Husted files for 2026 Senate race, launching aggressive statewide re-election push

FIRST ON FOX: Ohio Republican Sen. Jon Husted officially filed his paperwork to run for re-election on Friday, capping off a rollout week that highlighted his campaign objectives in a race that is expected to be one of the most expensive and closely watched Senate races in the country. 

Husted says he filed “because too many people in Washington have forgotten what it’s like to live, work, and raise a family in Ohio,” adding that his campaign will center on lowering costs, creating jobs, securing the border and “making America affordable again.”

Husted’s filing capped off a fast-moving week in which he released a new campaign video, his first ad, and a full leadership slate of 112 County Campaign Chairs representing all 88 Ohio counties — an unusually large infrastructure rollout this early in the cycle.

Husted’s team includes 23 county commissioners, 20 GOP county chairs, nine mayors, seven sheriffs, and five state legislators.

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Husted enters the 2026 cycle with the support of former President Donald Trump, who recently called him a “trusted conservative” who “has always delivered for Ohio.”

The Ohio senator’s campaign says the senator’s early filing, combined with his statewide staffing rollout, is intended to send a clear message: he is running aggressively, early, and everywhere.

“My focus is on delivering for Ohio’s working families,” Husted said. “That won’t change in this campaign, and it won’t change in my next term.”

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Husted was appointed to the Senate by Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine to fill in for JD Vance after the young senator left office to become Trump’s vice president. 

Husted, a former Ohio lieutenant governor, will square off against former Ohio Dem. Sen. Sherrod Brown next year.

Brown, a veteran Democrat who held statewide office for decades, is expected to frame his campaign around protecting union jobs, defending Social Security and Medicare, and pushing back on what he calls “corporate greed.”

Husted’s team, meanwhile, is preparing to cast Brown as a Washington insider out of step with Ohio’s economic and cultural concerns, similar to the narrative that Ohio Sen. Bernie Moreno used to successfully unseat Brown last year.

“Ohio needs conservative champion Jon Husted in the U.S. Senate,” the narrator says in Husted’s first campaign ad released earlier this week.