FILE - Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost speaks during a campaign rally for Republican vice presidential candidate Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, in Middletown, Ohio, July 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Paul Vernon, File)

Attorney General Dave Yost, who’s talked for months about running for governor, announced his intentions to seek the office next year.

Yost, a Republican, said Thursday: “After receiving a groundswell of support from voters across the state and much prayer and consultation, I am answering the call to duty. I will be faithful. I will not falter, and I will not fail.”

The Republican field for governor in 2026 is expected to be crowded. In addition to Yost, Treasurer Robert Sprague filed a designation of treasurer last week to run for governor and Vivek Ramaswamy, a wealthy venture capitalist who recently resigned as co-chairman of President Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, is expected to announce his candidacy as soon as next week.

Incumbent Mike DeWine, a Republican, cannot run for reelection next year.

Dr. Amy Acton, who rose to prominence as DeWine’s health director during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic and a Youngstown native, said she will run as a Democrat for governor. A Democrat hasn’t won a statewide executive branch office in Ohio since 2008.

Yost, who is serving his second four-year term as attorney general after two terms as state auditor, called himself a “principled conservative and a strong advocate for Ohio’s families, businesses and taxpayers.”

Yost’s gubernatorial announcement described him as “an America First attorney general, supporting President Trump’s agenda at the state level. He has devoted his career to protecting individual liberties, fighting against partisan lawfare and creating a stable environment for economic growth.”

Yost said: “This is my heart, my home. I work for the people of Ohio and I love my bosses. From the time I get up in the morning until I go to bed at night, I’m thinking about them and our future.”

Yost touted his record of protecting the Second Amendment, fighting the former President Joe Biden administration’s “open-border policy,” winning a Supreme Court decision striking down Biden’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate for businesses, strengthening charter school accountability and protecting school choice as well as his “pioneering case against a major energy corporation (FirstEnergy) for its role in a public corruption scandal (that) saved Ohio taxpayers more than a billion dollars.”

Katie Seewer, an Ohio Democratic Party spokesperson, said: “At every turn, Yost has ignored Ohio voters at the expense of special interests and extremists in his party. Now, he wants the same voters he ignored to send him to our state’s highest office. Yost said he’s ready to offer voters a choice, and we’re ready to make sure Ohioans don’t choose him.”

Sprague said a few days ago that “Ohio is built for more. It’s time to let hard-working Ohioans keep what they earn, end government waste and create real opportunity through good jobs. I’ll keep fighting to reform a broken system, protect our freedoms and make Ohio the Midwest’s economic powerhouse. The people of this state deserve bold, proven leadership, and I look forward to sharing my vision for Ohio in the weeks ahead.”

SECRETARY OF STATE

Republican Niraj Antani of Miamisburg, a former state legislator, announced he’s running for secretary of state in 2026. Antani unsuccessfully ran last year for the open 2nd Congressional District seat in the Republican primary, finishing 10th out of 11 candidates.

Antani wrote during his time in the Legislature, “I stood with a steel spine against the political establishment of both parties and special interests who all seek to preserve the status quo. We cannot afford elected leaders who shift their positions as the political winds change, who march to the beat of the drum of the establishment.”

Secretary of State Frank LaRose, a Republican, cannot seek another term in next year’s election because of the state’s term-limits law.

State Sen. Theresa Gavarone, R-Bowling Green, is strongly considering a bid for secretary of state.

Bryan Hambley, a cancer doctor who attracted media attention in 2016 when he was thrown out of a Trump rally for protesting, said he’s running for secretary of state next year as a Democrat.