It was a foregone conclusion that Dave Joyce and Michael Rulli, the two Republican congressmen who represent the Mahoning Valley, were going to win reelection.

The only questions were: By what margin and how much money would they raise?

The quick answer to both is: a lot.

Joyce, R-Bainbridge, will start serving his seventh two-year term representing the 14th Congressional District next month. The district, which includes all of Trumbull County, had a 9.7% Republican advantage based on statewide partisan voting results during the previous decade. That number will definitely increase once this year’s election results are included.

Joyce ran against Democrat Brian Bob Kenderes, who didn’t campaign, was convicted of a felony for filing a false voter registration to run for the seat and raised little to no money as he never filed a finance report with the Federal Election Commission. The FEC requires candidates who raise at least $5,000 to file reports.

Kenderes said he was indigent as his case progressed through the court system – and with his current residence being the Lake County jail – it’s highly doubtful he received contributions.

Joyce easily won, capturing 63.4% of the vote to 36.6% for Kenderes.

Joyce’s margin of victory was 26.8%. That is much better than the typical Republican running in the 14th District.

It’s also better than Republican Donald Trump did in the presidential election in the district. Trump beat Democrat Kamala Harris by 17.9% in the 14th.

Likely because Joyce knew he would easily win last month, he didn’t do much campaigning.

He raised $2,483,765 for this election relying on political action committees for 63.1% of the money he received, $1,567,473. He spent $1,525,426 on the campaign.

With a large amount of money carried over from his previous campaigns and spending nearly $1 million less than he collected for this election, Joyce’s campaign fund had a $2,842,160 surplus as of Nov. 25.

Yet I wonder why 140,431 people voted for Kenderes. He didn’t do anything of note except commit a felony related to his candidacy and more than one-third of those who voted backed him.

There are people who obviously didn’t know Kenderes was a felon or that he didn’t campaign and simply voted for the Democrat in the race.

Joyce received 6,432 more votes than Trump even though the presidential race had 404,825 voters compared with 383,858 for the congressional election.

Rulli, R-Salem, was in a unique position during last month’s election as the incumbent in the 6th Congressional District for a little more than four months.

Because of the resignation of Republican Bill Johnson, who represented the district for 13 years, the seat was open during a special June 11 election.

As the Republican and a state senator for three of the district’s counties – including Mahoning, its most-populous, and Columbiana, its third most-populous – Rulli was the heavy favorite in a district that had an 18% advantage for Republicans based on voting results in partisan statewide elections over the previous decade. Like the 14th, that Republican advantage will increase in the 6th.

Rulli was running against Michael L. Kripchak of Youngstown, an underfunded and unknown Democrat.

Rulli won the special election by 9.3% and he lost Mahoning County.

But special elections can produce surprising results, largely because turnout is incredibly low as it was during the Rulli-Kripchak race.

During last month’s general election for a full two-year term, Rulli exceeded the district’s Republican advantage, winning by 33.4%. Rulli received 66.7% of the vote to 33.3% for Kripchak.

Trump won by a slightly larger margin in the 6th District than Rulli, beating Harris by 33.7%. The 6th was Trump’s third-best district in Ohio. He won the 2nd District in southern Ohio by 47.6% and Republican Jim Jordan’s 4th District by 36.8%.

In the 6th District, there were 381,769 total votes for presidential candidates and 368,375 for congressional candidates.

Trump received 253,659 votes in the 6th compared with 245,860 for Rulli.

Rulli’s campaign raised a total of $1,134,667 as of Nov. 25 for two Republican primaries on the March 19 ballot, the special June 11 election and the Nov. 5 election.

Once Rulli won the special election, the PAC money rolled in and made up a majority of the contributions he received on and after June 11.

For his campaigns, Rulli spent $1,027,512.

He had $107,155 in his fund as of Nov. 25. It isn’t much, but he’ll have time to raise much PAC money as a sitting congressman in preparation for his 2026 reelection.

In comparison, Kripchak raised $78,967 and spent $111,496.

It put Kripchak in the position of having a $32,529 deficit and almost certainly no way to pay it off. Of the money raised by his campaign, $2,396 came from Kripchak.

Kripchak’s largest expense was $53,603 to Colossus Strategies and Consulting, the Canfield firm that ran his campaign.

Skolnick covers politics for the Tribune Chronicle and The Vindicator.

dskolnick@tribtoday.com