State Rep. Gary Click has announced he will run for his fourth and final term representing Ohio’s 88th House District—and he’s not pulling punches against the far-right primary challenger questioning his conservative credentials.

“You move to the right of Gary Click and you’re in the ditch,” the Vickery Republican told the Fremont News-Messenger when asked about Eric Watson’s insurgent campaign.

Click, a fundamentalist Baptist preacher and former community theater actor first elected in 2020, faces term limits after this cycle. Ohio House members can serve a maximum of four two-year terms. The May 5 primary will determine whether Click completes that tenure or whether Watson—a Tiffin entrepreneur who returned from Arizona in 2022—can unseat the three-term incumbent in a Republican primary that has already turned combative.

Watson has centered his challenge on Click’s co-sponsorship of Digital ID legislation and what Watson characterizes as the incumbent’s prioritization of corporate interests over constituent concerns. Campaign finance records support Watson’s central attack: 65.6% of Click’s $312,985 in total fundraising since 2020 has come from corporate PACs and industry groups, while individual donors within the 88th District account for just 13.9% of his campaign war chest.

Click is a primary sponsor of House Bill 200, “The America First Act,” which would align Ohio law with federal immigration law. He said he also wants to develop the ICE Act “to prevent the use of public facilities to train activists to obstruct justice” and emphasized “the importance of distinguishing between lawful protest and illegal activity.”

The incumbent has also launched a podcast called “What’s Clickin’,” which was rated among the worst uses of social media in Ohio politics by readers of Cleveland.com.

Click chairs the House Community Revitalization Committee and serves on the Education, Children & Human Services, and Ways & Means committees. He authored House Bill 68, the “SAFE Act,” which prohibits gender-affirming care for minors and bars transgender athletes from women’s sports.

Watson has secured the endorsement of Marcell Strbich, a Republican candidate for Ohio Secretary of State, and has framed the race as a “Battle for Truth & Freedom.” His platform advocates eliminating Digital IDs and property taxes entirely, protecting Ohio farmland from data center development, and “removing toxins from food.”

Despite Watson’s attacks on Click’s legislative record, Seneca County Board of Elections records show Watson has cast just one ballot in the district—the 2024 general election.

The Republican primary winner will face Tiffin City Councilman Aaron Jones, who is running unopposed on the Democratic ballot. Jones—a first-term councilman, Army veteran, and manufacturing supervisor—has centered his campaign on kitchen-table economics, public education investment, and infrastructure improvements.

Early in-person voting for the May 5 primary begins April 7. The primary winners advance to the Nov. 3 general election representing Seneca and Sandusky counties.