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ODP Statement On J.D. Vance Campaigning With National Abortion Ban Sponsor Lindsey Graham

Columbus, OH – Today, J.D. Vance is standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Senator Lindsey Graham, whose national abortion ban legislation Vance endorsed as “reasonable” – even as other Republicans scrambled to distance themselves from this dangerous attack on women’s reproductive freedom.

J.D. Vance has made his extreme feelings on abortion known – he’s compared abortion to slavery and called rape “inconvenient.” His position even puts him at odds with Senator Rob Portman, and Donald Trump, who has previously stated his support for abortion exceptions for rape and incest. 

“J.D. Vance standing arm-in-arm with the biggest cheerleader of a national abortion ban is further proof that he will stop at nothing to restrict the health and freedom of Ohio women. Today’s visit sends a clear message to Ohio women: J.D. Vance and Graham are two politicians obsessed with inserting themselves into deeply personal decisions that belong between Ohio women and their doctors,” said Michael Beyer, a spokesperson for the Ohio Democratic Party. 

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Ohio Democrats Release Digital Ad Hammering Pat DeWine and Pat Fischer’s Extreme Abortion Agenda

Watch the new Digital Ad HERE

Columbus, OH — Today, the Ohio Democratic Party released a new digital ad “Dangerous” that outlines the extreme agenda of Ohio Supreme Court candidates Pat DeWine and Pat Fischer. Both candidates have been endorsed by Ohio Right to Life, which has made clear that they only endorse candidates who don’t support abortion in cases of rape or incest. The ad will run digitally statewide, and is backed by a six-figure buy. 

“Pat DeWine and Pat Fischer are too dangerous for Ohio. They have made their stances on abortion abudently clear: they’re ready to rip reproductive rights away from Ohio women, even in cases of rape or incest. Abortion rights are on the ballot this November, and we’re showing Ohioans just how dangerous DeWine and Fischer really are,” said Matt Keyes, spokesperson for the Ohio Democratic Party. 

Both DeWine and Fischer have taken heat for their extreme abortion stances, from Fischer comparing abortion to slavery to DeWine saying that Ohioans don’t have extensive rights to due process under the Ohio Constitution to both candidates making their anti-choice opinions known as abortion lawsuits are set to reach the court as early as next year. 

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“Still Afraid” And “Scheduling Conflict:” The Mess Surrounding Mike DeWine’s Campaign This Week  

Good Monday afternoon, and welcome back to Mike Check, your weekly source of all the infighting, conspiracy spewing and corruption that’s making headlines in and around Mike DeWine’s campaign and statehouse, courtesy of the Ohio Democratic Party. 

Here are some stories you may have missed:

STILL AFRAID TO FACE OFF. This is your weekly reminder that Mike DeWine is in trouble with Ohio voters and he knows it. That’s why he’s done everything from campaigning on Democratic victories to dodging debates to avoid unscripted moments. His lack of a real record also has him dodging joint newspaper editorial board meetings where, GASP, he’d have to defend himself. The latest, his flat-out refusal to meet with editors of the largest newspaper groups across Ohio. The USA Today Ohio network said “Republican Mike DeWine, Ohio’s current governor, declined to share his thoughts during the meeting. He has refused to participate in debates and public forums alongside Whaley.” The column continued sharing video and in-depth answers from Whaley on the issues critical to Ohio voters. Kind of tells you all you need to know. THIS WEEK’S “SCHEDULING CONFLICT.” Mike DeWine is supposed to meet with Cleveland.com’s Editorial Board this week, but our magic 8-ball says “don’t count on it.” We know DeWine’s staff is busy crafting this week’s “scheduling conflict” conveniently at the exact time of the joint virtual meeting with Nan Whaley. And if he does show up, we know he’s still not facing voters and answering to his record directly, since he’ll just be hiding behind a computer screen. If DeWine is so afraid to talk about what he’s done, he doesn’t deserve the job he has.  

Thanks for catching up with us, that’s all the Mike Check we’ve got for this week.  Have a great week!

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“One of the Most Shameful Things An Ohio Politician Has Done This Year” 

Columbus, OH — In case you missed it, Cleveland.com’s Today in Ohio podcast blasted Keith Faber for his recent election conspiracy theories, calling Faber’s remarks, “one of the most shameful things an Ohio politician had done this year.” At a Westerville Tea Party event earlier this month, Faber floated a bizarre conspiracy theory that Ohio County Boards of Elections might use “special paper” to produce fake ballots to swing elections, trying to act tough when asked about auditing elections. It’s just the latest in a long line of election lies being told by Republicans running for office in Ohio as they try to ingratiate themselves with MAGA Republicans to further their own political ambitions.

“This is one of the most shameful things an Ohio politician has done this year, and man, these are the people that defied the Constitution on gerrymandering, including him. But I’m astounded,” said Cleveland.com editor Chris Quinn. “If you’re going to vote for the auditor, think about this,” Quinn continued.

Read more about Faber’s comments from the Ohio Capital Journal here and below: 

  • But that didn’t stop him from holding out a sinister possibility: that the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections might be diverting special voting-machine paper to other states where unscrupulous elements might use them to produce unsolicited, fraudulent ballots.

  • For his part, the director of the board of elections there said his office was doing no such thing and that the state auditor’s office had never contacted his agency about the matter.

  • With Republicans holding all statewide offices except the U.S. Senate seat occupied by Sherrod Brown, a Democrat, officials like Faber are in a tight spot when it comes to election fraud.

  • Former President Donald Trump continues to falsely claim that he was cheated out of the presidency in 2020 by a rigged election. And now, other Republican candidates are mimicking his past behavior by refusing to say whether they’ll accept the results if they lose on Nov. 8.

  • Experts say such talk is crippling our democracy by undermining faith in its most basic process. Indeed, about 70% of Republicans believe the 2020 presidential election was rigged despite Trump’s epic failure to produce any evidence of that.

  • So Ohio’s elected Republicans have a base that’s deeply skeptical of elections at the same time that those officials are running them. 

  • Secretary of State Frank LaRose, the official responsible for administering elections, has hyped the possibility of cheating while simultaneously touting how extremely rare it’s been in elections he’s run. In February, LaRose slammed the media for supposedly downplaying voter fraud just after he found just the possibility of one fraudulent vote for every 222,000 cast in Ohio in 2020.

  • Faber, the state auditor, seemed to be trying to take a similar tack last week when a member of the Tea Party audience asked him if he audited elections.

  • “What I found out is the paper, the paper we use to vote in Ohio, OK, is special paper,” he said. “You need special paper to run the machines. But there really wasn’t ever any inventory done on the paper, OK? And so that supply if you audit that, we’re going to start doing a count. If you ordered 100 (thousand) sheets of paper and you only voted 20,000 people, you better have 80,000 sheets left.”

  • He added, “And so we started asking those questions. And I wasn’t really worried because of the difficulty in Ohio of creating extra fake ballots because of the controls. But there was nothing to say the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections who ordered a million sheets of paper didn’t somehow quietly drop off 50,000 of them over here in (another state.) Because the paper is the same from machine to machine and state to state and so we started asking those questions. And I talked to a number of people at local boards of elections and said if you’re going to cheat, what would you do? And so we started looking at that. So the short answer is no. I don’t audit the election.” 

  • Faber’s staff was also asked whether he had any reason to suspect that Cuyahoga County — the most racially and ethnically diverse in Ohio — had or was planning to sneak voting-machine paper out of state for use in fraudulent voting.

  • The communications staff didn’t address that question. Nor did it address whether there was any evidence that the kind of voting fraud Faber described had ever been done anywhere in the United States.

  • Asked if Faber’s office contacted the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections to learn how it uses ballot stock, Perlatti said, “No. We really, from an elections standpoint, we really don’t have much interaction at all with the auditor’s office. The auditor’s office comes in more so with county in general on things like payroll and county procurement.”

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ICYMI: Cleveland.com Editorial: Three Ohio Justices Err in Revealing Views on Abortion Issues Likely to Come Before Them

Columbus, OH — In case you missed it, the Cleveland.com editorial board today took the three Republican Supreme Court justices on the ballot this November to task for making their anti-choice opinions known as abortion lawsuits are set to reach the court as early as next year. The GOP justices have also been endorsed by Ohio Right to Life, which has made clear that they will not support candidates that support rape and incest exceptions to abortion bans. It’s just the latest reminder that abortion is on the ballot this November, and if the extreme Republicans on the court are all re-elected, Ohioans’ reproductive freedoms will be ripped away from them. 

“In a year when a flurry of abortion litigating and legislating was to be expected in Ohio, the decision by these three justices to share their personal abortion views in this way cannot help but further erode trust in the judiciary — and increase the perception that justice in Ohio is far from blind, fair and impartial,” writes the Cleveland.com editorial board. 

Read more from Cleveland.com HERE and below: 

  • In early March, with the U.S. Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade abortion ruling expected to fall that spring, three sitting Ohio Supreme Court justices — all of whom are on the ballot this year — answered a questionnaire from Right to Life of Greater Cincinnati on their legal philosophies and views on abortion, as well as other issues. 
  • Among the questions they answered were ones that bore on whether Roe v. Wade was rightly decided, when life begins and whether the Ohio Constitution includes any provision “intended to require the use of public funds for abortion.”
  • But Ohio Supreme Court Justices Sharon L. Kennedy, who is running for chief justice, and Pat Fischer and Pat DeWine, who are running for re-election, had no problem answering “Agree” to all three questions, although Kennedy annotated her Roe answer to note that Roe was (at that point) the law of the land. Pat DeWine’s annotation to that question said, “The text of the Constitution does not reference a right to abortion.” Fischer similarly wrote, “The right of privacy is not written in the text of the U.S. Constitution.”
  • None of them annotated their “Agree” to the question on life beginning at fertilization. On the issue of whether there’s an Ohio constitutional provision intended to require public funding of abortion, Kennedy wrote she knew of no such provision and Fischer that “there is no such text in the Ohio Constitution.” DeWine answered “Agree” without annotation.
  • Why is this significant? Because the Ohio Supreme Court is expected to take up important legal questions bearing on abortion soon. One such case was filed at the Ohio Supreme Court in June, after Roe was overturned and a judge allowed Ohio’s abortion “heartbeat” law to take effect.
  • That is, the justices’ answers on constitutional rights to abortion, to when human life begins and to Ohio constitutional provisions bearing on funding of abortions all could be relevant in this case — which will eventually find its way to the state high court — and in similar legal cases.
  • How can litigants expect a fair shake if three of the court’s current seven justices have offered their personal legal opinions already on these matters — without noting explicitly that these were their personal views and that they would set them aside to apply the law?
  • Arguably, three sitting Ohio Supreme Court candidates just offered their views on the substance of abortion matters likely to come before them.
  • In a year when a flurry of abortion litigating and legislating was to be expected in Ohio, the decision by these three justices to share their personal abortion views in this way cannot help but further erode trust in the judiciary — and increase the perception that justice in Ohio is far from blind, fair and impartial.

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