Dems see bright spots amid GOP gains, infighting
All is not 100% bleak for Ohio Democrats: General Assembly Republicans are attacking their fellow Republican, Gov. Mike Dewine, over his fight against COVID-19.
And for what seems to be the first time since 1952, Franklin County's prosecuting attorney will be a Democrat, former Ohio Court of Appeals Judge Gary Tyack. He unseated veteran Franklin County Prosecuting Attorney Ron O'brien.
Franklin County's prosecutor has jurisdiction over alleged felonies committed at Ohio's Republican-run Statehouse. And Columbus City Attorney Zach Klein, also a Democrat, has jurisdiction over alleged misdemeanors committed at the Statehouse. Given the House Bill 6 scandal, which might be a plus for Democrats who voted against it, the Capitol Square timing couldn't be better – for Democrats.
True, Republicans gained Ohio House seats at this month's election for the legislature's 2021-22 session. And 2022 is when Dewine is expected to ask voters for a second term. But it takes 66 House votes to override a governor's veto. And the House GOP caucus, led by Speaker Bob Cupp, a Lima Republican, will have 65 votes. That will give House Democrats (34, beginning in January) some room for tactical roll-call games when Republicans go after Dewine.
Salting that soup is the possibility that another Republican could challenge DeWine's renomination in 2022's GOP gubernatorial primary. (Coincidentally or not, U.S. Rep Jim Jordan, an Urbana Republican, has loudly indicated he opposes Dewine's moves to fight COVID-19.) Why and how Ohio's right-to-life governor can be faulted for trying to save the lives of Ohioans already born is a logical mystery. But logic has never stopped the legislature grandstanders.
And lame duck General Assembly Republicans might soon send Dewine what can only be considered an insultingly broad expansion of Ohio's gun laws. Republican legislators shrugged off gunsafety measures Dewine proposed after 2019's mass murder in Dayton's Oregon District.
Democrat Tyack's defeat of Republican O'brien reflects Franklin County's transformation from rock-ribbed Republican turf to a Democratic stronghold. That said, Tyack is anything but shy.
Sure, Ohio's squishy “ethics” laws can make it tough to win convictions in (state-prosecuted) corruption cases. Meanwhile, the U.S. attorney for southern Ohio, David Devillers, aided by the FBI and armed with strong federal anticorruption laws, has taken off after alleged Statehouse corruption.
In July, a federal grand jury indicted then-house Speaker Larry Householder, a Republican from Perry County's Glenford; former Republican State Chair Matt Borges; political consultant Jeff Longstreth; and lobbyists Juan Cespedes and Neil S. Clark.
The grand jury alleged that the five defendants, by spending $60 million in socalled “dark money,” won passage by the state Senate and the Ohio House of House Bill 6.
The bill requires Ohio's electricity customers to bail out two nuclear power plants (Perry and Davis-besse) formerly owned by Akron-based Firstenergy Corp. Cespedes and Longstreth have pleaded guilty. Householder, Borges and Clark are presumed innocent unless convicted.
The House removed Householder as speaker soon after his indictment. And Dewine, who signed HB 6 almost as soon as it passed, called for HB 6's repeal. So did many other officeholders. But neither the House, led by Cupp, or the Senate, led by lame duck President Larry Obhof, a Medina Republican, has repealed HB 6. Obhof, who voted “yes” on HB 6, has said he favors repealing it.
There might be entirely innocent explanations for the legislature's stall in repealing HB 6. And coincidences don't necessarily show intentions. Voters should comb out the coincidences from the legislative saga of HB 6:
h House Bill 6 passed the House with just one vote to spare. It passed the Senate with just two votes to spare. That doesn't indicate legislative suspicion. Nah. That's just a coincidence.
h Like President Obhof, Speaker Cupp voted “yes” on HB 6. Another coincidence.
h The chair of the Cupp-picked committee talking (and talking …) about repealing HB 6, Rep. Jim Hoops, a Napoleon Republican, voted “yes” on HB 6. Yet again, a darned coincidence.
So House Bill 6 passed because nobody in the legislature knew it would force Ohio electricity customers to hand over hundreds of millions of dollars to stock market speculators? Yeah, right.
Thomas Suddes is a former legislative reporter with The Plain Dealer in Cleveland and writes from Ohio University. tsuddes@gmail.com