Ohio primary elections 2018: the race to replace Gov. John Kasich is wide open

Voters are heading to the polls for key primaries in Ohio, West Virginia, Indiana, and North Carolina, kicking off 2018 midterms season in earnest.

The races will decide candidates for crucial House, Senate, and governor’s races — and Ohio’s governor’s race is one of the most important, and bizarre, in the country.

Republican governor and 2016 presidential candidate John Kasich is term-limited, and it’s anyone’s guess who will succeed him. On the Democratic side, former Obama administration official Richard Cordray is looking to fend off Dennis Kucinich, a former Congress member who is now a Fox News talking head with an unusual affinity for President Trump and the Syrian government. Mike DeWine, Ohio’s attorney general and a former US senator, is the presumed Republican favorite, but Lt. Gov. Mary Taylor is making the race interesting and hugging as closely as she can to Trump.

Democrats are also hoping to pick up House seats in the First District, which is on the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s Red to Blue list, and the 10th District, where they’re running a former Republican.

Also on Tuesday, voters will weigh in on a rare bipartisan deal to reform redistricting in one of the most gerrymandered states in the country.