Trump Visits Youngstown To Stump For Ramaswamy, Husted
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YOUNGSTOWN - In between saying gas prices were going to "drop like a rock," and that he'd end the wars in Iran and between Ukraine and Russia, President Donald Trump urged Ohio voters to support U.S. Sen. Jon Husted and gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy in this election.
During Monday's rally at Covelli Centre, Trump, a Republican, criticized the two GOP candidates' Democrats opponents - Sherrod Brown, a former three-term senator who lost reelection in 2024 who is seeking a return to the upper chamber, and Amy Acton, the state's health director during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic who is running for governor.
Trump called Brown the candidate of "Marxists, communists and anti-Americans." Trump contended Brown wants to reopen the southern border and let men play in women’s sports.
Trump said Acton "is horrible. She's a radical left lunatic. She'll tax you until the day you die."
Trump said Husted is "one of the most respected men in Washington already," and praised Ramaswamy as a "great friend," urging Ohioans to vote for both of them.
Trump said: "I'm asking everyone to pretend, just pretend I'm on the ballot."
Because Republican majorities are at stake in this election, Trump said "in a way I am" on the ballot.
Trump mentioned the downtown Youngstown steam heat crisis with SOBE Thermal Systems LLC a few months away from going out of business without government intervention.
Trump said he instructed the Department of Energy to work with Husted and U.S. Sen. Bernie Moreno, a Republican, to come up with a solution to keep the heat on.
Moreno's efforts, announced June 30, to provide federal loan guarantees through the DOE to help SOBE customers buy their own boilers and get off the system failed because the program requires at least $250 million be spent. The purchase of boilers for downtown SOBE customers would be considerably less than that.
Trump announced Monday that Cleveland was selected by the U.S. Department of War for a new 46,000-square-foot submarine component repair center.
Trump contended oil "is going to drop like a rock" and that gas prices are lower now than when Democrat Joe Biden was president. The U.S. average for a gallon of regular gas on Monday was $4.35.
Trump said the war in Iran would end if that country knew what it wanted and the same for the war between Ukraine and Russia. Trump has repeatedly said he would end both wars.
Trump also spent time talking about Senate races in Minnesota and Michigan.
A couple of people interrupted Trump's speech, with the president insulting the man for his weight - calling him "fat" - and a woman for waiving clothes with a Palestinian flag.
This was Trump's second visit to Ohio in nine days, campaigning for Husted and Ramaswamy on Oct. 3 in Vandalia, near Dayton. Vice President JD Vance, a former U.S. senator from Ohio who vacated that office to become vice president, campaigned for the pair at a Friday rally in Lima.
At Monday's rally, Ramaswamy said: "This is probably the most important election for governor that our state has ever seen in our history. I will pledge to you proudly and without apology, I will be the most conservative governor this state has ever seen in our history."
This is a race, Ramaswamy said, between "success over communism, success over socialism."
Ramaswamy said of Acton: "We refuse to reward failure with a promotion."
Ramaswamy said he will fight to reduce property taxes, electric costs, legal immigration, a better education for children and for the American way of life.
"As Americans, we believe in merit, that the best person gets the job, regardless of their skin color, that you are judged not on the color of your skin, but on the content of your character and your contributions. That is who we are as Americans."
Husted said under Republican rule, Ohio has prospered - and he's been "a leader" and "was part of that revolution" as Ohio House speaker, secretary of state, lieutenant governor and now as senator.
"Are you ready to win?" Husted asked to applause. "If you want something in life, you've got to fight for it, don't you?"
The state has the most jobs ever and the lowest unemployment since the latter statistic has been tracked since the 1970s, Husted said.
"We reformed our taxes," Husted said. "We made them cut regulations that made Ohio a terrible place to do business. We fought, fought and fought" and achieved success.
Husted said: "We've had to fight a lot of bad public officials, a lot of bad politicians along the way. One of those guys was Sherrod Brown."
Husted said during Brown's 50 years of holding elected office, he's done nothing to help the state.
"Can you name one thing that he's done to make your life better? No" Husted said. "Everywhere I go, I ask that question. No one can come up with a thing."
Husted added: "He did a lot to you, but he didn't do anything for you to make your lives better."
During Husted's speech, there was a disturbance with a person in attendance. The person was shouted down by the audience with Husted saying after the person was escorted out: "We won't be intimidated or bullied."
Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, selected Husted, who was his lieutenant governor, in January 2025 to replace Vance. As the seat has two more years in its term after this election, it will be back on the ballot in 2028.
Most polls have the governor and Senate races as statistical dead-heats in a state that last elected a Democrat as governor in 2006 and where Brown, the last Democrat elected to the Senate, lost two years ago.
Democrats are looking to make political inroads in a mid-term election in states where they've struggled, including Ohio, while Republicans are looking to maintain control, particularly in the U.S. House and Senate.
Trump was largely responsible for changing the political climate in Mahoning and particularly Trumbull, which were two longtime Democratic strongholds.
Trump won Mahoning County in the 2020 and 2024 presidential elections. He won Trumbull County in 2016, 2020 and 2024, as well as winning the state of Ohio by comfortable margins in each of the last three presidential elections. Trump was elected president in 2016, lost in 2020 and won again in 2024.
Trump again repeated false claims that the 2020 election was "rigged" against him.
Mahoning County Democratic Party Chairman Chris Anderson said of Trump's visit: "The entire local GOP ticket will be fighting for space to take selfies with him and get their campaign photos and not one will ask him when he plans to deliver on one of those promises (he made during a 2017 speech at the Covelli Centre) in between trying to kiss his ring. While working people suffer under the GOP rule, I hope that just one of those Republicans will prove me wrong and call out this disaster and use their power instead of simply going along with this vanity exercise."
Monday was Trump's third rally at the Covelli Centre.
There were about 2,500 to 3,000 people at Monday's rally - a considerably smaller crowd than the two other times Trump had rallies there.
There were about 7,000 at a 2017 rally and about 5,500 at a 2022 event. About half of the permanent seats in the arena were closed off even before the event started with a large American flag backing the rear seating and tarps put up in other sections.
Trump was there July 25, 2017, for a rally right before a Senate to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. The Senate voted against his plan three days after the rally.
During that speech, Trump famously said: "Don't move. Don't sell your house. We're going to fill up those factories or rip them down and build new ones."
The General Motors assembly plant in Lordstown, which was the Valley's largest employer when Trump made that pronouncement, had eliminated its third shift on Jan. 23, 2017, about six months before the rally. GM eliminated its second shift at Lordstown on June 15, 2018, and announced a few months later that it would shut down the plant, which occurred March 6, 2019.
Anderson said: "Donald Trump told Mahoning County not to sell their homes and then he didn't lift a finger to save the jobs that paid the mortgages. It was a hollow promise from a politician who treated our community as a convenient backdrop."
While mulling a third presidential campaign, Trump stumped Sept. 17, 2022, at the Covelli Centre for Vance, who was elected to the U.S. Senate less than two months later. Trump then chose Vance as his vice presidential running mate with the pair elected in November 2024.
Trump spent much of that Sept. 17, 2022, speech airing past grievances, including false claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him. Trump said at the time that if he was president, there wouldn't have been a Russian invasion of Ukraine, high gas prices and inflation.
During the 2016 campaign, Trump made stops at the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport in Vienna, Youngstown State University and the Canfield Fair. Shortly after the Feb. 3, 2023, train derailment in East Palestine, Trump visited the Columbiana County community.