Illinois and Ohio primaries 2024: Trump-backed Senate candidate prevails in Ohio primary

538 tracked key House and Senate races, including a California special election.

November’s presidential matchup may be set, but Democrats and Republicans still need to decide who will run in hundreds of downballot races (e.g., for Senate and House) this fall. A batch of these contests were decided on Tuesday, March 19.

Tuesday was primary day in Ohio and Illinois, and in the biggest contest of the day, Republicans chose former President Donald Trump's endorsee Bernie Moreno as their candidate in Ohio’s U.S. Senate race. It was a good night for other Trump endorsees too, as Derek Merrin prevailed in the GOP primary for Ohio's 9th Congressional District, while incumbent Mike Bost is leading his challenger in Illinois's 12th District, as of early Wednesday morning. Plus, a special election in California could have immediate implications for House Republicans’ razor-thin majority.

538 reporters and contributors broke down the election results as they came in with live updates, analysis and commentary. Read our full live blog below.


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First results in Ohio's 9th

The first votes for Ohio's 9th Congressional District are rolling in, and with 13 percent of the expected vote reporting, Merrin is slightly ahead with 46 percent of the vote, while Riedel is second with 39 percent, and Lankeneau is a distant third (14 percent). As Nathaniel wrote earlier, Merrin was a late addition to the contentious race after audio leaked of Riedel calling Trump "arrogant." And as I wrote earlier, Merrin is no stranger to intra-Republican battles.

—Monica Potts, 538


Ohio Republican and Democratic primary voters have different concerns

As we wait for the first results to trickle in, let's take a look at the issues voters are thinking about in the state. Among likely primary voters in Ohio, Republicans are much more concerned about immigration than Democrats, according to a poll released last week by Emerson College/The Hill/Nexstar. Specifically, given a list of options, 27 percent of voters who said they were very likely to vote in the Republican primary selected "immigration" as the most important issue facing Ohio, while only 2 percent of very likely Democratic primary voters said the same.

Republican primary voters were also more likely than Democratic primary voters to name "the economy (jobs, inflation, taxes)" as the most important issue facing the state, 39 percent to 27 percent. On the flip side, likely Democratic primary voters were more likely than Republicans to select "abortion access," 15 percent to 3 percent, and "threats to democracy," 18 percent to 7 percent.

—Mary Radcliffe, 538


Polls are now closed in Ohio!

Polls have now closed across Ohio. The Buckeye State usually counts its early and mail votes first, so expect to see some large vote dumps right off the bat. A word of caution, though: Early and absentee votes are not necessarily representative of the electorate as a whole. We'll want to wait to get more Election Day votes in before drawing any concrete conclusions.

—Cooper Burton, 538


A quiet but consequential primary in Ohio's 13th

Rounding out our key House races in Ohio as polls close at 7:30, the Republican primary has been pretty uneventful in another Ohio swing seat: the 13th District, which Biden would have carried by 3 percentage points in 2020. Democratic Rep. Emilia Sykes will likely face either former state Sen. Kevin Coughlin or Hudson City Councilor Chris Banweg in November. Not much distinguishes the two, though: They both support Trump and share the same conservative positions on abortion, immigration, guns and more. And they both have raised only modest amounts of money: $332,000 for Coughlin, $280,000 for Banweg. Sykes, by contrast, has pulled in $1.9 million for her reelection bid so far.

—Nathaniel Rakich, 538


How geography has helped make for a close Illinois's 12th District GOP primary

With 68 percent of the expected vote reporting, Bost leads Bailey 53 percent to 47 percent in the Republican primary in Illinois's 12th District. But Bost looks to be on pace for a potentially narrower win — and perhaps could even lose. After the 2020 Census, Illinois Democrats drew a gerrymander that packed more Republican-leaning turf into Bost's 12th District in southern Illinois, which he had represented since 2015. About half of the new-look version of the seat had been in Bost's old district, but much of the eastern part of the seat was new to him. Meanwhile, Bailey's old state Senate seat made up a large chunk of that eastern section, giving him a geographical base of support for this primary despite facing the incumbent Bost.

As things stand, Bost is winning about 70 percent of the vote so far in the area he represented prior to the 2022 election, while Bailey is winning 73 percent in the counties that were in his old state Senate seat. The two are running about even in the remaining turf. The good news for Bost is that more of the primary vote will likely come from his neck of the woods. But the good news for Bailey is that more outstanding votes are likely left to be counted in his area of the district. A back of the envelope calculation based on each candidate's showing so far would put Bost up about 51 percent to 49 percent by the time all is said and done, but that is too close to call.

—Geoffrey Skelley, 538