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Ohio Democratic Party to Launch “Road to Recovery” Tour Monday Ahead of Biden Visit to Ohio

Tour Will Highlight Economic Policies Benefiting Working Families across the State ahead of President Biden’s Visit to Ohio Wednesday

Columbus, OH — Today, the Ohio Democratic Party is announcing a “Road to Recovery” tour across the state as Ohio is building back better thanks to the leadership of President Biden and Ohio Democrats. During the tour, Ohio Democrats will meet voters where they are to talk about economic policies that are working for working families under Democratic leadership. The tour comes ahead of President Biden’s visit to the state Wednesday for a town hall discussion in Cincinnati.

Thanks to President Biden and Ohio Democrats:

  • More than 5 million Ohioans are fully vaccinated and able to safely gather with family and friends again;
  • Ohio families are receiving a massive tax cut and targeted checks to help them with the costs of raising children thanks to the expanded Child Tax Credit;
  • And Ohio is set to receive major investments in roads, bridges and new jobs under an infrastructure plan negotiated by President Biden.

“Thanks to President Biden, Senator Brown and Ohio Democrats, Ohio is on the road to recovery and building back better for working families in our state. We know our work isn’t over, but Ohio Democrats are excited to meet voters in their local communities to celebrate the success we’ve made so far and discuss the work we have left to do to build back better in Ohio,” said Ohio Democratic Party Chair Liz Walters.

The tour will feature Ohio Democrats talking about the progress being made under the Biden Administration and local Ohioans discussing how Democratic policies have benefitted them and their families, including stops in:

  • Toledo on 7/19
  • Akron on 7/20
  • Cincinnati on 7/21

More details will be shared with local media ahead of the events. For more information, email Matt Keyes at [email protected].

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GOP #OHSen Candidates Will Do or Say Anything to Advance Their Own Interests

Columbus, OH — In case you missed it, Cleveland.com’s Andrew Tobias this weekend reminded Ohio voters that the GOP Senate candidates don’t stand for anything but themselves and can’t be trusted. Tobias outlines the massive shifts each candidate has taken on Trump in recent months, as they view their support of Trump as the only thing that can help them advance their own interests and get elected, while the needs of Ohio voters fall to the wayside.

As these candidates stumble all over themselves to change their entire value system to match Trump’s and attack one another over past slights against the failed Florida blogger, the messiest Senate primary in the country gets even messier. And Ohio voters are becoming increasingly turned off by all of them, best illustrated at a recent Trump rally when the field of Senate candidates was met with boos and indifference when their names were announced.

“But the flip side of that purity test is that candidates are as quick to point fingers at each other as they are to emphasize their own Trump bona fides. And the candidates themselves have provided each other with plenty of material, which is true of no one more than Vance. That leaves voters to try to figure out what the candidates really think as Trump continues to be the defining force in the Republican Party even after losing the November election,” writes Tobias.

“By rushing to reverse themselves on any negative public statement they’ve ever made about the failed blogger from Florida, each of these Senate candidates is showing Ohio voters just how uniquely unqualified they all are for the job. A U.S. Senator should stand up for the interests of Ohio voters regardless of political or outside pressure. These candidates have shown they will cave at the drop of the hat when their own ambitions are at stake,” said Matt Keyes, spokesperson for the Ohio Democratic Party.

Read more from Cleveland.com here and below:

  • The dynamic in the early days of the GOP Senate race has been well-documented – the candidates are angling for Trump’s support, as well as the support of Trump’s voters as they try to claim the nomination to succeed outgoing Republican Sen. Rob Portman.
  • But the flip side of that purity test is that candidates are as quick to point fingers at each other as they are to emphasize their own Trump bona fides. And the candidates themselves have provided each other with plenty of material, which is true of no one more than Vance.
  • That leaves voters to try to figure out what the candidates really think as Trump continues to be the defining force in the Republican Party even after losing the November election.
  • Vance, the latest entry into the race, has the richest background to mine for anti-Trump statements.
  • His 2016 memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy,” emerged as a popular text among the literary set to explain Trump’s appeal among white working-class voters. While promoting his book, Vance made clear that he found Trump to be personally repugnant and racially divisive.
  • But after he got in the Senate race this year, NBC News reported on an email Moreno sent to a Republican fundraiser about Trump in March 2016, referring to Trump as a “lunatic.” The fundraiser now works for Timken.
  • In a late January interview with cleveland.com and The Plain Dealer about the future direction of the Republican Party, Timken said there was more to the GOP than Trump: “It’s never just about one candidate, it’s about what we rally around and our principles and at the end of the day what we can deliver,” she said.
  • When asked during the same interview about Rep. Anthony Gonzalez, the Rocky River Republican who voted to impeach Trump over his role in the Jan. 6 riot, Timken politely disagreed with his decision to impeach Trump.
  • Three months later, after getting into the Senate race, she called for him to resign from office.
  • But Gibbons has said there are things about Trump’s personality that turn him off. In 2018, he called Trump “not my style,” and in a May 2021 Jewish Insider interview, distinguished his personal political views from Trump’s while also saying he agreed with the moves Trump made as president.
  • Some media outlets noted, however, that Mandel and other Ohio Republicans avoided mentioning Trump by name during a speech at the July 2016 Republican National Convention in Cleveland.
  • But Mandel also kept a low profile following the November 2016 election, and then dropped completely out of the public eye after he abruptly quit the U.S. Senate primary in January 2018.
  • Timken’s campaign argues he was AWOL for Trump, dropping out of the public eye during his presidency. Mandel has said he worked behind the scenes to boost Trump’s candidacy – saying he helped coordinate more than $500,000 in donations to Trump from others, and signed on to a letter with 700 other veterans defending Trump in September 2020.

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Not Even $10 Billion from Big Tech Can Save J.D. Vance from Himself

Columbus, OH — It’s been another rough week for the GOP Senate field, including its newest member J.D. Vance. While J.D. has gotten used to the lifestyle of the rich and the famous, in which his Big Tech cronies hang on his every word, suddenly he finds himself in a world where his hypocrisy and phoniness is under scrutiny as the rest of the country discovers what Ohio has known for so long — J.D. has always only ever been in it for himself. Somewhere, Peter Thiel must be wondering if it’s too late to ask for his millions back as J.D.’s opening salvo in the race is, “I’m not just a flip-flopper, I’m a flip-flop-flipper on Trump.”

And in what has already become the messiest Senate primary in the country, Vance’s fellow Republicans are already on the attack, hoping to prove to Trump that they love him more than Vance ever could. Josh Mandel went after Vance unprompted this week, calling Vance “Mitt Romney, Jr.,” a strange attack from a guy who campaigned  (trademark fake accent and all) across Ohio with Romney in 2012. 

Vance, sensing his fledgling campaign is already in trouble, fired back against candidates like Mandel and Jane Timken who have made their campaigns all about Trump, as he tells NBC News: “But I also think he (Trump) thinks that people who kiss his a– all the time are pretty weak.”

It’s a back-and-forth that may pay the bills of all the D.C. Trump consultants working on the GOP race, but it’s increasingly turning off voters in Ohio, as their interests and priorities get left behind in order to try and keep the attention of a failed Florida blogger. 

“The GOP Senate primary looks more like a Hollywood reality show than a political campaign, featuring a bunch of rich people bickering back and forth over things that Ohioans couldn’t care less about. As Republicans leave Ohio families behind, Democrats are focused on the issues that matter to our state, from COVID recovery to infrastructure to helping working families get ahead,” said Matt Keyes, spokesperson for the Ohio Democratic Party. 

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J.D. Vance “Desperately” Attempts To Distance Himself From Past Trump Criticism

Columbus, OH — It’s been less than a week since J.D. Vance entered Ohio’s “crowded and nasty” GOP Senate primary and he’s already facing a barrage of brutal headlines. Vance spent the first days of his campaign on a desperate apology tour in an attempt to “disown” old anti-Trump tweets after facing “criticism that he flip-flopped on his support for Donald Trump.”

Vance’s grovelling is par for the course in the messy primary where Republican candidates have been stumbling all over themselves in desperate attempts to secure Donald Trump’s support rather than the support of Ohio voters. His primary rivals have been “quick to highlight their opponent’s past” and in a sign of more attacks to come, Vance warned that the other GOP candidates have “baggage of their own” related to Trump and other issues.

Take a look at what Ohioans are reading about Vance’s desperate attempts to rewrite history:

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DeWine has Dodged Long Enough

Columbus, OH — Following more major allegations in a recently-released book by Neil Clark, Mike DeWine owes Ohioans a lot more information on his connections to the largest public corruption scheme in state history. From campaign donations to top-level staff connected to the scandal, DeWine can’t shake his links to the scandal.

DeWine and his team have repeatedly declined to comment on the scandal, including as recently as Friday when his press secretary offered no comment to questions about Clark’s accusations. Today, DeWine offered an insufficient, one-sentence answer when asked about the allegations and has repeatedly refused to say what he knew about the scandal and when.

Here are five questions about DeWine’s connections to the HB 6 scandal that Ohio voters deserve answers to:

  1. Were DeWine, Jon Husted or any of DeWine’s top advisors involved in discussions about the HB 6 campaign, including conversations about campaign donations connected to the scheme?
  2. Why did DeWine move forward on the appointment of Sam Rendazzo to lead the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio despite concerns raised to Husted and DeWine’s then-chief of staff about Rendazzo’s connections to FirstEnergy?
  3. What was discussed at meetings between DeWine, Husted and FirstEnergy executives at an October 2018 Republican fundraiser and a separate sitdown dinner in December 2018?
  4. Why did DeWine turn to FirstEnergy to solicit campaign contributions to his daughter’s Greene County prosecutor’s race?
  5. Why have DeWine and his team consistently shied away from — or outright refused to answer — questions regarding the scandal?

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