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Generally, on reporting trips, the job begins once I land on the ground, hence, “on the ground reporting.” But in Dayton, Ohio, I got my first tidbit of information in the air, looking out of my plane’s window to a large farm field below with the giant words, “Trump 28,” blasted onto it like a crop circle.
It was a reminder that President Donald Trump won the Buckeye State by 11 points in 2024, and yet, both the Senate and gubernatorial races here are proving uphill climbs for the GOP’s respective nominees — Sen. Jon Husted and Vivek Ramaswamy — even with Democratic challengers in former Sen. Sherrod Brown and Dr. Amy Acton whose support feels rather tepid.
I spoke with Michael in the Oregon District neighborhood, one of few in this beat-down city of empty storefronts still brimming with life. His attitude seemed to be something akin to a pox on both political parties’ houses.
POLL: DEMOCRATIC UNITY, REPUBLICAN CROSSOVERS SHAPE OHIO SENATE RACE
An abandoned building pictured in downtown Dayton, Ohio. (David Marcus)
“It doesn’t seem like either candidate is going to be good for anybody,” the young man said, regarding Ramaswamy and Amy Acton. He added, “It doesn’t matter who you vote for, either way, they’re not going to represent what the people actually want.”
When I asked Michael if there was a politician these days who did inspire him, his answer was Texas GOP Congressman Brandon Gill, a far more populist figure than either the technocratic Ramaswamy or the establishment Husted, the latter of whom Michael admitted to knowing almost nothing about.
At Blind Bob’s, I met Miss Barbara — as the men there all dotingly called her — a woman in her 70s who has lived in Dayton her entire life. She regaled me with tales of the busy metropolis she remembers from the 1970s and 1980s.
“I suppose it was sometime in the 90s that things started going downhill,” she told me, citing the loss of GM factories.
On the elections, Miss Barbara told me, “I’ll start paying attention soon, I try to keep an open mind,” adding in an echo of Michael, “Not much seems to change either way.”
Just down the road, I found Bonnett’s Book Shop, opened in 1939 by the grandfather of its current owner, Kevin. Once the world’s largest retailer of back-issue magazines, the shop has been a neighborhood fixture for generations. I asked Kevin what he was looking for from his state and federal governments.
A 19th Century building facade pictured in Dayton, Ohio. (David Marcus)
POLL: SQUEEZED BY COSTS, FRUSTRATED VOTERS TURN TO THE DEMOCRATS
“In the last few decades, there’s been a big push for small businesses,” Kevin told Digital, adding, “There’s been a lot of help for new small businesses … we’re not a new business, we don’t get much attention.”
“We don’t get much attention,” seemed to be a running theme from almost all the Daytonites I spoke with this week, very much directed at both political parties.
There is a strong case to be made that no state in the union has suffered more grievously from the economic upheavals of the 21st Century, from global trade to increased challenges in farming, than Ohio — where the emptiness of small-city America feels just a little more empty.
Eateries line the street in Dayton’s Oregon District. (David Marcus)
It breaks one’s heart to see the monumental architecture of past glory, as intricate in detail as it is overpowering in scale, brought low — often literally empty shells of a once mighty Midwestern city.
Sam, who runs a convenience store in the shadow of the abandoned stone and brick towers, told Digital, “It just feels like more of the same, from both parties, nothing much gets done.”
Given the dim view that many Ohioans take of traditional politics, it seems little wonder that Trump has consistently carried the state with big numbers on a message of rebirth and growth that, while it sometimes delivers less than it promises, at least it promises something.
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Right now, there is not much indication that either Ramaswamy or Husted have the populist magic in a bottle that has rocketed Trump to victory, which explains why the president was in nearby Vandalia last weekend for a rally.
Hopeless is too strong a word for Dayton, Ohio, but tired and skeptical are not; Tired of a tame politics that cannot fix the big problems like massive amounts of empty commercial property, and skeptical that anyone running today can change that.
“Trump 28” was spotted by air on a farmer’s field in Ohio. (David Marcus)
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Over the next month, as Miss Barbara starts paying more attention, the Ohio candidates who can breathe a little hope into the voters will fare best. But it can’t be with either party’s familiar bromides; rather, it must be done with new ideas.
