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May 16, 2022

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 the Republican governor’s race and Mike DeWine’s statehouse, courtesy of the Ohio Democratic Party.

Here are some stories you may have missed:

CALL TO ACTION. Last week, the Cleveland.com Editorial Board echoed Ohio Democrats’ call for accountability and transparency from DeWine over the FirstEnergy bribery scandal, the largest public corruption scheme in Ohio history. Ohio Democrats are trying to get DeWine to tell us what he knew and when about the scandal, questions that have gone unanswered for too long. As the Cleveland.com editorial board writes: “House Bill 6 and the alleged legislative corruption that would have forced consumers to pay for FirstEnergy’s mistakes is a matter of great public importance, as is Ohio’s cozy regulation of public utilities.” The time for answers is now.

HB6 ON HBO. HBO’s Last Week Tonight with John Oliver took FirstEnergy and Ohio Republicans to task last night with a feature on how working Americans are paying the price for the too-cozy relationship between politicians and Big Energy. Oliver highlighted the FirstEnergy bribery scandal as the perfect example of how energy executives are too often in the pocket of politicians, like Larry Householder, or political appointees like Sam Randazzo and his friends in Mike DeWine’s office. Oliver’s feature is another reminder of just how shocking this bribery scandal is and how we still don’t have answers from Mike DeWine about what he knew and when about the largest public corruption scheme in Ohio history.

FIND SOME SHAME. Mike DeWine has spent the last week traveling the state to claim credit for Democrats’ hard work to put Ohio back on the road to recovery. DeWine announced a boost to behavioral healthcare workforce funding on Friday following his grant announcement for law enforcement last Monday. The problem? DeWine opposed the legislation that made this critical funding possible. Now, because it’s an election year and he’s losing voters by the minute, he’s looking to gain support wherever he can find it – and using Democrats’ accomplishments to do it. DeWine should find some shame and stop campaigning on Ohio Democrats’ work to put our state back on the road to recovery.

THE BLADES COME OUT. The Toledo Blade Editorial Board took DeWine to task this week as Toledoans continue to ask why planned improvements along U.S. 23 between Toledo and Columbus were again shot down. Placing the blame squarely on DeWine and ODOT, the Blade says the updates are needed now and accuses DeWine of “spinelessness.” No lies detected here.

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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For Immediate Release:
May 16, 2022

Columbus, OH — California Vance is limping into the general election and struggling to unite the Ohio GOP – he himself even admitted just how unlikable he is.

On the Mark Blazor Show last week, Vance said, “there are a lot of Republican voters with hurt feelings about the primary results.” And he’s right – which is why he admitted he’s got his work cut out for him when it comes to earning the support of Ohio Republicans. Silicon Valley Vance, knowing just how unlikable he is, went on to say he would start his pitch to Ohio voters by saying, “I might not have been your favorite candidate…” Ouch.

One pastor and Josh Mandel supporter took to Facebook to share his disappointment that Vance is the GOP nominee, saying, “The fall out from this will be felt for years to come. Some who think they won actual[sic] lost in winning. Some who lost actually won in losing.”

And the troubles uniting the Ohio GOP for Vance don’t end there. On the Dan Rivers Show, Vance said he’s talked to Josh Mandel, Jane Timken and Matt Dolan since winning the primary – yet he’s been playing phone tag with Mike Gibbons, his most vocal critic throughout primary season. Here’s just a taste of what Gibbons had to say about California Vance:

• Gibbons told The Vindicator that Vance is “backed by a big-tech guy from the West Coast and he put $13.5 million into his campaign.” He also said “If somebody can move in from out of state and with outside of the state money come into this state with really abandoning it until it was time to run for the U.S. Senate and the state elects that individual then I feel sorry for the voters in this state. I don’t think the voters of this state are going to be duped into that.”
• Gibbons told the New York Times that Trump’s endorsement of Vance shocked him, that Vance was someone who “flew in from the West Coast,” and that, “Ohioans should be insulted” by the whole affair.

“After a primary defined by vicious personal attacks and a race to the bottom that embarrassed Ohio on the national stage, the Ohio GOP is stumbling into the general election trying to cobble together support behind California Vance. As it turns out, it’s hard to unite Ohioans behind an elitist who freely admitted he feels ‘out of place’ in Ohio and cashed in on Ohioans’ pain with a Netflix Hollywood movie deal,” said Michael Beyer, a spokesperson for the Ohio Democratic Party.

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Columbus, OH — In what’s become a theme of the week for the DeWine campaign, Mike DeWine once again tried to claim credit for legislation he opposed. At an event in Columbus this morning, DeWine touted $85 million in American Rescue Plan funding to invest in students interested in working in behavioral healthcare and grow the behavioral health workforce.

The problem? Mike DeWine opposed the American Rescue plan, legislation passed by Democrats that made this funding possible. In fact, in March of 2021, DeWine went on record saying he would have voted against ARPA if he was still in Congress.

“If Mike DeWine had his way, this important investment would never have been possible. We’re grateful to the Ohio Democrats who made this critical funding a reality and once again call on DeWine to find some shame and stop campaigning on Democratic victories for our state,” said Ohio Democratic Party spokesperson Matt Keyes.

In another example of DeWine’s desperation and hypocrisy earlier this week, DeWine similarly used Ohio law enforcement officers as political pawns when he announced funding for the Miami Valley Regional Crime Lab that also was made possible by the American Rescue Plan.

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For Immediate Release:
Friday, May 13, 2022

“The DeWine administration should produce the requested information because, yes, Ohioans have an unquestionable right to know how their state does business in their names.”

Columbus, OH — In case you missed it, Cleveland.com’s Editorial Board is pushing for transparency and accountability from Mike DeWine after Ohio Democrats sued for answers in the largest public corruption scandal in state history. Ohio Democrats, on behalf of Ohio voters, are trying to find out what DeWine knew and when about the bribery scandal.

“One conceivable aim of DeWine’s administration: To conceal, in his daily calendar, what was discussed in certain meetings. One is a 2019 meeting with a FirstEnergy Corp. official before DeWine signed a $1 billion bailout – to be paid by Ohio electricity customers – of money-losing nuclear power plants then owned by a subsidiary of the Akron electric utility,” writes the Cleveland.com Editorial Board.

Since October, Ohio Democrats have been working on getting answers to who knew what and when about the FirstEnergy scandal – which Ohioans continue to pay $287,000 every single day for – but have been stonewalled at every turn by the DeWine administration. The lack of accountability from DeWine is leading Ohioans in all corners of the state to wonder what he’s hiding and why.

Read more from the Editorial column here and below:

• Once again, hair-splitting by state officials is getting in the way of the public’s right to know about public business conducted by public officials, in this case Republican Gov. Mike DeWine. The Ohio Democratic Party is suing the governor because it wants to see details of the governor’s official schedule but, the party alleges, DeWine’s office is misusing certain Open Records Act exemptions to mask them.
• One conceivable aim of DeWine’s administration: To conceal, in his daily calendar, what was discussed in certain meetings. One is a 2019 meeting with a FirstEnergy Corp. official before DeWine signed a $1 billion bailout – to be paid by Ohio electricity customers – of money-losing nuclear power plants then owned by a subsidiary of the Akron electric utility.
• DeWine signed the bailout, House Bill 6, on July 23, 2019. Six weeks earlier, on June 10, DeWine had met with Michael Dowling, then a FirstEnergy senior vice president.
• On March 31, 2021, DeWine quietly signed into law legislation repealing HB 6′s nuclear bailout and a “decoupling” provision that had also been inserted into the law that guaranteed FirstEnergy’s annual ratepayer revenue at 2018 levels, a notably high electricity-use year.
• Cleveland.com’s Jeremy Pelzer reported that Democrats’ lawsuit over DeWine’s schedule, filed May 5 in Franklin County Common Pleas Court, challenges DeWine aides’ redacting of (editing and/or blacking out) parts of some entries in DeWine’s schedule from when he took office in January 2019 onward, including the entry for the meeting with Dowling.
• What the edited schedule does show, Pelzer reported, is that DeWine met with Dowling at the Governor’s Mansion, in suburban Bexley, for a half hour. But the schedule doesn’t reveal what the meeting’s purpose was.
• House Bill 6 and the alleged legislative corruption that would have forced consumers to pay for FirstEnergy’s mistakes is a matter of great public importance, as is Ohio’s cozy regulation of public utilities.
• Citing assorted exceptions to the Open Records Act to shield details of the governor’s schedule really amounts to denying voters and taxpayers information they need – and information they pay for in the form of salaries granted to public officials and employees entrusted with state business.
• It’s preposterous to apply the frequently misused “trade secrets” exemption to gubernatorial discussions. What’s in question aren’t chemical formulas or algorithms, but the public interest.
• In that connection, it’s important to recall what the Ohio Supreme Court decreed nearly 62 years ago in State ex rel. Patterson v. Ayers: “The rule in Ohio is that public records are the people’s records, and that the officials in whose custody they happen to be are merely trustees for the people; therefore anyone may inspect such records at any time, subject only to the limitation that such inspection does not endanger the safety of the record, or unreasonably interfere with the discharge of the duties of the officer having custody of the same.”
• Neither of those limitations applies to DeWine’s schedule: The people pay him to follow it; they pay someone to compile it; they have an irrefutable right to see what’s in it. The DeWine administration should produce the requested information because, yes, Ohioans have an unquestionable right to know how their state does business in their names.  

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Columbus, OH — Following the U.S. Senate’s failure to pass the Women’s Health Protection Act, Ohio Democratic Party Chair Elizabeth Walters released the following statement:

“Today’s vote is a reminder that the basic rights of all Ohioans to reproductive healthcare – including abortion and birth control – are at stake in this year’s election. Ohio Republicans, from J.D. Vance to Mike DeWine to extremists in the Statehouse, are on a relentless campaign to strip women of their fundamental rights and enact new, cruel restrictions that would punish women, including survivors of rape and incest. 

“Thank you to Senator Brown for recognizing the urgency of this moment and voting to protect abortion rights. With Ohio Republicans already vowing to criminalize abortion, it is critical that Ohioans elect Tim Ryan and Nan Whaley, as well as pro-choice Democratic candidates up and down the ballot in November. This year’s election could not be more important and we will continue to fight so that women can make these healthcare decisions in consultation with their doctors – without unwanted and unnecessary interference from politicians.”

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