Craig Riedel wants Republican primary voters in Northwest Ohio to believe he is a MAGA conservative. He says so in his campaign ads. He says so on his campaign website. He closes his television spot with a voiceover announcer declaring him “Conservative. Republican. MAGA.”

There’s just one problem: Donald Trump already told voters Riedel is none of those things.

And the record behind that assessment is not a matter of interpretation. It’s a matter of audio recordings, Truth Social posts, rescinded endorsements, and 2 consecutive primary defeats — a trail of political wreckage that Riedel is now hoping Northwest Ohio voters will simply forget as he seeks the open Ohio Senate District 1 seat in the May 5 Republican primary.

The tape

In December 2023, while Riedel was running for the Republican nomination in Ohio’s 9th Congressional District, Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk released audio of Riedel in conversation with a potential donor. On the recording, Riedel was asked directly whether he wanted Trump’s endorsement.

“I’m not. We are not. Nope,” Riedel said on the tape, according to reporting by Politico.

When pressed on what he would tell voters about supporting Trump, Riedel went further: “Donald Trump, he’s a different person than me. I don’t like the way he communicates. I think he is arrogant. I don’t like the way he calls people names. I just don’t think that’s very becoming of a president.”

Asked whether it was safe to say he wouldn’t support Trump’s primary run, Riedel replied: “I’m with you.”

The fallout was swift. Rep. Matt Gaetz called Riedel a “RINO Never-Trumper.” Rep. Elise Stefanik, then chair of the House Republican Conference, withdrew her endorsement, saying she was “very disappointed in his inappropriate comments regarding President Trump.” Rep. Max Miller followed suit.

Riedel scrambled. He issued a hasty Trump endorsement and called the leaked audio a “setup” orchestrated by “Matt Gaetz and a social media trickster.” But the damage was done. National Republicans held high-level discussions about recruiting a replacement candidate before the filing deadline, according to Politico’s reporting at the time.

Trump’s verdict

On March 18, 2024 — the day before Ohio’s primary — Trump posted on Truth Social to deliver his own assessment of Riedel.

“Derek Merrin is an incredible America First Patriot who is running for Congress in Ohio’s 9th Congressional District against a RINO, Craig Riedel, who is no friend of MAGA,” Trump wrote, according to PBS NewsHour reporting. Trump gave Merrin his “Complete and Total Endorsement.”

Merrin won the primary the following day with 52% of the vote. Riedel finished with roughly 35%, according to the Ohio Capital Journal.

It was Riedel’s second consecutive defeat in the same district. In 2022, he lost the 9th District Republican primary to J.R. Majewski, who took 36% to Riedel’s 31%.

The rebrand

Rather than accept that Republican voters have now rejected him twice, Riedel has pivoted — not to a new message, but to a new audience. He is running for the Ohio Senate District 1 seat being vacated by term-limited Senate President Rob McColley, and he is doing so with an entirely new political persona built on the very identity Trump told voters he doesn’t have.

His campaign announcement called him an “America First champion.” He pledged to create a state-level “Department of Government Efficiency” — a reference to the Elon Musk-led federal initiative. He promised to “eradicate DEI” from Ohio’s public institutions. His ad declares Northwest Ohio “MAGA country” and pledges that he will “drain the swamp in Columbus, like President Trump is draining the swamp in D.C.”

The transformation would be remarkable if it weren’t so transparent. Less than 3 years ago, Riedel was privately telling donors he didn’t want Trump’s endorsement and considered the president arrogant and unpresidential. Now he has built an entire campaign around the premise that he is Trump’s ideological heir in Columbus.

No endorsement from Trump has materialized for Riedel’s Senate bid. His campaign has not addressed the contradiction.

The contrast

Riedel’s opponent in the May 5 primary is state Rep. Jim Hoops of Napoleon, who has represented the 81st House District since 2018 and previously served in the Ohio House from 1999 to 2006.

Whatever voters think of either candidate’s policy positions, the organizational gap between them is significant. Hoops entered the race with more than 50 endorsements from local elected officials across all 9 counties in the district and $300,000 cash on hand, according to his campaign. In a recent Q&A published by The Crescent-News, Hoops said he passed 4 times as many bills as Riedel during their overlapping time in the legislature and secured more than 60% more in capital funding for the region.

Riedel has secured endorsements from Americans for Prosperity-Ohio and Ohio Value Voters — national and statewide organizations — but has not demonstrated comparable local support.

In that same Crescent-News Q&A, Riedel took a swipe at Hoops, saying “Ohio doesn’t need more career politicians who have betrayed conservatives time and again.” It is a curious line of attack from a candidate who was caught on tape privately trashing the leader of the conservative movement he now claims to represent — and who was then publicly repudiated by that same leader.

A pattern, not a pivot

What Riedel is doing in the District 1 race is not a genuine ideological evolution. It is a calculated rebranding effort by a candidate who has now lost 2 straight Republican primaries and is hoping that a different electorate in a different race won’t bother checking the receipts.

The facts are straightforward: Riedel privately refused to endorse Trump. He called Trump arrogant. He lost the endorsements of prominent Republican allies over those comments. Trump himself labeled him a RINO and told voters he was “no friend of MAGA.” And then Riedel lost — twice.

Now he’s back, draped in MAGA branding, asking a new set of voters to buy what 2 previous sets of Republican primary voters already rejected. Whether that sales pitch works is up to the voters of Northwest Ohio’s 1st Senate District on May 5. But they should at least be making their decision with the full picture in front of them.

The District 1 seat covers 10 counties in Northwest Ohio: Defiance, Fulton, Hancock, Hardin, Henry, Paulding, Putnam, Van Wert, Williams, and a portion of Logan County. No Democratic or independent candidates have filed as of this writing.

TiffinOhio.net reached out to the Riedel campaign for comment. No response was received prior to publication.