wilderness trying to find a place," he said.
Ringold said rising fuel and food prices and Trump's combative style have left him questioning some of the choices made by a president he once strongly supported.
"God knows we didn't vote for this," he said of inflation.
Like several voters interviewed by Reuters, Ringold also cited Trump's rhetoric. "I wish he would just tone down that rhetoric ... that old New York in-your-face 'I got you sucker'" persona, he said.
EARLY TURNOUT FAVORS DEMOCRATS
In early voting that began in Ohio last week, Democrats appeared to be more motivated than Republicans.
In Trumbull County, home to the city of Warren and many blue-collar jobs, a strong turnout during the first three days brought 1,224 Democrats to the polls, 559 Republicans and 453 with no known political affiliation, according to county data.
Paul Sracic, an Ohio-based senior fellow with the right-of-center Hudson Institute, said "working-class voters, if they are moving at all away from Trump, Brown is a safe landing spot for them" because of the former senator's populist record.
"Trump has done a good job of basically focusing on social issues with our guys," said Jose Arroyo, a United Steelworkers official who engages in contract negotiations and labor relations for the sprawling labor union.
Trump "seemed to latch on sort of to the dissatisfaction of where the working man has gone. Pensions go away. Plants close. Livelihoods they've always known disappear."
The problem, he said, is that focusing primarily on hot-button social issues ignores advancing policies that would "improve the lives of working people" and actually turn them into law.
The 50,000 manufacturing jobs in 1990 in the Youngstown-Warren area fell to about 20,000 in 2026, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.
In recent years, the Mahoning Valley, long a powerhouse of the steel and automotive industries, has attracted a few new manufacturing plants. Arroyo said the Iran war has boosted domestic oil industry exploration, creating more demand for equipment made of steel. But he acknowledged that the war had also brought higher consumer prices.
NLRB 'DISMANTLING'
When Trump began his second term in January 2025, he promptly fired two Democratic officials at the National Labor Relations Board and left the agency without the quorum required to take actions. That paralysis lasted for nearly a year.
Ohio AFL-CIO President Tim Burga cited what he called Trump's "dismantling" of the NLRB as having hindered union organizing efforts and made it harder to contest unfair labor practices and secure work contracts with companies.
"We were on a path for the first time in my lifetime, under the Biden administration, for having a national industrial policy," Burga said, but the Trump administration rolled much of it back. Biden and Congress enacted programs to spur investment in such industries as clean energy and semiconductors.
Trump's trade battles with Canada also were unhelpful to labor, he said.
OHIO VOTERS REMAIN DIVIDED
Bill Callahan, 75, a self-described Democrat from Cortland, said some relatives who once backed Trump "are traveling back" toward Democrats because "they don't like (politicians) taking money out of their pockets."
A part-time warehouse worker from Cortland after a career at General Electric, he said he considered voting for Trump in 2016 but was put off by ethical concerns.
Others interviewed by Reuters said higher prices were not enough to change their vote.
Joe Scarabino, who co-owns a bait-and-tackle business with his wife Kathryn near Cortland, said the couple responded to higher fuel costs by raising delivery charges rather than product prices, thus having an impact on fewer customers and small business owners.
"We believe our Christian values are more than gas prices," he said. The couple declined to say who they support.
Retired coal-fired power plant worker Chuck Burns, 67, of Wellsville, credited Trump with reducing illegal immigration and boosting the value of his retirement investments. "He's done a good job ... he's got balls," Burns said.
Burns praised Trump's immigration restrictions at the southern border and said his retirement savings have increased in value since Biden left office.
Asked what issues worry him in this election season, Burns said, "It's just that Democrats – it's unbelievable some of the stuff that they want to do."
Asked to explain, Burns raised transgender issues. "Those poor people, they feel that way, that's fine, that's their business," he said. "They (Democrats) don't need to incorporate our young kids into that stuff." REUTERS