Jordan facing Morocco in Delaware County race
Delaware County consistently ranks among the fastest-growing areas in Ohio and nationally, with residents and businesses relocating or expanding north of Columbus proper.
Historically, it's also been a reliably Republican area, with voters there siding with John Mccain over Barack Obama in 2008 (59%-40%), Mitt Romney over Obama in 2012 (61%-38%) and Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton in 2016 (54.5%-39%).
Lower down the ticket, Rep. Kris Jordan, R-ostrander, hasn't won a legislative race by less than double digits since his first run in 2008, when he defeated his Democratic opponent by 22 percentage points. His closest race came two years ago, when he won 56%-44%.
Jordan is hoping for comparable results in Tuesday's general election, touting a conservative track record and approach to policy-making that he says will be needed in addressing the impacts of coronavirus in the next legislative session.
“I've proven over the years to fight to protect your individual liberties,” Jordan said. “We've seen our individual liberties disappear in tremendous ways in the last eight or nine months. I want to get our school open back up safely. … It's going to take years for some of these businesses to recover.”
But Democrats are hoping increasingly blue areas, particularly in the southern parts of the county, will make a difference this year and help propel their nominee into the Statehouse. First-time candidate Rachael Morocco is also a doctor who said she would bring her medical perspective to the Ohio House during an ongoing global pandemic.
“I'm a physician, I care about our community,” Morocco said. “I want to make a difference. I'm not doing this because this is my job or my career. I'm doing this because I really feel passionately that I can make a difference and I can make a change.”
She added, “There's so much division in our state and our country, I think it's time to bring the message that we can start working together to really start making some positive change.”
Jordan and Morocco are facing off in the race for House District 67, which covers Delaware County generally to the west of Interstate 71, including the city of Delaware.
Navigating the pandemic
A Cleveland native, Morocco and her family have lived in Lewis Center for about eight years. She's currently the lead physician at Nationwide Children's Hospital's primary care center in Westerville, in addition to teaching at Ohio State University.
In her spare time this year, she's been hanging campaign literature on voters' doors and finding other ways to connect to the local electorate.
“I've always been an active Democrat — I voted, I would volunteer on campaigns, door knocking, phone calls,” she said. “But I wasn't ever thinking that I was going to go on the ballot.”
During the past few years, Morocco has made frequent trips to the Statehouse to advocate as part of Moms Demand Action, pushing for stronger gun control laws. She decided to run for Ohio House after hearing from patients and other community members about issues not being addressed by lawmakers.
“Over the years in my clinic, I've just had all these patients and all these problems, and I was seeing recurring themes,” she said. “Issues of health care and the cost of health care and education, the funding for that and the resources available, families whose kids are in foster care because of opioids, and parents who work multiple jobs and can't really put food on the table. I just wanted to do more.”
Morocco said her medical background and knowledge would also help during budget and other legislative deliberations in the new sessions, as coronavirus infections continue to climb statewide. “We need more physicians in the Statehouse, especially during this time when we're trying to navigate our way through (the pandemic),” she said. “The pandemic's not over. We're not in the end of it. We're still in the thick of it.”
Among other issues, Morocco puts school funding reform at the top of her priority list, replacing the existing system with one that better reflects the cost of education and ensures the state's primary and secondary schools are adequately funded.
“The more of us in there who are willing to make it a priority, I think, the more likely we are to make a difference,” she said.
She'd also like to tackle health-care and prescription medication costs, including better controls on the price of insulin. Legislation on that issue has been introduced in the current session by another legislator physician — Rep. Beth Liston, a Democrat serving a northwestern Franklin County district just south of the one being sought by Morocco.
Safety and freedom
COVID-19 will continue to be a focus for lawmakers and other state officials, potentially for years to come. This session, Jordan introduced several pandemic-related bills, including one that would block cities from collecting income taxes from residents working from home in other areas.
Emergency legislation enacted earlier this year allows collections of income taxes from the municipalities where employees' offices are located, even if they are working remotely because of coronavirus.
“If you're working from home for much of the year, you're not receiving any of the services or benefits from the community that your office is located at,” Jordan said. “They shouldn't be paying income tax in the community that they have barely been to in the last nine months.”
Jordan also favors limits on the authority of the governor and state health director to issue long-term orders. He's worked on legislation that would limit such orders to a couple of weeks, then requiring legislative action to continue.
“I think that we've reacted in a very extreme way, more than we should have. I'm more scared of losing my freedom than I am getting sick with the virus,” he said.
He added later, “If you feel safer wearing (a mask), fine. I encourage people to do it if they feel safer. I don't think the government should tell healthy people that they have to cover their faces. ... Let people take their risks, knowing what their risks are, but not arbitrarily making rules and shutting down businesses for much of the year."
If reelected, Jordan said he would
continue to support legislation to reduce government regulation and taxes and to generally keep “government out of your life as much as we can, and let the people of Delaware County enjoy their freedom and fruits of their labors.”
Jordan supported the selection of Larry Householder as the Republican speaker of the House this session. Householder was removed from the post after he and four others were charged in what federal prosecutors have ranked among the biggest public bribery and corruption scandals in state history. Two pleaded guilty last week.
According to court documents, Householder and the others involved used dark money from Firstenergy and related entities to ensure candidates who supported the now-former speaker were elected, to get the $1 billion nuclear bailout HB 6 passed and to block referendum efforts to overturn the legislation.
“If he did something that was criminal, he should have to deal with the consequences of that,” Jordan.
And on HB 6, Jordan said he supported bill because it included a repeal of renewable and advanced energy mandates.
“That saved us about $5 per bill throughout the year,” he said. “The stuff for nuclear plants was an (85-cent per month) increase. So if I can save the people in Ohio $50 a year, that was worth it for me to be able to vote on that one.”
Democrats and other HB 6 opponents dispute such calculations, saying they don't include the full cost of the bailout.
Jordan said he doesn't support a full repeal of HB6: “There was some good policy in there that I don't want to throw out just because the process may have been inappropriate.” mkovac@dispatch.com @Ohiocapitalblog