2020 United States presidential election in Ohio

The 2020 United States presidential election in Ohio was held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020, as part of the 2020 United States presidential election in which all 50 states plus the District of Columbia participated. Ohio voters chose electors to represent them in the Electoral College via a popular vote, pitting the Republican Party's nominee—incumbent President Donald Trump and his running mate, Vice President Mike Pence—against the Democratic Party nominee, former Vice President Joe Biden and his running mate, California Senator Kamala Harris. Ohio has 18 electoral votes in the Electoral College.
Republican Donald Trump won Ohio with 53.27% of the vote, while Biden received 45.24% of the vote. Trump won by nearly the same margin that he defeated Hillary Clinton by in 2016. This marked the first time that Ohio voted for the losing candidate since Richard Nixon in 1960, and also the second consecutive election in which the state voted over 10 points to the right of the nation as a whole, confirming the state's trend towards the Republicans. This is the first time since 1976 in which Ohio voted to the right of Texas, a state that last voted Democratic that year. Biden became the first candidate, of either party, to win the election without winning Ohio since John F. Kennedy. It was won by Trump with a margin of 8.02%.
Analysis.
Ohio, a Midwestern U.S. state, has been considered one of the most competitive states in said region in the early 21st century. For example, it was a vital tipping-point state in the heavily contested 2004 election, and its projection in 2012 put Barack Obama over the top in the Electoral College. After Trump won Ohio in 2016 by an unexpectedly large margin of 8 points, it was initially considered out of reach for Democrats. However, Democrats contested it after polling pointed to a possibly close result in 2020. 
From 1964 through 2016, the Buckeye State had been a reliable bellwether, voting for the winner of every presidential election. In 2016, however, it voted over ten points to the right of the nation as a whole, indicating that it might be on the cusp of losing its bellwether status. And, indeed, in 2020, Ohio backed the losing nominee for the first time since it backed Richard Nixon in 1960, and, in so doing, voted over ten points to the right of the nation overall for the second time in a row, giving Trump a comfortable eight-point margin even as he lost nationally. This indicated that Ohio is likely following a similar path as Missouri, another former Midwestern bellwether state that has more recently become reliably red, had done in 2008 and 2012. In this election, Ohio weighed in at 12.5% more Republican than the nation as a whole, even voting more Republican than Texas, a Southern state that has been a GOP stronghold for four decades.
While Biden outperformed Hillary Clinton in the Midwest at large, Trump managed to flip two Ohio counties Republican: Lorain, a suburban county of Cleveland, and Mahoning, anchored by the car-making town of Youngstown. Trump hence became the first Republican presidential candidate to win Lorain County since Ronald Reagan in 1984, and the first to win Mahoning County since Richard Nixon in 1972. Biden became the first Democrat to win the White House without carrying Mahoning County since FDR in 1932, and the first Democrat to win the White House without carrying Lorain County since Harry Truman in 1948. On the other hand, Biden won back Montgomery County, home to Dayton, a county which Trump had flipped in 2016. He also came within 7 points of flipping suburban Delaware County in the Columbus area, the closest a Democrat has come to flipping it since 1964. 
This was the first presidential election in which a candidate received more than 3 million votes in Ohio.
Ohio is one of four entities (along with Iowa, Florida, and Maine's 2nd congressional district) that voted twice for Barack Obama and twice for Donald Trump. Ohio and Florida also voted twice for George W. Bush; and Ohio and Iowa also voted twice for Bill Clinton. All three voted twice for Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, and Dwight Eisenhower.
Primary elections.
The primary elections were originally scheduled for March 17, 2020. However, on March 16, Ohio governor Mike DeWine recommended moving the primaries to June amid concerns over the COVID-19 pandemic. As the governor does not have the power to unilaterally make this decision, he went to court to request the delay. However, a judge rejected the lawsuit. Later in the day, the state's Health Director ordered the polls closed as a health emergency. On March 17, the Ohio Supreme Court allowed the primaries to be postponed to June 2. Then on March 25, in-person voting was canceled, and the deadline for mail-in voting was moved back to April 28.
Republican primary.
Incumbent President Donald Trump ran unopposed in the Republican primary, and thus received all of Ohio's 82 delegates to the 2020 Republican National Convention.
Libertarian caucus.
Online voting took place from March 16 to April 11, with 192 participants. The primary was tabulated using instant runoff voting. Percentages shown are percentage of ballots cast.
General election.
Polling.
Graphical summary
Aggregate polls
June 1, 2020 – October 31, 2020
January 1, 2020 – May 31, 2020
January 1, 2018 – December 31, 2019
Results.
Official state results from the Ohio Secretary of State are as follows: 
Mahoning County.
Mahoning County, anchored by the car-making town of Youngstown, voted Republican for the first time since Richard Nixon's landslide re-election in 1972. The slim victory by Trump marked a collapse in Democrats' support among white working-class voters, and tightened the President's grip on blue-collar white voters. 
David Betras, who was Democratic chairman of Mahoning County until 2019, speculated on the disconnect between Democrats in Washington who focused messaging Trump's unfitness for office, his taxes and possible impeachment, and the concerns of blue-collar workers were supporting Trump for his trade war with China, regardless of economic pain caused by tariffs.
By congressional district.
Trump won 12 out of the 16 congressional districts in Ohio.