Before every election, both parties try to figure out what states they are competitive in and they begin to work on a budget. The same holds true for PACs, who often has more money than the party. Priorities USA, an influential left-leaning political action committee, helped former President Barack Obama win re-election in 2012.
They also worked for Hillary in 2016. They have surveyed the political landscape and have decided that Ohio is a low priority. In political speak, that means it’s not worth the money. That figures, the Democrats are keying on Florida, Virginia, Pennsylvania and Michigan.
The Midwest state of Ohio, with its 18 Electoral College votes, has been considered an important “swing state” in many recent presidential elections, but that may not be the case in the upcoming 2020 election.
Ohio media outlet cleveland.com reported on the surprising admission from a prominent Democratic Party-aligned Super PAC that the state had essentially been downgraded as not being a priority in the next national election cycle.
Signaling the downgrade of Ohio by Democrats is the fact that it was not included in the PAC’s first round of expenditures — roughly $100 million — for an early engagement program that is focused on targeting voters in the states of Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
Nor was Ohio mentioned in an already planned second round of that program, which intends to focus on states like Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, New Hampshire and North Carolina.
Josh Schwerin, a spokesman for Priorities USA, explained, “It’s not in our initial spending plans. It is in the states to watch and see if an investment is worth making.”