ICYMI: Cleveland.com & The Plain Dealer Endorse Chelsea Clark For Secretary Of State
October 31, 2022
“While LaRose equivocates, Chelsea Clark leaves no doubt where she stands.”
Columbus, OH — In case you missed it, the Cleveland.com/The Plain Dealer Editorial Board endorsed Chelsea Clark for Secretary of State.
Clark earned the endorsement over Frank LaRose, who is so busy planning his run for U.S. Senate that he’s already abandoned the job he has now. For the last year and a half, LaRose has been passing GOP-gerrymandered maps, sowing election doubts to gain the support of MAGA Republicans and creating taxpayer-funded solutions to problems that don’t exist. The Editorial Board listed LaRose’s dangerous rhetoric around elections as a significant reason they endorsed Clark.
“In other words, LaRose, a former Green Beret who now serves in the Army reserves, subtly sowed doubts about the integrity of a U.S. presidential election two years ago. What will happen in two years if Trump is again on the ballot and things don’t go his way in Ohio? That’s partly why, in a close call, our editorial board urges Ohio voters to choose Democrat Chelsea Clark, a 36-year-old Cincinnati-area politician and entrepreneur, as secretary of state for the next four years,” writes the Editorial Board.
Read more from the Cleveland.com/Plain Dealer Editorial Board here and below:
- In a year when former President Donald Trump still stokes the dangerous lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen — endorsing state-level candidates he apparently thinks will be able and willing to help him if he runs again in 2024 — the race for Ohio’s secretary of state, the state’s chief elections officer, takes on special importance.
- The trouble is that LaRose, 43, who was endorsed by Trump for this election, equivocated when our editorial board asked whether Joe Biden were elected president fair and square.
- Biden “is the president of the United States and was elected through the process we have,” LaRose said. “But I’ve also been clear that there were things that happened in 2020 that shouldn’t have happened. … [They] weren’t some, you know, grand scheme to steal the election. They were things that happened … in courtrooms where activist judges changed the rules, that at the last minute happened in secretary of states’ offices….”
- In other words, LaRose, a former Green Beret who now serves in the Army reserves, subtly sowed doubts about the integrity of a U.S. presidential election two years ago. What will happen in two years if Trump is again on the ballot and things don’t go his way in Ohio? That’s partly why, in a close call, our editorial board urges Ohio voters to choose Democrat Chelsea Clark, a 36-year-old Cincinnati-area politician and entrepreneur, as secretary of state for the next four years.
- Clark, as well, is committed to voting reforms; her late father had firsthand experience of the fight for civil rights for Black Americans (and of the inside of the Birmingham, Alabama, jail). Clark is founder and CEO of the nonprofit STEM Lab, providing STEM education access for underserved youth in Cincinnati and Hamilton County, and has served on the Forest Park City Council for nearly five years.
- While LaRose equivocates, Chelsea Clark leaves no doubt where she stands. She also supports voter access and outreach to ensure that all Ohioans who want to vote and are eligible to vote will be able to cast a ballot.
- Ohioans should elect Chelsea Clark as secretary of state. Early voting in the Nov. 8 election has begun.
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