Did Donald Trump Jr. say Democrats ‘want to make Ohio a state’?

Claim:

At a Nov. 2 rally in Swanton, Ohio, Donald Trump Jr., the eldest son of U.S. President Donald Trump, said Democrats “want to make Ohio a state.”

Rating:

Context

Based on the context of his remarks, Trump likely meant to refer to the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico.

Just before the 2026 U.S. midterm elections, videos circulated online claiming to show Donald Trump Jr., the eldest son of President Donald Trump, telling attendees at a political rally that Democrats “want to make Ohio a state.”

Ohio, of course, has been a state since 1803 (though a legislative loophole has led some to claim it was admitted officially in 1953). Trump’s supposed gaffe spread quickly, and Snopes readers contacted us hoping we could verify the remark.

The video is real — Trump really did say Democrats want to “make Ohio a state.” We reviewed his remarks in full context, and present that information here as well.

Several reputable outlets, including The Columbus Dispatch, shared Trump’s remarks, reporting that he was speaking at a rally outside of Toledo, Ohio. Those outlets often credited the original footage to Reuters. 

Snopes found the rally in question featured both Trump and Vice President JD Vance, was held in Swanton, Ohio, which is indeed not far from Toledo. While we were unable to locate the Reuters footage, we did find C-SPAN’s coverage of the rally. 

Trump took the stage around seven minutes into the footage and spent much of his speech claiming Democratic candidates — both in Ohio and across the nation — would “push towards communism, socialism, open borders, trans-ing your children.”

When discussing the supposed “open borders” policies of Democrats, he referenced the debunked “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory by accusing Democrats of catering to immigrants and aiming to grant them U.S. citizenship in an effort to seize permanent control of the government. Just before the 10-minute mark, Trump then claimed Democrats wanted to increase the size of the Supreme Court and grant Ohio and Washington, D.C., statehood, with the goal of “permanent one-party rule.”

We are on a path towards communism. That’s not me saying it; it’s them saying it. When they say they want to defund ICE, they want to get rid of the Border Patrol, they want to open our border to tens of millions of illegals and make the illegals that are here permanent citizens. When they say that, what do you think their reasoning behind that is? 

They want to, what is it, save democracy by destroying democracy. They want to pack the Supreme Court. They want to make Ohio a state, make D.C. a state, have permanent one-party rule. 

All apparently — I don’t know how it works, but you know, they can do these things and get away with it — all in the name of somehow preserving democracy. It’s not how it works. We all know that, we’ve seen it. 

Again, they’re saying these things out loud. They’re not even hiding from it, right? They usually get caught in the back room and now they’re just saying it, they’re running on it. The most radical people ever put forth by the Democrat Party, and they’ve been pretty radical for a while, are the people actually winning their primaries.

He likely meant to say Puerto Rico, the U.S. territory in the Caribbean, instead of Ohio. Groups have fought over the political status of the island for decades.

Democrats, including Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, have pushed for Puerto Rico to hold a binding referendum on statehood — but so did Republican Presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush. 

Republicans in Florida, including Sen. Rick Scott, Gov. Ron DeSantis and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio have all previously made comments expressing their support for the idea as well — though not in recent years. 

Sources