WASHINGTON, D.C. — The stakes in Ohio’s U.S. Senate race could not be higher, as it may well determine which party controls the chamber next year. Yet neither one of the presidential candidates—Vice President Kamala Harris or former President Donald Trump—has campaigned in Ohio to try to affect the outcome.

Trump has already played a large role in the Senate race. His endorsement helped businessman Bernie Moreno win the Republican nomination.

Since holding a rally with Moreno right before the Republican primary in March, though, Trump has not visited Ohio at all.

“If you look at our state officeholders, the governor or secretary of state and so on, as well as our senators, we only have one Democrat who has been elected statewide,” said Benjamin Bates, communication studies professor at Ohio University. “So it’s a pretty safe place for someone like Donald Trump.”

The Trump campaign is instead devoting time and resources to swing states like Pennsylvania, Michigan and Arizona.

“The Trump campaigns in 2016 and 2020 picked up Ohio rather handily,” said Chapman University assistant political science professor Hannah Ridge. “So they may feel, especially with Vance as a running mate, that it's not necessary for them to campaign for their own interest in Ohio.”

The shift from battleground state to reliably Republican may explain why Harris has not visited Ohio either.

But there is another reason top Democrats are not campaigning with Sen. Sherrod Brown: his own efforts to distance himself from the party.

Brown previously called on President Joe Biden to bow out of the presidential race and skipped the Democratic National Convention in August.

“Sherrod Brown very much pitches himself as a centrist or even perhaps conservative, a pro-labor populist, and his positions do not align neatly with the majority of the Democratic Party. So were he to appear beside Kamala Harris or to be endorsing Kamala Harris, it might hurt his own chances of being reelected,” Bates said.

Brown has said he would be willing to campaign with Harris if their schedules align, but that he remains focused on his own campaign.

“I’ve endorsed the vice president, but my job is my job,” he told reporters on a press call in July. “My focus will always be fighting for Ohio, not who’s running for president.”

National candidates and their surrogates are still making a limited effort to support Moreno and Brown.

This week Moreno held a tele-rally with Trump and attended a fundraiser in Columbus with vice presidential candidate JD Vance.

The Brown campaign is airing radio ads with former President Barack Obama’s endorsement.

Trump still has not ruled out a rally in Ohio to boost Moreno, but with 18 days left before the election, time is running out. The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.