(WASHINGTON) — Ohioans head to the polls Tuesday to vote in Democratic and Republican primaries, featuring multiple hotly contested races, including battles for governor, secretary of state and U.S. Senate.

The race to replace Sen. Rob Portman, who is retiring, features a crowded Republican primary in which former President Donald Trump’s endorsement powers will be tested.

In the GOP Senate primary, almost all the candidates have centered their campaigns around being a Trump conservative. But it was a “never-Trumper” turned Trump ally, J.D. Vance, who scored Trump’s coveted endorsement, upending the race.

In the days leading up to the Ohio primary, Club for Growth, a conservative anti-tax group backing Republican candidate and former Ohio treasurer Josh Mandel, released an ad attacking Vance and questioning Trump’s endorsement of him.

The ad features previous comments from Vance criticizing Trump supporters by saying they voted for the former president for racist reasons.

Other notable Republicans vying for the nomination include Mike Gibbons, a wealthy businessman, Jane Timken, former chairwoman of the Ohio GOP, and Ohio state Sen. Matt Dolan.

Unlike his opponents, Dolan has distanced himself from Trump, saying his campaign is focused on Ohioans and that Republicans focusing on the results of the 2020 election are taking the wrong approach.

On the other side of the aisle, three candidates are running in the House Democratic primary. Rep. Tim Ryan, who briefly ran for president in 2020 and has long represented the working class Youngstown area, is the clear frontrunner. The other candidates in the race are Traci Johnson and Morgan Harper.

In the GOP gubernatorial primary, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, who is seeking a second term, is favored to win. He faces a spirited faceoff with members of his own party who were disappointed with his relatively strict response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Republicans looking to replace DeWine include former U.S. Rep. Jim Renacci, former state Rep. Ron Hood and Joe Blystone, a farmer who jumped into the race. Trump has not endorsed in the contest, but Renacci has campaigned on Trumpism and has cited Trump’s support of him in 2018 during his failed campaign for Senate.

Ohio’s secretary of state race has received more attention than in previous election cycles. A greater focus has been placed on the top election position of overseeing and validating election results following the 2020 election. ​​Ohio GOP Secretary of State Frank LaRose faces a primary challenger in John Adams. Adams has expressed unfounded doubts about the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election results, whereas LaRose has danced around the issue.

LaRose acknowledged President Joe Biden as the legitimate president, but his campaign borrows Trump’s rhetoric of “protecting elections,” and LaRose has campaigned on fighting voter fraud despite no evidence it is a widespread problem. Trump endorsed LaRose and is considered likely to win and continue on to the general election.

Multiple House races will play out throughout the state Tuesday but the rematch between Rep. Shontel Brown and Nina Turner for Ohio’s 11th Congressional District will be one of the most closely watched of the night. Brown was first elected in a special election following Marcia Fudge’s appointment to serve as secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Brown and Turner’s rematch is viewed as a reflection of the divisions between the Democratic Party’s progressive and establishment wings. Progressives like Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont have endorsed Turner. Biden, however, endorsed Brown on Friday, calling her “an ardent advocate for the people of Ohio and a true partner in Congress.”

Turner and Brown approached the campaign trail from different ends of the Democratic political spectrum. Turner, a former co-chairwoman of Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign, has heavily criticized the Democratic Party and Biden in the past and her previous loss to Brown was seen as a win for the Democratic establishment. On Monday night, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a leading left-wing voice, threw her support behind Turner.

Over 100,000 votes have already been cast statewide, and 182,000 absentee ballots had been requested as of the end of early voting on April 22, according to LaRose.

“As I’ve visited county boards of elections this month during early voting and spoken with voters, what I’ve seen firsthand are the high standards of accessibility and security which make our state a national model,” the secretary of state said in a statement reporting early voting numbers.

Due to an ongoing redistricting litigation battle still playing out in the state, Tuesday’s primary in Ohio will not feature legislative races for the state House or Senate. Voters will cast ballots for governor, attorney general, secretary of state, auditor, U.S. House and U.S. Senate. A second primary will be held for legislative races, though no date has been set, according to LaRose’s office.

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(WASHINGTON) — The parents of Austin Tice, an American journalist and Marine Corps veteran abducted in Syria, have already been waiting almost a decade for their son to return home. After a public plea for support over the weekend, President Joe Biden wasted no time, saying on Monday he would meet with them “today.”

White House press secretary Jen Psaki provided more details on the meeting after it took place, saying in a statement that “the president reiterated his commitment to continue to work through all available avenues to secure Austin’s long overdue return to his family.”

Psaki added that Biden’s national security team “will remain in regular contact” with the Tice family, as well as the families of other hostages.

The heightened attention to Tice’s case comes after the head of the White House Correspondents’ Association paid tribute to him during the group’s annual dinner on Saturday, asking his mother to stand and be acknowledged as the president looked on.

Later in the evening, during his own remarks, Biden said that he would like to meet with her and Tice’s father.

“After the President made those comments, obviously we went into action to work to set up the meeting on Sunday and see if Debra and Mark Tice — Austin’s parents — would be available,” Psaki said during a briefing.

That high-profile moment at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner took place just days after Trevor Reed, an American and former Marine held captive in Russia for nearly two years, was freed as part of an international prisoner exchange –a deal that fell into place weeks after Reed’s parents had a White House meeting with the president of their own.

The Tices have previously met with National Security adviser Jake Sullivan and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, but Psaki called the audience with Biden “an additional and more significant step.”

State Department Spokesperson Ned Price added that the meeting was a testament to the administration’s commitment to bring Tice back home, adding “he has been away from his family for far too long, and we’re doing everything we can to see that comes to a successful conclusion.”

But Tice’s imprisonment poses unique challenges. Reed’s release was the result of months of intense negotiations within Moscow. But the U.S. has not had a formal diplomatic relationship with Syria since the onset of the country’s civil war in 2012 — something Tice’s mother has voiced frustration over in prior interviews.

Despite that complication, Price said the U.S. could still secure Tice’s freedom.

“You didn’t hear us share the details of those consultations before [Trevor Reed] was released. We do believe that we can best and most effectively achieve potentially successful outcomes if we do have space to conduct private conversations,” Price said. “We of course don’t have, I would say, fully normal relations with Moscow at this time and yet we were able to have a discrete, focused set of discussions regarding the effort to free Trevor Reed that ultimately were successful.”

Tice disappeared in 2012 while covering the Free Syrian Army, a group of Syrian military officials who had joined the opposition against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. A month later, a video was released showing him blindfolded, removed from a car and led by armed men up a hill, saying “Oh, Jesus.” He has not been publicly heard from since.

The FBI is offering a reward of up to $1 million for information leading directly to the safe location, recovery and return of Tice.

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(WASHINGTON) — An apparent draft Supreme Court opinion obtained by Politico shows the panel’s conservative majority of justices is ready to overturn nearly 50 years of established abortion rights precedent since Roe v. Wade.

The document, which Politico said it obtained from a “person familiar with the court’s proceedings,” is marked “first draft” and dated Feb. 10, 2022 — two months after oral arguments were heard in the case Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. ABC News has not independently confirmed the draft.

“Roe was egregiously wrong from the start,” writes Justice Samuel Alito, the opinion’s apparent author, in a copy of the draft posted online.

The leak is an extraordinary breach of Supreme Court protocol and tradition. Never before has such a consequential draft opinion been leaked to the public before publication.

Reached by ABC News, a Supreme Court spokeswoman declined to comment.

The Dobbs case involves Mississippi’s ban on abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy — well before fetal viability, the longstanding dividing line established by the court before which states cannot restrict a woman’s access to the procedure.

During arguments in December, five of the justices hinted that they were ready to do away with the “viability standard” established by Roe and a subsequent 1992 decision, Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

An unnamed source familiar with the deliberations told Politico that Justices Alito, Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett all initially supported a ruling siding with Mississippi and “that line-up remains unchanged as of this week.”

The drafting of Supreme Court opinions, however, is a fluid and dynamic process, sources familiar with the internal operations have told ABC News. The document posted suggests a majority of justices is likely to side with Mississippi, but how broad a ruling will ultimately come down remains unclear.

Chief Justice John Roberts famously changed his vote late during deliberations over the Affordable Care Act in 2012, narrowly saving the law from being struck down. A Wall Street Journal editorial this month suggested that Roberts, who reveres established precedent and the court’s reputation, may be trying to convince one of his conservative colleagues to join him in a narrower opinion.

If Alito’s opinion were to hold, as written, it would dramatically upend abortion rights across America, effectively allowing each state to set its own policy.

“The Constitution does not prohibit the citizens of each State from regulating or prohibiting abortion,” the draft concludes. “Roe and Casey arrogated that authority. We now overrule those decisions and return that authority to the people and their elected representatives.”

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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