Ohio will be a battleground again in 2012 for the presidential election, and right now President Obama is hanging tough against likely opponent Mitt Romney.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney overtook former House Speaker Newt Gingrich in a new Buckeye State poll released Wednesday by the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.

The eight-day survey, which ended Monday, shows that 27 percent of Republicans here favor Romney. Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, who finished eight votes behind Romney in this month’s Iowa caucuses, received 18 percent; Gingrich received 17 percent.

Romney today would be the strongest candidate in a head-to-head showdown with President Barack Obama. The poll found that 44 percent of Ohio voters would vote for Obama, 42 percent for Romney — a virtual tie given the poll’s 2.4 percent margin of error.

The hypothetical match was a percentage point tighter in last month’s poll.

Romney was in favor of Issue 2, so I suspect that the Obama campaign will hammer him on that. If they do this in the spring and early summer, Romney might not be able to recover in Ohio, and there’s no way Romney can win the election without Ohio.