Nov. 7 – Ohio will have an open seat in the U.S. Senate as U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance, R-Ohio, was elected vice president on Tuesday and will sit in the White House with President-elect Donald Trump next year.
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine will appoint Vance’s replacement, with the timeline determined by when Vance chooses to resign from the Senate seat, said Dan Tierney, DeWine’s press secretary.
Vance, a Middletown native, could serve until Jan. 20, when he and Trump will be inaugurated, but DeWine expects Vance could choose to leave the job sooner.
Vance’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
It is not known who the contenders are or will be, but among the Republicans whose names have appeared in several published reports in recent months are state Sen. Matt Dolan, R-Chagrin Falls, Secretary of State Frank LaRose and former Republican caucus. state party chair Jane Timken, all of whom ran unsuccessfully in the Republican primary for U.S. Senate, Lt. Gov. Jon Husted and former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.
Whoever DeWine appoints would fill Vance’s seat until a special election would be held in 2026 for the remainder of the term, which ends in 2028. DeWine is a Republican.
“This is actually the second time the governor will fill a vacancy for a statewide office. He did that when Justice Sharon Kennedy (of the Ohio Supreme Court) was elected chief justice,” Tierney said.
He expects DeWine to follow the same process he used when he appointed Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters, a Republican, to fill Kennedy’s seat in 2022.
“It won’t be formal,” said Tierney, who expects people will let DeWine know they are interested in the job.
“Second, the governor will likely come up with a short list once he hears from everyone, plus his own ideas. He’s going to do some research in private, have some conversations in private. He will of course announce the decision publicly,” Tierney said.
“When he filled the Supreme Court vacancy, he was looking for someone who was qualified, someone who would represent the state of Ohio well and, most importantly, someone who voters would ultimately confirm for another term on the court.”
Tierney said that proved to be the case with Deters, who on Tuesday defeated Judge Melody Stewart, a Democrat, for a full six-year term on the court.
Whoever replaces Vance would have to run for four elections in four years to keep the seat, a primary and a general in 2026 to keep the seat until the term expires in 2028, and then another primary and a general that year if he or she wants to win an election. full six-year term in the U.S. Senate.
But being a former U.S. senator himself, DeWine will also be looking for something special in a new U.S. senator for Ohio, Tierney said.
“The only additional thing is that the governor served 12 years in the U.S. Senate, so he has some strong opinions about what he likes to see in a senator. And what you probably know if you cover the governor is that when he was in the Senate, he really tried to do the work of the Senate in terms of going through the committee process, focusing on legislation and working across the aisle,” Tierney said. “And so those are kind of the qualifications that he looks at when it comes to serving the state of Ohio well.”
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