Republican kills governor bid over fears 'family squabble' would tear apart GOP

Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost announced the suspension of his gubernatorial campaign in an email to supporters on Friday.

Yost said he has enjoyed traveling around the state engaging with Ohioans in his bid to succeed term-limited Governor Mike DeWine, but “it is also apparent that a steep climb to the nomination for governor has become a vertical cliff.”

“I do not wish to divide my political party or my state with a quixotic battle over the small differences between my vision and that of my opponent,” Yost wrote, seeming to refer to fellow candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.

“I am simply not that important.” Ramaswamy, an entrepreneur who was also the co-leader with Elon Musk of the Trump-created Department of Government Efficiency, received the Ohio Republican Party’s gubernatorial endorsement on May 9.

Yost said the state “has challenges ahead” and Columbus “needs re-engineering, not demolition.” He warned of a “comeback attempt” by former U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown that could “unwind all of the good that the last 15 years of Republican leadership has brought.”

“This is a time to protect Ohio, not a time for a family squabble,” Yost wrote.

Brown has not formally announced any bid for elected office, but former Ohio Department of Health director Amy Acton has already thrown her hat in the ring to vie for the governor’s seat as a Democrat.

Yost, whose term as state attorney general runs until Jan. 2027, plans to “continue to fight for Ohio and Ohioans” for the rest of his tenure, but “I suspect that this is not my final chapter,” he told supporters.