President Donald Trump held a live telephone rally for Ohio on Saturday, October 31, 2026, urging voters in the state to back Senator Jon Husted and gubernatorial nominee Vivek Ramaswamy just three days before the November 3 midterm elections. The Trump Ohio Tele-Rally, announced on the president's Truth Social account, also named three Republican congressional candidates — but it notably left out Representative Max Miller, an incumbent Republican whose name had appeared on an earlier Trump endorsement list for Ohio.
The tele-rally was scheduled for 2:45 p.m. ET on Saturday, with supporters told to answer their phones to join the call. In the announcement, reposted by the president, Trump said: "OHIO, I will doing a TeleRally, LIVE, at 2:45pm ET, for U.S. Senator Jon Husted, Vivek Ramaswamy for Governor, Congressman Mike Carey (OH-15), Eric Conroy for Congress (OH-01), and Derek Merrin for Congress (OH-09) — All have my Complete and Total Endorsement, and will never let you down. They LOVE the Great People of Ohio, and so do I — Answer your phones, and ENJOY!"
The Ohio tele-rally was one of a series of telephone events Trump held on Saturday as he entered the final weekend of a midterm campaign in which he has been the most visible figure on the Republican side. According to Reuters, a White House official said Trump would hold back-to-back in-person rallies in Kansas and Iowa on Sunday in addition to nearly 20 telephone events, a schedule that replaced — and then partly restored — a plan that had changed twice in three days.
Trump had originally planned to visit Salina, Kansas, on Saturday and Dubuque, Iowa, on Sunday. On Thursday, October 29, the Republican National Committee announced those trips were cancelled and would be replaced by tele-rallies. On Friday, October 30, after calls from Republicans in both states, Trump reversed course in the Oval Office and reinstated the Sunday visits, while keeping the Saturday telephone programme. The Ohio call fitted that pattern: a state where Trump has already campaigned in person three times this month, reached by phone on the Saturday before the election.
The timing mattered. Early voting had already passed 49 million ballots by Friday, according to Reuters, putting participation ahead of the total recorded before the 2022 midterms. With all 435 House seats and 35 Senate seats on the ballot, both parties were making their closing arguments, and Ohio — with a governor's race, a Senate race and several competitive House contests — was one of the states where the national parties were spending the final weekend.
Ohio has been one of the most heavily contested states of the 2026 cycle. Trump has visited three times in October: Dayton on October 3, Youngstown on October 12 and Chillicothe on October 28, where he campaigned for Husted and Ramaswamy at Ohio University Chillicothe's Shoemaker Center. At Chillicothe, Trump defended Ramaswamy's disputed campaign advertisement featuring the estranged mother of Democratic gubernatorial nominee Amy Acton, saying Ramaswamy had been treated "very unfairly" and that the ad should keep running despite bipartisan criticism.
The governor's race has been close throughout. Polls released in late October showed Acton, a former state health director, and Ramaswamy effectively tied, with one Suffolk University-USA TODAY survey putting Acton ahead 48 percent to 44 percent and another survey putting Ramaswamy narrowly ahead. The Senate race has been similarly tight: Husted, appointed to fill the seat vacated by Vice President JD Vance, faces former Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown, who lost re-election in 2024 and is seeking a comeback. RealClearPolitics polling averages and the Cook Political Report have rated the contest a toss-up.
Max Miller's absence from the tele-rally list drew attention because Trump had previously included him in a published Ohio endorsement list, which named "Max Miller for U.S. Congress (OH-07)" alongside Husted and Ramaswamy. Miller, who represents Ohio's 7th Congressional District, is seeking re-election while denying domestic-abuse allegations made by his former wife, who is the daughter of Ohio Republican Senator Bernie Moreno. The tele-rally announcement gave no explanation for his omission, and neither the White House nor Miller's campaign had publicly explained it at the time of writing.
The five names on the tele-rally list covered the top of the Ohio ticket and three House races the party considers competitive. Husted, the Senate incumbent, and Ramaswamy, the gubernatorial nominee, were the headliners. Carey, who represents the 15th District around Columbus, Conroy, running in the 1st District around Cincinnati, and Merrin, running in the 9th District around Toledo, were the House candidates named.
Trump's message to Ohio voters was framed in the same language he has used throughout the campaign: that the named candidates have his "Complete and Total Endorsement" and "will never let you down." The format — a telephone call that supporters join by answering their phones — allows a campaign to reach voters across a whole state in a single afternoon, without the logistics of a hall, a motorcade and a crowd. For a president who had already held 25 rallies in October across 19 states, according to Reuters, the telephone format offered a way to add states without adding travel days.
Trump also held a Pennsylvania tele-rally on Saturday, backing Stacy Garrity for governor and Representatives Ryan Mackenzie, Rob Bresnahan, Scott Perry and Lloyd Smucker. The two calls, Ohio and Pennsylvania, were part of the same Saturday programme, and they illustrated how the final weekend was split: telephone events on Saturday, in-person rallies in Kansas and Iowa on Sunday, and Election Day on Tuesday.
Coverage of the announcement focused on the omission as much as on the endorsement. A live-election blog noted that Trump "also said he would campaign for three Republicans contesting competitive congressional races in the state. However, Representative Max Miller was notably absent from the list of candidates named by the president," and linked the absence to the abuse allegations Miller denies. No statement from Trump explaining the omission was reported.
The broader final-weekend picture was one of a campaign still adjusting its schedule in public. At his Daytona Beach rally on Friday, Trump told supporters he had expected that event to be his last of the midterm blitz, saying, "I thought this was going to be my last one, Byron, I thought this was it," before adding that he would go to Iowa and Kansas after all. He described his voice as operating at "49.2 percent" after weeks of rallies, and said Republicans in both states had asked him to come for crowds of about 50,000 each.
Democrats, meanwhile, were dealing with their own final-weekend difficulties elsewhere. In Michigan, a dispute between Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed and his former primary rival Haley Stevens cast doubt on a planned joint appearance in Detroit on Sunday, after El-Sayed's campaign asked Stevens to stay away from his remaining events and Stevens called on him to apologise for past remarks about Israel. The Michigan dispute, reported by Firstpost, underlined that both parties were entering the final days with unity problems in key Senate states.
The Ohio tele-rally matters for three reasons. First, Ohio is a state Trump has carried in all three of his presidential campaigns, and a state where Republicans are defending a Senate seat and seeking to hold the governor's office. A strong Republican showing there would help the party's argument that the midterm map is wider than the Democrats' polling lead suggests.
Second, the Miller omission matters because it is a visible, if unexplained, change in Trump's public support for an incumbent Republican. Endorsement lists are closely watched in the final days of a campaign, and a name missing from a list that previously included it invites questions — from voters, from donors and from the candidate's own supporters — that the campaign has so far not answered.
Third, the format itself matters. The shift to telephone rallies, alongside the reinstatement of the Kansas and Iowa visits, shows a campaign trying to maximise reach in the final 72 hours: in-person crowds for television in two states, and telephone calls that can reach voters in many more. With more than 49 million early votes already cast, the remaining audience is the smaller group of voters who will decide on Election Day itself, and both parties are competing for them with every tool available.
Trump returns to in-person campaigning on Sunday, November 1, with back-to-back rallies in Kansas and Iowa. In Kansas, the rally in Salina — moved from Saturday — is for Senator Roger Marshall, who faces Democrat Adam Hamilton in a race that polls show Hamilton leading. In Iowa, the Dubuque rally is for Representative Ashley Hinson, who faces Democrat Josh Turek in a race polling averages show Hinson leading by less than a point.
Ohio voters will not have another Trump visit before Election Day on Tuesday, November 3, unless the schedule changes again — as it has twice already this week. The tele-rally call, and the names on it, will therefore be the president's final direct appeal to Ohio voters in this campaign, and the absence of Max Miller's name from that appeal will be part of the story Ohio voters take into the voting booth.
When was the Trump Ohio tele-rally? The live telephone rally was announced for 2:45 p.m. ET on Saturday, October 31, 2026, three days before the November 3 midterm elections.
Who did Trump back in the Ohio tele-rally? Senator Jon Husted, gubernatorial nominee Vivek Ramaswamy, and House candidates Mike Carey (OH-15), Eric Conroy (OH-01) and Derek Merrin (OH-09).
Why was Max Miller left out? No reason was given in the announcement. Miller, the Republican incumbent in Ohio's 7th District, had appeared on an earlier Trump Ohio endorsement list, and he denies domestic-abuse allegations made by his former wife.
What else is on Trump's final-weekend schedule? Nearly 20 telephone rallies on Saturday, including Pennsylvania, followed by in-person rallies in Kansas and Iowa on Sunday, November 1.
When is Election Day? Tuesday, November 3, 2026. All 435 House seats and 35 Senate seats are on the ballot.
Related coverage: Trump Kansas and Iowa rallies reinstated for Sunday in final midterm push; Trump Texas rallies: Paxton, methane plan and a Talarico surge; Trump $1 million voter fraud reward: tips must lead to arrest and conviction.
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