An open-seat Ohio congressional race is an early electoral gauge of the voting public’s views on the Trump administration‘s deportation tactics.
Madison Sheahan announced Jan. 15 that she was stepping down as deputy director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and seeking the Republican nomination to take on longtime Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH). Sheahan, 28, faces a crowded Republican primary field in a newly redrawn 9th Congressional District, which is likely to be one of the nation’s most competitive House contests in the 2026 election cycle. House Democrats need to net three seats in November to claim a majority, and both parties are expected to play hard for the district covering Toledo and Ohio’s northwest corner.
It’s part of an Ohio congressional remap ahead of the midterm elections, spurred by a statewide voter-approved ballot initiative. In 2024, President Donald Trump would have won the 9th Congressional District 55% to 44% over Democratic rival, then-Vice President Kamala Harris. The previous iteration of the district Kaptur held was a shade less politically challenging, with Trump beating Harris 53% to 46% in 2024.
Yet, beating Kaptur, 79, will be a challenge no matter who emerges as the Republican nominee. Kaptur has demonstrated considerable political endurance, stretching back to her initial House election during the midterm elections of the late President Ronald Reagan’s first term. Since then, Kaptur has been a leading critic of international trade deals and their effects on working-class constituents. It’s a message that in many ways presaged and later converged with Trump’s populist and protectionist rhetoric.
Which is where the ICE situation comes in as the 2026 election cycle gets going. More than a year into Trump’s second term, the agency, spearheading efforts to deport illegal immigrants from the United States, is at the center of Democratic “Resistance” efforts.
It’s also drawing some criticism from Republican lawmakers over the fatal shootings early in 2026 of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. Both were American citizens killed by federal agents during “Operation Metro Surge,” a large-scale ICE and Customs and Border Protection enforcement operation in Minneapolis. Their deaths have sparked national controversy, massive local protests, and significant political friction between the Trump administration and Minnesota officials.
Sheahan launched her House campaign as the ICE confrontations with protesters in Minnesota reached a peak. And she’s leaning into defending her former agency, headed by Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.
“In less than one year at ICE, I’ve stopped more illegal immigration than Marcy Kaptur has in her 43 years in Washington,” Sheahan proclaims in her launch video. “Ohio neighborhoods are safer thanks to President Trump and ICE.”
Sheahan is an Ohio native who previously worked as a political aide for then-Gov. Kristi Noem (R-SD) and in the administration of Gov. Jeff Landry (R-LA). To face Kaptur in November, Sheahan will have to win a crowded May 5 Republican primary.
The GOP field in the 9th Congressional District includes Derek Merrin, a former state representative who narrowly lost to Kaptur in 2024. Also running for the Republican nomination are state Rep. Josh Williams, 41, and Air Force veteran Alea Nadeem, who is in her early 40s.
A longtime incumbent’s toughest opponent yet?
Kaptur is running for reelection despite Ohio’s most recent round of redistricting, which made her conservative-leaning constituency even tougher to hold. Kaptur, though, responded to the unwelcome development by dispelling any talk she’d retire. The congresswoman said in a statement last fall, “I remain committed to serving Northwest Ohio and will seek re-election with a renewed focus on accountability and protecting the voice of the people.”
Northeast Ohio voters have stuck with Kaptur for more than 40 years — a ballot loyalty that will be sorely tested in an increasingly red state. Even though polls show Democrats are strong heading into the November elections, with a decent chance of winning the House majority.
“Democrat Marcy Kaptur, first elected in 1982, is the longest-serving woman in congressional history,” notes the 2026 Almanac of American Politics. “Kaptur is a plainspoken Democrat who touts her connection to blue-collar constituents, even as her party has become more suburban and white-collar; this demographic shift has made her reelections tougher than ever, exacerbated by unfriendly redistricting.”
In 2024, with Trump romping to victory statewide in Ohio over Harris 55% to 44%, Kaptur barely won reelection. She edged Merrin, finishing eight-and-a-half years as a state representative, by 2,382 votes, good for a 48.3 to 47.6% victory.
Merrin, 39, will likely cite that near-loss as an argument that he’s the best Republican nominee to finish the job against Kaptur. While Sheahan is tying herself to the Trump administration’s ICE deportation agenda.
Sheahan’s pro-ICE statements come as a sizable majority of Americans want significant changes to the agency. An NBC News Decision Desk Poll powered by SurveyMonkey, released on Feb. 11, found nearly 3 in 4 U.S. adults supported some changes to ICE, with 29% saying it should be abolished outright.
And a KARE 11/ Minnesota Star Tribune poll, also released Feb. 11, showed a majority of Minnesotans wanted federal agents investigated in the fatal shootings of Good and Pretti.
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Still, while the surveys by NBC News and the Minnesota local station and newspaper show skepticism toward ICE tactics, the data also found locals were divided over how much to reform the agency. And how to handle immigration policy broadly.
In a Republican-leaning Ohio House district, support for ICE is likely to be even stronger. It all makes for a lot of political moving parts. And Ohio’s 9th Congressional District is likely one of the nation’s most competitive House battlegrounds over the next eight months-plus.
David Mark (@DavidMarkDC) is the managing editor of the Washington Examiner magazine.