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Voters in Ohio have cast their ballots and according to Decision Desk HQ, President Donald Trump is the projected winner in the Buckeye State over former Vice President Joe Biden. Ohio has 18 electoral votes.
Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins and Libertarian candidate Jo Jorgensen were also on the ballot.
The polls were open from 6:30 a.m. until 7:30 p.m. on Election Day. Approximately 3.4 million people voted early either in-person or by mail, according to Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose. There were more than 266,000 outstanding absentee and provisional ballots still to be counted as of 11:30 p.m. while Trump held a lead of more than 400,000 votes.
Follow the 2020 presidential election results courtesy of Heavy’s partners at Decision Desk HQ below:
See the Most Recent Presidential Election Results From Ohio & the Map of Votes Across the State Here
The Ohio presidential election results can be viewed in the widget below, which updates in real-time. Hover over an individual county to see localized results.
The Ohio Secretary of State’s Office has reiterated that the final vote tally is never certified on Election Night. The deadline for the state to officially certify the results is November 28.
The state agency explained on its website that all absentee ballots returned to county boards of elections by November 3 would be included in unofficial vote totals shared on election night. Ballots postmarked by November 2 and received by election officials by November 13 will be counted.
Ohio’s two U.S. Senators, Republican Rob Portman and Democrat Sherrod Brown, were not on the ballot this year. Brown was re-elected in 2018 and Portman defeated a challenger in 2016.
But Ohio’s 16 congressional representatives are all on the ballot. Of the incumbents, 12 are Republican and four are Democrat. The incumbents facing challenges include Republican Jim Jordan, Democrat Tim Ryan and Republican Troy Balderson.
One key race that has attracted national attention has been the matchup for Ohio’s 1st Congressional District. Incumbent Republican Steve Chabot has held the office since 2011 but faces a tough challenge from Democrat Kate Schroder, a former health care executive. University of Cincinnati political science professor David Niven explained its significance to WXIX-TV: “Since the current map that we have for Congressional districts was drawn in 2012, not a single seat has changed hands. The map is undefeated. It’s 144-and-0. This could be the first race in a decade in Ohio to change party hands.”
The results for the House races can be viewed below by clicking on Ohio on the map or by selecting Ohio from the dropdown menu. Hovering over the district will show the results for each race.
Polls Suggested Ohio Voters Were Split Between Trump & Biden Ahead of Election Day
Getty Trump vs Biden
Ohio registered nearly 8.1 million voters ahead of the 2020 election. Registered Republicans hold a slight edge over Democrats. More than 1.9 million Ohioans are registered as Republican and nearly 1.6 million are affiliated with the Democratic party.
But more than 4.5 million of Ohio voters are not affiliated with a political party, the Associated Press reported, and that may have influenced Ohio’s toss-up status in this election. An average of recent polls by RealClearPolitics had Biden and Trump in a statistical tie in the final days before polls closed.
A poll from Quinnipiac University, released on October 29, had Biden ahead by 5 percentage points with a margin of error of 2.9%. Fox News released a poll on October 21 that had Trump leading by 3 percentage points, which is within the margin of error.
Ohio Has Selected the Winner of Each Presidential Election Since 1964
Getty Residents of Lake County participate in early voting on October 16, 2020, at the board of elections headquarters in Painesville, Ohio.
Ohio has traditionally enjoyed a reputation as a swing state. The Buckeye State has selected the winner in 30 out of the last 32 presidential elections. (Ohio voters favored Richard Nixon over John F. Kennedy in 1960 and narrowly selected Republican Thomas E. Dewey over sitting president Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1944). As the Washington Post pointed out in 2016, no Republican has ever won the presidency without also carrying Ohio.
In 2016, Trump carried Ohio by more than 8 percentage points over Hillary Clinton. FiveThirtyEight editor-in-chief Nate Silver reflected after the election that Ohio had represented Clinton’s struggles across the entire Midwest and that pollsters and political pundits had missed the significance. He criticized analysis from the New York Times that suggested Trump’s strong standing in Ohio meant the state was losing its bellwether status. Silver wrote, “It was fine to point out that Ohio, which is generally somewhat Republican-leaning relative to the country as a whole, wasn’t a must-win state for Clinton. But the article didn’t contemplate the possibility that Clinton’s poor position in Ohio could also portend problems in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, which probably were must-wins for her and which, like Ohio, had plenty of white voters without college degrees.”
According to 270toWin, President Barack Obama carried Ohio in 2008 and 2012 with, respectively, 51.5% and 50.7% of the vote. President George W. Bush won the Buckeye State by similar margins. He garnered 50.8% of Ohio’s vote in 2004 and 50% in 2000 (compared to Democrat Al Gore’s 46.5%).
Follow the 2020 Presidential Race Results From Across the Country & the Updated Electoral College Map Below
Heavy has partnered with Decision Desk HQ for live election results from across the country. Those results can be seen below:
Decision Desk HQ is also tracking the race to 270 electoral college votes, the number needed for either Trump or Biden to secure the presidency. Those results are available below:
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