Megan Henry, Ohio Capital Journal

Survivors of Dr. Richard Strauss say Ohio Republican U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan knew about the sexual abuse the student-athletes suffered, according to HBO’s new documentary, “Surviving Ohio State.”

Jordan declined to be interviewed for the documentary, but his name is frequently brought up by former Ohio State wrestlers and a referee. The documentary came out last month. Over the years, Jordan has repeatedly denied having any knowledge of the abuse.

“To say that (Jordan) knew nothing, that nothing ever happened, it’s a flat out lie,” former Ohio State Wrestler Dan Ritchie said in the documentary.

Strauss sexually abused at least 177 male victims between 1979 and 1996 during his time as a physician for Ohio State’s Athletics Department and at the university’s Student Health Center, according to an independent investigation commissioned by Ohio State University.

Strauss retired from Ohio State University in 1998 and died by suicide in 2005 when he was 67. Jordan was an Ohio State assistant wrestling coach from 1987 to 1995.

“Chairman Jordan never saw or heard of any abuse, and if he had, he would have dealt with it,” said Russell Dye, spokesperson for Jordan.

At one point in the documentary, Ritchie said Jordan claimed, “If (Strauss) ever did that to me, I’d snap his neck like a stick of dry balsa wood.”

In the documentary, wrestling referee Fred Feeney shared his experience with Strauss sexually assaulting him in the shower after a wrestling match.

He said he told then Ohio State Wrestling Coach Russ Hellickson and Jordan that Strauss was masturbating beside Feeney in the shower.

“Jim Jordan looked at me straight in my face and said, ‘It’s Strauss. You know what he does,’” Feeney said in the documentary.

Jordan turned to politics after coaching — serving in the Ohio House of Representatives from 1995 to 2000 and the Ohio State Senate from 2001 to 2006 before being elected to the U.S. House of Representatives where he represents Ohio’s 4th Congressional District. He is up for reelection next year.

Former Ohio State wrestler Mike Schyck said he thought Jordan would help the Strauss abuse survivors.

“Jim Jordan is a pit bull,” Schyck said in the documentary. “And so I figured why in the hell wouldn’t this guy step up for us?”

The documentary shows television clips of Jordan adamantly denying he knew about the abuse.

“I’ve stood up to the FBI,” Jordan said when pressed by NBC4 reporter Colleen Marshall in a clip from the documentary. “I’ve stood up to the IRS. So if I thought there was something wrong, if I knew there was something wrong happening, I would have stood up for them.”

“There was no truth to the fact that I knew of any abuse,” Jordan said in July 2018 during a press gaggle with central Ohio reporters. “I’ve talked to other coaches, they didn’t know about any abuse. It’s just not accurate to say those things, that we know of it and didn’t report it. It’s just not true.”

Ohio State University has settled with 296 survivors who sued the university for more than $60 million.

“We express our deep regret and apologies to all who experienced Strauss’ abuse,” Ohio State University Spokesperson Chris Booker said in an email. “… All male students who filed lawsuits have been offered the opportunity to settle.”

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine said he has not seen “Surviving Ohio State,” but recently referenced the working group he established back in 2019 in response to the Strauss abuse that sought a review of medical board sexual misconduct cases for the last 25 years.

“I’m confident that we, at that point, did everything that we could do and we look forward to the future in regard to making sure that the medical board reacts, when there are reports that come in, in an appropriate way and has the expertise within that board, and the right people,” DeWine said Monday when asked about the documentary.

DeWine signed Ohio Senate Bill 109 into law last year which enables the State Medical Board of Ohio to hold licensees accountable when they engage in sexual misconduct or commit sexual crimes.

Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost said last week the state’s Republican Party ”made a bad decision” by endorsing Vivek Ramaswamy for governor last month.

“The party exists to win elections, and it’s not a pretty game,” Yost said Friday during a City Club of Cleveland forum. “I’m used to getting bruised by the political process. This was just a little bit bigger bruise that I’m accustomed to.”

The Ohio Republican Party endorsed businessman Vivek Ramaswamy for governor May 9 — a year before the primary. Yost dropped out of the race a week later.

The City Club of Cleveland originally invited Yost, who officially announced he was running for governor back in January, to speak about his platform for governor before he suspended his campaign.

“I did offer to withdraw as speaker, but I guess it was too late to find someone more interesting,” Yost said.

NOTUS reported that Yost asked the Trump administration for an appointment in exchange for suspending his campaign, but ultimately rejected their offer of ambassador to Cyprus.

When asked if this was true during the forum, Yost said, “I think it would be inappropriate to publicly discuss private conversations.”

Michael McIntyre, executive editor of Ideastream Public Media, asked Yost questions during the forum ranging from abortion to Yost’s future.

Yost, who is against abortion, has appealed the decision to strike down the state’s six-week abortion ban that went into effect for several months after Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022. Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signed Ohio’s six-week abortion ban into law in 2019, but it was blocked in court at the time.

When asked if Yost’s goal was to limit abortion, he said, “It is to preserve those matters that are adjacent to abortion that were passed by our duly elected general assembly, whether they fall within the rubric of the amendment of being directly or indirectly impacting or limiting the right to abortion.”

Ohioans voted to protect access to abortion, fertility treatments, contraception, and miscarriage care through a constitutional amendment in 2023, but Ohio Republican lawmakers recently introduced Ohio House Bill 370, which would ban all abortions – regardless of rape or incest. It would also outlaw IVF and IUDs.

“I will decline, as I usually do, to take a public opinion on matters in front of the legislature because I have neither a vote nor a veto,” Yost said when asked about the bill. “If it were to pass, it would be my statutory duty under the law to defend it, regardless of whether I agreed with it or not.”

Yost’s term as state attorney general ends January 2027, and he said he’s still thinking about what he will do next.

“Eventually I will make a decision,” said Yost, who is term-limited. “What I can tell you is I’m not prepared to go quietly down into that good night and hope to remain active in fighting for Ohio and America’s future.”

Two candidates have announced so far they are running for attorney general in 2026 — current Republican Ohio Auditor Keith Faber and former Democratic state rep. Elliot Forhan.

Ohio governor race

Ramaswamy and former Morgan County school board president Heather Hill are currently the only GOP candidates running for governor, but Lt. Gov. Jim Tressel previously said he is considering running.

Former Ohio Department of Health Director Amy Acton is the only Democrat running for governor and will speak at the City Club of Cleveland on Wednesday.

Democrats are waiting to see if former U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown will run for Senate or Ohio governor, or nothing at all. Currently, gaming and technology businessman Chris Volpe, of Columbus, is the only announced Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in 2026.

Current Republican Ohio Auditor Keith Faber is running for attorney general in 2026; current Republican Ohio Treasurer Robert Sprague is running for secretary of state in 2026; and current Republican Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose is running for auditor in 2026.

Bryan Hambley, a cancer doctor with University of Cincinnati Health, is the only announced Democratic candidate for Ohio Secretary of State. Former state representative Elliot Forhan has announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for Ohio Attorney General. No Democrats have yet announced their candidacy in 2026 for Ohio auditor or treasurer.

Ohio Democratic lawmakers want to eradicate slavery from the Ohio Constitution.

State Reps. Dontavius Jarrells, D-Columbus, and Veronica Sims, D-Akron, are working on a joint resolution that would remove slavery from the state’s foundational document.

“This isn’t political,” Jarrells said Wednesday during an Ohio Legislative Black Caucus press conference. “This isn’t personal. This is a moral overdue journey to change our constitution once and for all. Other states have already done it. We simply want Ohio to live up to this promise of freedom.”

Seven states have removed the slavery loophole from their constitution — Alabama, Oregon, Tennessee, Vermont, Utah, Colorado, and Nebraska, according to the Abolish Slavery National Network

“I submit that slavery and or involuntary servitude in any shape, form or fashion, should be disembodied from the sacred pages of the founding document of our great state,” Sims said. “It is time to remove any exception under any circumstances, slavery is a vile, despicable imposition upon another human being.”

This is not the first time there have been legislative attempts in Ohio to remove slavery from the state’s constitution. Jarrells had a bipartisan joint resolution that was unable to get out of committee during the last General Assembly. A Senate Joint Resolution was also unsuccessful back in 2020.

If the House and Senate pass the new joint resolution, it would go to the statewide ballot for the voters to decide.

Wednesday’s press conference was hosted by members of the Ohio Legislative Black Caucus in honor of Juneteenth, a federal holiday Thursday remembering the end of slavery in the United States on June 19, 1865 — two years after the Emancipation Proclamation.

“Juneteenth signifies the end of slavery, and it’s a time to celebrate,” said State Rep. Terrence Upchurch, D-Cleveland. “Although we are proud of the progress we have made, that does not negate the fact that there are still several challenges Black Ohioans face across the state. People are still struggling with finding housing, healthy foods, good paying jobs, satisfactory education, fair treatment in the justice system, and so much more.”

Jarrells introduced House Bill 306 last month, also known as the Enact the Hate Crime Act.

“It empowers victims with real civil remedies and gives law enforcement clear, enforceable tools to hold perpetrators accountable,” he said. “This bill says that every single person in this state deserves to live without fear, and if you are targeted for who you are, this state will stand with you.”

State Rep. Darnell T. Brewer, D-Cleveland, talked about recent gun legislation he is working on.

“Gun violence is devastating our communities,” he said. “We can no longer afford to be silent or inactive.”

Black youth are 11 times more likely to die from firearm homicide than their white peers, according to Brady: United Against Gun Violence.

Brewer said he plans on introducing a resolution to encourage responsible gun ownership by promoting safe storage practices to prevent children from accessing guns and a resolution on safe firearm storage education.

“Gun violence is not just an emergency,” he said. “It’s a daily reality.”

Infant mortality, when a child dies before their first birthday, is higher for Black babies compared to white babies. The national infant mortality rate is 5.5 per 1,000 live births for babies and 10.9 for Black babies, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The infant mortality rate for Ohio Black babies in 2022 was 13.4 per 1,000 live births.

“Why do we stop caring about babies after they’re born?” State Rep. Derrick Hall, D-Akron, asked.

State Rep. Ismail Mohamed, D-Columbus, talked about House Bill 281, a bill that would withhold Medicaid funding from hospitals that do not cooperate with the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement. State Rep. Josh Williams, R-Sylvania Twp., introduced the bill last month.

“What this bill does is essentially force medical providers to choose between honoring your oath as medical providers or complying with the state’s political agenda,” Mohamed said. “It will discourage immigrant communities from seeking life saving treatment care out of fear.”

Mohamed also talked about House Bill 1, a piece of legislation that would place restrictions on foreign ownership of land. State Reps. Angie King, R-Celina, and Roy Klopfenstein, R-Haviland, introduced the bill earlier this year.

“It is arbitrary,” Mohamed said. “It is discriminatory in its face, and will negatively impact economic development in the state of Ohio.”

Ohio doctors saw an increase in women getting long acting reversible contraception in the weeks following President Donald Trump being elected.

Planned Parenthood of Greater Ohio noticed a 30% increase in call volume during the week of the election, most of them about accessing contraception or asking what another Trump presidency means for accessing reproductive health care, said Dr. Bhavik Kumar, chief medical officer of Planned Parenthood of Greater Ohio. Intrauterine devices can last between three to 12 years, depending on the type, according to Planned Parenthood.

Some of their centers saw a 200% increase in the number of IUD insertions in December compared to November, he said.

“We can never tell exactly why everyone’s coming in, but anecdotally and talking to patients, they’re all expressing some level of fear, uncertainty and bracing themselves for a couple of years of uncertainty given the way that this administration behaved the first time,” Kumar said.

Planned Parenthood reported a 760% increase in people making IUD appointments and a 350% increase in people making birth control implant appointments at their health centers the day after the election compared to Election Day, said Planned Parenthood Spokesperson Priscilla Vazquez.

Dr. Ashley Brant, an Ohio OB-GYN associated with Ohio Physicians for Reproductive Rights, has seen patients in the last couple weeks that have cited the current political climate as their reason for getting an IUD.

“It’s the desire to use highly effective birth control, coupled with concerns about access to birth control in the future that’s sort of what’s under this urgency or concerns about access to reproductive health care in the future if they had an unintended pregnancy,” she said.

During Trump’s first term in office, he appointed three anti-abortion justices to the U.S. Supreme Court, which paved the way for overturning Roe v. Wade in 2022. 12 states have a total abortion ban, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

The Kaiser Family Foundation surveyed more than 500 gynecologists in 2023 and more than half of them reported more patients were asking for contraception — sterilization, IUDs and implants — after the supreme court ruling.

“How many kids you have is both deeply personal, but also influenced by our life circumstances like your financial situation, the stability of your relationships, what you expect your life to be like in one year, five years, 10 years,” Brant said. “With any major change in politics in the U.S., people are likely wondering, what this means for their lives and for their families and making the best decisions that they can with the information that they have.”

Trump was inaugurated Monday and the government website reproductiverights.gov dedicated to providing information on reproductive health care is now no longer accessible.

“(Sexual and reproductive health care) has been unfairly targeted and marginalized when it comes to the Trump administration, and is a potential target, and so people … are panicked and uncertain and trying to make quick decisions about what’s best for them given the amount of uncertainty that’s coming their way,” Kumar said.

This recent uptick mirrors an increase in the number of people getting IUDs after Trump’s first election win back in 2016 when the daily rate of long-acting reversible contraceptive insertion was up 21.6% in the month after Trump was elected president in 2016, compared to the 30 days before, according to the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

“It’s triggering for a lot of people, in the sense that for a large swath of our country, their ability to control their body and their life and their futures has been compromised, and they are having to move into action to do what’s best for them,” Kumar said.

Proposed Medicaid work requirements mean more than 61,000 Ohioans could potentially lose their health insurance, if the incoming Trump administration allows Ohio Republican state leaders to proceed with their plan.

While the Biden administration has stood in the way, Ohio’s 2023 budget signed by Gov. Mike DeWine requires the state Medicaid department to re-apply with the federal government under the new presidential administration for permission to impose work, drug testing, and/or education requirements for adult Medicaid health coverage recipients.

A goal of this requirement is “promoting economic stability and financial independence,” according to the Ohio Department of Medicaid.

Work requirements for Medicaid would have the opposite effect, said Will Petrik, director of policy and advocacy at Rise Together Innovation Institute.

“This proposal will take health care away from thousands of people who are struggling to make ends meet,” he said. “This proposal is going to reduce access to Medicaid, that will leave residents sicker and more vulnerable.”

The state is currently undergoing a comment period on the new requirements before submitting them to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Anyone who wishes to comment on the new proposed requirements can email the Ohio Department of Medicaid at GroupVIII@medicaid.ohio.gov until Jan. 21 at 5 p.m.

“It kind of leads to this mentality that this is going to help people pull themselves up by their bootstraps,” said Kathryn Poe, health and budget researcher at Policy Matters Ohio. “When the thing that actually pulls people up by their bootstraps is health insurance and housing and all of these other social benefits have to be in place before you can work, not after.”

The Ohio Department of Medicaid estimates 61,826 would lose their health insurance if these changes were to take effect, a number Poe and Petrick think is low.

“I think that they’re going to hit more administrative issues than what they can estimate,” Poe said.

Showing proof of work can be challenging if people don’t have reliable access to the internet, Petrik said.

Poe is worried people who are sick or disabled and can’t work will have a hard time proving to the state that they are unable to work.

“People often need health insurance to get that diagnosis to prove that they have a disability,” Poe said. “It’s just very messy. … We’re creating this system in which Ohioans are very uncertain about the future of their health insurance if they’re using state benefits. The ability to have health insurance is one of those primary cornerstones of economic stability.”

A lot of people who get kicked off of Medicaid do not re-apply, Poe said.

“You often have to fight your way back into the system, and not everybody has the time or the money, or, quite frankly, just the emotional energy to try to fight your way back into the system,” Poe said.

People typically start to accrue medical debt when they lose their health insurance.

“If you have someone who’s kicked off of Medicaid who has Type 1 diabetes, that person still has to go in and get their insulin every month, they’re just going to keep racking that number up until they can get health insurance again,” Poe said.

Georgia and Arkansas have tried to implement Medicaid work requirements, but faced various challenges.

“It doesn’t work because it requires a lot of administrative lift for the state to actually go in and verify that someone is working,” Poe said.

A federal judge put Arkansas’ program on hold in 2019, but not before 18,000 adults lost their health insurance.

Georgia launched the Georgia Pathways to Coverage program in July 2023 that offers Medicaid coverage to low-income, working adults, but enrollment has fallen well short of expectations. More than 40% of Georgia’s counties had less than 10 enrollees, even though the state had one of the highest percentages of uninsured populations in the country, according to the Georgia Budget and Policy Institute.

Members of the Senate have asked the Government Accountability Office to investigate the Georgia Pathways to Coverage program.

Ohio spent nearly a billion dollars on private school scholarship programs for the 2024 fiscal year, the first full year with near-universal school vouchers.

The total scholarship amount for Ohio’s five private school scholarship programs was $970.7 million, according to final data from the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce. Well more than a third that money ($406.7 million) was from Education Choice Expansion scholarships.

“I think this does have potentially a negative impact on students, on public schools around the margins, as you see those enrollment trends, but then in the big picture, when you have close to a billion dollars in public money that’s going to private schools, that means a billion dollars in state money that’s not available to meet the needs of the nearly 90% of kids that attend our public schools,” said Ohio Education Association President Scott DiMauro.

The $970.7 million number is higher than the estimated $964.5 million the nonpartisan Ohio Legislative Service Commission predicted when it came to the scholarship programs.

The five private school scholarship programs are the Autism Scholarship Program, the Jon Peterson Special Needs Scholarship Program, the Cleveland Scholarship, the Education Choice Scholarship and the Educational Choice Expansion Scholarship Program.

Students on the autism spectrum are eligible to receive vouchers up to $32,455 for the Autism Scholarship Program. Students who have an Individualized Education Program (IEP) from their district are eligible for the Jon Peterson Special Needs Scholarship. The Cleveland Scholarship is for all students living in the boundaries of Cleveland Metropolitan School District. Students living in the boundaries of a low-performing school district are eligible for Education Choice scholarships.

Lawmakers expanded the Education Choice-Expansion eligibility to 450% of the poverty line last year through the state budget — creating near-universal school vouchers. This means a family of four above the $135,000 income threshold can still be eligible for at least 10% of the maximum scholarship.

K-8 students can receive a $6,165 scholarship and high schoolers can receive a $8,407 scholarship in state funding under the expansion.

There were 93,159 applicants for the EdChoice Expansion scholarships and 89,794 were awarded scholarships, according to ODEW data. The amount of EdChoice-Expansion scholarship payments more than tripled from fiscal year 2023 to fiscal year 2024.

For the traditional EdChoice scholarships, there were 44,020 applicants and 42,779 were awarded scholarships — totaling $273.1 million, according to ODEW data.

During this time, nonpublic school enrollment increased about 2%, going from 169,807 in fiscal year 2023 to 173,156 in fiscal year 2024, according to ODEW data.

Public school enrollment declined slightly — dropping about 6,000 students from the 2022-23 school year to the 2023-24 school year.

Most of these new EdChoice Expansion scholarships are students who were already attending private schools, DiMauro said. Ohio’s voucher program started with the Cleveland Scholarships back in 1996.

“This was intended to help students who didn’t have the resources to have options outside of public schools,” DiMauro said. “(The EdChoice Expansion) is clearly intended to benefit people that had long ago made the decision to send their kids to private schools.”

In some cases, the universal vouchers have allowed private schools to increase tuition, he said.

“The increased revenue comes at the expense of the state,” DiMauro said. “It’s the private schools themselves that are directly being subsidized through this program, even more than families are.”

If private schools are going to accept vouchers, DiMauro wishes there was more transparency when it comes to private school tuition.

The OLSC predicts the five scholarship programs’ payment total will exceed a billion dollars next year.

Aaron Churchill, Ohio’s research director for the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, thinks these scholarship payment figures are sustainable year-to-year.

“I do think we can walk and chew gum at the same time,” he said. “We can support great public schools. We can provide the resources for them. … We can also empower families with greater choice. And I think that’s the direction that Ohio is moving.”

Total payments for the five scholarship programs for the past five fiscal years, according to ODEW data:

$610.2 million in fiscal year 2023 $554.5 million in fiscal year 2022$444.5 million in fiscal year 2021$394.2 million in fiscal year 2020$346.6 million In fiscal year 2019

Remaining scholarships

For the Cleveland Scholarship this fiscal year, there were 8,626 applicants and 8,361 scholarships were given — totaling $53.6 million, according to ODEW data.

There were 5,610 applicants for the Autism Scholarship and 5,385 were awarded for $141.7 million, according to ODEW data.

For the Jon Peterson Scholarship, there were 9,439 applicants and 9,082 scholarships were awarded, totaling $95.6 million, according to ODEW data.

Follow OCJ Reporter Megan Henry on X.

Ohio is one of seven states that elects state supreme court justices based on partisan elections — which can impact voters and campaign finance dollars. This is a new change, with Ohio Republican lawmakers adding party labels to the races starting in 2022.

However, partisan elections are “a difficult fit for judges,” said Michael Milov-Cordoba, counsel for The Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law.

“Legislators are changing the types of elections … to obtain a political advantage one way or another,” he said. “State courts are all deciding more significant national issues than they were in the past.”

Nonpartisan elections are used in 14 states for state supreme court races and another 14 use what’s called “merit selection,” a sort of job application process where candidates apply for a vacancy in the judicial system in a state, a nominating commission reviews the applications and makes a recommendation to the governor or other appointing entity, according to The Brennan Center.

The rest of the states use either gubernatorial or legislative appointment, or a hybrid selection process. Ohio switched from nonpartisan to partisan supreme court elections in 2021.

Something else that has changed along with the new partisanship in the race is the money involved.

“What we’re seeing in the past few cycles is an unprecedented amount of outside spending in judicial candidate races,” Milov-Cordoba said.

About 9% of donations to the six Ohio Supreme Court candidates totaling more than $365,000 have come from outside of Ohio as of Sept. 19, according to 2023 and 2024 campaign donations posted on the Ohio Secretary of State’s website.

Incumbent Democratic Justice Michael P. Donnelly is being challenged by Republican Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas Judge Megan Shanahan.

Incumbent Republican Justice Joseph Deters, who decided not to run for his current seat, is opting instead to go up against incumbent Democratic Justice Melody Stewart.

Democratic candidate Lisa Forbes, of the Eighth District Court of Appeals, and Republican candidate Dan Hawkins, of the Franklin County Court of Common Pleas, are battling for Deters’ open seat.

The Ohio Supreme Court currently has a 4-3 Republican majority. This election could either flip the court Democratic or Republicans will add to their numbers.

The Democratic candidates have received nearly $272,000 in contributions from outside of Ohio and the Republican candidates have gotten more than $93,000 in out-of-state contributions, as of Sept. 19.

Deters has received the most campaign contributions with more than $909,000 and Stewart has received the least amount of contributions with more than $480,000, as of Sept. 19. About 4% of Deters campaign donations have been from out-of-state, with nearly half of those coming from Florida.

Hawkins has received about $27,400 from out-of-state donations and Shanahan has received about $21,200 in contributions from outside of Ohio, as of Sept. 19. Both of them received the most out-of-state money from Washington, D.C.

Donnelly has received about $98,400 in donations from outside of Ohio, about 16% of his total donations, as of Sept. 19. 16% of Forbes’ campaign contributions has also come from out of Ohio, totaling about $97,300. About 15% of Stewart’s donations (about $76,100 came from outside of Ohio. All three democrats received the most out-of-state donations from New York.

The change in spending for judicial races has been significant over the past 15 to 20 years, said Phillip Marcin, professor of instruction at the Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron.

“Outside groups weren’t spending a lot of money, to the point where they were just low-profile affairs,” Marcin said.

But now that there has been an “explosion of spending” and partisan labels added to the races, Marcin said judicial races are starting to resemble more “political” races, like legislative or congressional races.

Campaigning rules for judicial candidates are different, for example, candidates are restricted from making knowingly false statements about fellow candidates in television ads, and typically ads paid for by judicial campaigns focus on their candidate’s qualities and qualifications.

But changing the elections to include partisan affiliations could have impacts on voters without any effort on the candidates’ part.

Marcin said the ongoing debate on whether or not political parties should be attached to judicial candidates has brought two arguments: supporters of the partisan elections (and increased spending on those races) say if voters turn out specifically to vote for other candidates on the ballot, they are more likely to also vote in judicial elections. This decreases the “roll-off” percentage, or the number of people who vote at the top of the ticket, but ignore down-ballot races and issues.

“(Supporters of partisan elections say) the more campaign spending that happens in judicial races, the more the roll-off decreases,” Marcin said.

During the 2020 election, more than a million Ohioans who voted didn’t vote for a state supreme court justice.

Opponents of partisan affiliations, which has included former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, say having to answer to a political party can alter judicial behavior.

“The traditional notion of a judge is that they should be neutral and impartial,” Marcin said.

But if pushed to run in partisan campaigns with donations coming their way, Marcin said research has shown judges can feel “expected to rule in line with the groups that you’ve received money from,” such as increasing sentences to appear “tougher on crime.”

“There’s evidence that judges alter their behavior in order to increase their chances of election,” Marcin said. “…That should be incredibly frightening to everyone.”

This could be a problem because of the impact judicial races have on the long term future of not just the state, but also the country as a whole.

“There used to be a lot of issues that were more federal in nature, but on some of these issues the United States Supreme Court has said we’re not really going to deal with these things anymore, we’re going to leave these to the state,” Marcin said.

Some of these issues include redistricting and abortion – which was sent back to the states in the Dobbs decision – both of which are hot issues in Ohio with 2023’s Issue 1 that enshrined reproductive rights in the Ohio Constitution, and this year’s Issue 1, which seeks to constitutionalize redistricting reform.

The Ohio Supreme Court has also already been asked to rule on various issues having to do with the reproductive rights amendment and state laws regulating abortion, along with redistricting maps by the Ohio Redistricting Commission, and summary language for the redistricting reform proposal.

“Now, the states are much more influential on these issues that are going to impact thousands, hundreds of thousands of people,” Marcin said.

Ohio Capital Journal is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Ohio Capital Journal maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor David Dewitt for questions: info@ohiocapitaljournal.com. Follow Ohio Capital Journal on Facebook and X.

A few dozen college students and faith leaders rallied outside the Greater Columbus Convention Center while inside the man behind Project 2025 was giving his keynote address.

The Center for Christian Virtue hosted the first day of the Essential Summit on Thursday, with speakers including Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts, Ohio Senate President Matt Huffman and Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost. CCV is listed as a hate group, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Project 2025 is a Presidential Transition Project written by the Heritage Foundation that spells out the first 180 days in office for the next right-wing administration. Former President Donald Trump has tried to distance himself from Project 2025, but former Trump administration officials helped create the policy book, which heavily leans on Christian Nationalism values.

In response to the Essential Summit, the Ohio Student Association and the Ohio Organizing Collaborative’s Amos Project organized a rally and a press conference.

Students rally against Project 2025

College students of faith slammed Project 2025 at the rally.

For University of Cincinnati student Chloe Freeman, being a Christian is a large part of who she is.

“Growing up Christian, I was taught that the greatest thing was love,” Freeman said. “What is happening today in that convention center is not loving. What is happening in that convention center is taking faith and capitalizing on it to create hateful and divisive policies. That is not faith. That is not what Jesus wanted.”

As a person of faith, Ohio State University student Eloni McClain said one of her most important duties is to love thy neighbor.

“I urge the Heritage Foundation to separate their hateful rhetoric from Christian ideals,” McClain said.

Michelle Stanley, a Kent State University student, called Project 2025 a blueprint for authoritarian control of the government.

“This extremist plan seeks to strip away our freedoms and dismantle the democratic institutions that protect us,” Stanley said. “This plan will further separate schools and the workplace in our communities. … Project 2025 targets young people by eroding education.”

People held up various signs at the rally that — Project 2025 attacks women’s rights; Jesus loves queer people; protect freedom, reject project 2025; Christians against Christian Nationalism.

Faith leaders speak out against Project 2025

Numerous faith leaders spoke out against Project 2025 at the First Church of God on Columbus’ Southeast Side Thursday before rallying outside the Convention Center.

Faith and Freedom are under attack, said Pastor Lesley Jones, the organizing director of OOC’s Amos Project, a federation of congregations across Ohio that try to promote justice.

“Project 2025 threatens to dismantle our democracy by deconstructing government agencies, rolling back policies that protect the most vulnerable and marginalized, and blurring the lines between the practice of faith and creating public policy that ensures the well being of everyday folks,” she said. “We are concerned about the exploitation of our faith and ignoring the call of our sacred text that calls us to love God and love our neighbor.”

Church of God Bishop Timothy Clarke called Project 2025 “an aberration of the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

“I do not think he would recognize what they are lifting and lording just a few miles from here, because his gospel was so different,” he said, referring to the Essential Summit happening in downtown Columbus.

Pastor Michael Harrison, of the Union Baptist Church in Youngstown who serves as the chair of the OOC, talked about how Project 2025 intersects with Christian Nationalism.

“It promotes hate, violence and discrimination,” he said. “This project is against the teachings of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”

What would Project 2025 do?

Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom.)

The nearly 900-page policy book would touch nearly every fabric of the executive branch.

Honesty for Ohio Education compiled a document explaining how Project 2025 would affect education and how it lines up with what is happening in Ohio, especially when it comes to creating university school vouchers.

Project 2025 would eliminate the United States Department of Education and would eliminate the Office of Head Start, which means closing Head Start child care programs that served about 833,000 low-income children in fiscal year 2022.

Project 2025 would also, among other things, seek to reverse the FDA’s approval of mifepristone, a drug used in medication abortion, and go after immigrant communities through mass deportations.

Other speakers at the two-day Essential Summit included Dr. Ben Carson, the Housing and Urban Development secretary during the Trump administration; Larry Arnn, the president of Hillsdale College (a conservative Christian college in Michigan); state Sen. Rob McColley, R-Napoleon, and state Rep. Josh Williams, R-Sylvania.

This is the first time CCV is hosting the Essential Summit, which is a precursor to Friday’s annual Ohio March for Life that is also hosted by CCV.

Ohio-based religious instruction program LifeWise Academy, which appears to have connections to the Heritage Foundation, was one of the sponsors of the Essential Summit. Westerville City Schools Board of Education, a suburban school district north of Columbus, recently rescinded their release for time policy that had allowed LifeWise to participate in the district.

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Ohio Capital Journal is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Ohio Capital Journal maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor David Dewitt for questions: info@ohiocapitaljournal.com. Follow Ohio Capital Journal on Facebook and X.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine said on Monday there have been “at least 33” bomb threats in Springfield and he announced troopers from the Ohio State Highway Patrol will be dispatched to 18 school buildings for the foreseeable future. During a news conference Tuesday, he encouraged parents it was OK to send their children back to school.

“We will continue this protocol as long as it is necessary,” DeWine said. “So you can be assured that we will have troopers there. We will have troopers very visible. These troopers will go through the building before anybody enters that building, to make sure there is no problem. We have not had one of the threats be anything but unfounded. We do not believe there is a real threat out there, but we are certainly not going to take any chances.”

Springfield has recently been thrust in the national spotlight after former president Donald Trump repeated the false claim that Haitian immigrants who have moved to the Clark County city over the years were eating cats and dogs during. State public safety officials and Gov. DeWine have debunked this claim.

When asked how much money has been spent to address the hoax threats, DeWine said he didn’t think that number could be calculated quickly.

“We have our federal partners who are involved, we have state, we have locals, we got three different levels of government that are very, very much involved,” DeWine said. “I don’t know if I can even guess.”

DeWine and his wife Fran visited Simon Kenton Elementary School on Tuesday.

“What we’re told by the teachers is the kids are doing well, we can just see it in the classroom,” DeWine said, noting it looked like a typical classroom. “Teachers also, though, told us that the kids had a tough day (Monday), so that’s not what we want to see. Our goal is to get back to normal and do that just as quickly as we can.”

There was a threat made to a school Tuesday afternoon DeWine said, but quickly added it was “quickly determined by the analyst to be unfounded.” An unfounded bomb threat was made to the Ohio Statehouse Monday morning and DeWine confirmed it was related to what’s been going on in Springfield.

Springfield Local Schools Superintendent Matthew Geha said Tuesday was the first near normal day since last Thursday.

“Our attendance was down (Tuesday),” he said. “There is still a high level of fear due to these unfounded threats and hoaxes that have marred our existence going on a week now. I encourage our parents to please return your students to school.”

An elementary school in the district with 500 students was missing 200 students on Tuesday, Geha said.

“We still had over 50% of the kids there, so I will take that as a win for today, and hopefully that increases to 75% tomorrow,” he said.

DeWine said he has not heard from Trump or his running mate Ohio U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance, even though Vance backed his previous false claims about Springfield on CNN over the weekend.

Despite a rumored visit to Springfield by Trump, DeWine said he has received no word from the Trump campaign about a potential visit to Springfield. Typically, a visit by a presidential campaign is welcome, but DeWine cautioned such a visit at this time.

“They certainly have the right to be here,” DeWine said. “If any of the candidates come, they will be welcomed by the people of Springfield. I have to speak in reality, though, that resources are really stretched here, and that’s just fact. We’re really focused on keeping kids in school. … It would be fine with me if they decided not to make that stop right now.”

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Ohio Capital Journal is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Ohio Capital Journal maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor David Dewitt for questions: info@ohiocapitaljournal.com. Follow Ohio Capital Journal on Facebook and X.

Shannon Gallagher and her family saw the writing on the wall as bills targeting transgender youth were being introduced in the Ohio Statehouse last year.

Their youngest child Alex, now 17, is transgender non-binary and their family no longer felt welcome in Ohio, so they moved to New York City last fall.

“It was not an easy decision,” Gallagher said. “… We decided we needed to create an environment and move somewhere where all of our family members felt wanted and appreciated for who they are.”

The Gallaghers made the decision to move in June 2023 — months after state Rep. Gary Click, R-Vickery, introduced his gender-affirming care ban bill (House Bill 68) and shortly after state Reps. Beth Lear, R-Galena, and Adam Bird, R-New Richmond, introduced a transgender bathroom ban bill (House Bill 183).

“Is this where we’re gonna call home?” Gallagher recalls thinking when she lived in Ohio. “This place obviously does not want our family here and is trying their hardest to get rid of us. That’s very much how we felt. So it’s like, why are we contributing to the economy here?”

The Gallagher family’s four children in 2017. (Photo provided by Shannon Gallagher)

It felt like there was something new every day, said Alex’s dad Eoghan Gallagher.

“Normally, that new thing that came out wasn’t encouraging,” he said.

They tried fighting by testifying against the bills.

“It just started taking a huge toll on all of us,” Shannon Gallagher said. “We just had a heart-to-heart as a family, and realized that the weight of all of that was crippling all of us and that we, unfortunately, had to leave.”

The Gallaghers moved to Ohio in 2011 after previously living in Los Angeles, Utah, and New Jersey. They had already moved from Dublin to Grandview in 2021 for the smaller school size and the gender-inclusive restrooms in the high school.

“To find out that the state could come in and tell them you can’t offer that to your students anymore was devastating,” Gallagher said. “We realized that it didn’t really matter what the school’s rules were if the state was going to change what they were allowed to do.”

In the year since their out-of-state move, Ohio’s gender-affirming care ban bill recently became law. This blocks transgender youth from starting hormone therapy and puberty blockers.

Alex started receiving gender-affirming health care at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in 2021, but the family said they were already seeing the chilling effect the bills were having on Alex’s health care.

The bathroom ban bill — which would require Ohio K-12 schools and colleges to require students to use the bathroom or locker room that aligns with their gender assigned at birth — is only one step away from being sent to Gov. Mike DeWine’s desk for his signature. The Ohio House wove H.B. 183 into Senate Bill 104, which revises the College Credit Plus Program, during the last House session in June. SB 104 passed, sending it over to the Senate for concurrence. The lawmakers are currently on break.

The Ohio Capital Journal reported earlier this year that more than 100 families with transgender members have made plans to leave Ohio.

“We realized we were in a very privileged position to be able to (move), which is one reason why we are still trying to help our friends in Ohio as much as possible,” Gallagher said. “We want to give back.”

The Gallagher family in 2016. (Photo provided by Shannon Gallagher).

Getting out of Ohio and moving to Brooklyn has been a relief for the Gallaghers.

“Everybody’s stress level just dropped,” Gallagher said. “We were holding all of this in and we knew it was bad, but we didn’t know it was as bad as it was until we got out because it was all consuming.”

New York is seen a LGBTQ friendly state. It has school nondiscrimination laws on the books that protect LGBTQ students from discrimination in school on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity and shield laws that protect gender-affirming care, according to the Movement Advancement Project.

The family’s mental health as a whole has improved dramatically since moving.

“It was night and day in a lot of ways,” Gallagher said. “There’s lots of gender neutral bathrooms everywhere we go. We used to always have to plot and plan where we would go.”

In New York City, it is illegal to discriminate against someone on the basis of gender identity or expression. This includes denying access to bathrooms.

Time they previously spent protesting Ohio’s anti-transgender bills they now spend listening to K-pop, going to concerts and exploring New York.

“Our conversations don’t revolve around the nasty things (Rep.) Click is saying,” Gallagher said. “We talk about more fun things. We do a lot more as a family.”

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Ohio Capital Journal is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Ohio Capital Journal maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor David Dewitt for questions: info@ohiocapitaljournal.com. Follow Ohio Capital Journal on Facebook and X.

As the 2024 Election inches closer, some people are turning to their faith leaders for guidance when determining who to vote for.

Even though it is illegal for a church to engage in political campaigning activity, people oftentimes look to clergy to help give them a frame of reference and context when deciding who to vote for, said Rabbi Hillel Skolnik of Congregation Tifereth Israel of Columbus.

“It makes sense that your religious beliefs would inform the way that you act at the ballot box,” he said.

The Ohio Capital Journal talked to three Columbus faith leaders about advice they give to members of their congregations who come to them for help when deciding which candidate to vote for in this year’s presidential election between Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump.

“God is not beholden to a political party,” said Jed Dearing, the rector at Trinity Episcopal Church in downtown Columbus.

“Vote your conscience”

Tim Ahrens, senior minister of the First Congregational Church of the United Church of Christ in downtown Columbus, encourages people to vote.

“Don’t just go in and do nothing because you haven’t done any of your homework and research,” Ahrens said. “Vote your conscience and vote what you believe.”

To help counsel people looking for voting advice, he asks them what they believe.

“I explore with people what values they hold at the center of their being,” Ahrens said. “Who holds the values that you hold, and as close as you can, believe can represent who you are.”

Trinity Episcopal Church

People in Dearing’s congregation often come to him with questions.

“How do I love my neighbor despite the hateful language that’s been used?” he said. “How do I pray for a candidate who I don’t like? How do we pray without being judgmental?”

A lot of people that come to him are angry — especially women and members of the LGBTQ community.

“So there’s that question of — with people who are speaking so hatefully and seeking to remove rights and take away things that have been established — how do I hold a love and care and respect for them in my heart, especially when they use dehumanizing language?” he said. “How do I not just stay angry?”

He said this reminds him of Moses and the burning bush from the Book of Exodus from the Bible.

“At this point, the Hebrew people are enslaved by the Egyptians and that bush is burning, but it doesn’t consume itself and burn up and it also doesn’t burn Moses,” he said. “Instead it calls to him … (and) ends up reorienting his life to go work for freedom for the people enslaved. For me, as Christians, the real challenge and the cause is to figure out how do we cultivate a fire that burns for justice, freedom, for equitable opportunity for all without being consumed and angry?”

When choosing a candidate to vote for, Dearing said he thinks of the verse Micah 6:8 — “He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”

“Are they committed to justice? To mercy? Do they have humility? Are they going to be someone in office who will continue to learn and grow just as, hopefully, we’re continuing to learn and grow?” Dearing said.

Jewish context

Skolnik tries to address certain issues by giving Jewish background and context.

For example, he said, Judaism supports a women’s right to choose to abort a pregnancy.

“That is not saying vote for a particular candidate, but it is putting into a Jewish context an important issue which might affect the choice that you make at the ballot box,” Skolnik said.

He tries to help people using three principles: study, worship and the act of loving kindness.

“Our Jewish lives are meant to be a balance of those three,” Skolnik said. “… The people who they choose to be their leader is who is aligning with you in the way that you would choose to try to have a life that includes learning, worship and act of loving kindness.”

Israel-Hamas War

The Israel-Hamas war is something Jewish voters can’t ignore, Skolnik said.

More than 39,900 people have been killed, more than 92,200 people have been injured and more than 10,000 people are missing in Gaza since the Israeli invasion after a Hamas-led attack in October that killed nearly 1,200 people in Israel, according to Al Jazeera.

“It is certainly a giant issue of feeling like a candidate that you would support would, at the very least, support Israel’s right to defend itself,” Skolnik said. “The idea of Israel’s right to defend itself doesn’t mean agreeing with every decision that Israel makes every moment of every day, but that is certainly a thing that comes in giant, big, bold letters of context.”

For Dearing, he said it has been hard for some people in his congregation to see the United States continue to fund Israel throughout the Israel-Hamas War. President Joe Biden signed into law $14.1 billion for funding to support Israel back in April.

“There’s that question of, in general, the values that I hold tend to lean closer to the Democratic Party, and right now that party is the one in control, continuing to make the choice to fund this war,” Dearing said. “Do I vote for president a party that is continuing to fund this war that seems to have gone past justice or defense?”

Christian Nationalism

Ahrens recently gave a sermon criticizing Christian Nationalism.

“Legislating morality never works,” he said in his sermon. “Just read your Bible and you’ll see how it fails time and time again. Additionally, Christian nationalism is an ideology held overwhelmingly by white Christian Americans, and thus it tends to exacerbate racial and ethnic cleavages.”

Christians should be politically engaged, he said in his sermon.

“But I also believe that we can and should do this without becoming Christian nationalists, because Christian nationalism is neither Christian nor patriotic,” Ahrens said in his sermon. “Christian nationalism tends to treat other Americans as second class citizens, including, but not excluding others, including women, and children, and immigrants. They also tend to treat science and scientists and scientific education with disdain.”

Follow OCJ Reporter Megan Henry on Twitter.

Ohio Capital Journal is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Ohio Capital Journal maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor David Dewitt for questions: info@ohiocapitaljournal.com. Follow Ohio Capital Journal on Facebook and X.

Ohio State University hired a conservative law professor who was the driving force behind bringing “intellectual diversity centers” to a handful of Ohio universities.

Lee Strang was recently hired as the executive director of the Salmon P. Chase Center for Civics, Culture, and Society at Ohio State University John Glenn College of Public Affairs. This is one of five intellectual diversity centers that were propped up after Gov. Mike DeWine signed the state budget into law last summer.

“Leading the Chase Center is an opportunity to be part of the solution to how Americans of all backgrounds and viewpoints, together, will renew our common civic life,” Strang wrote in an email to the Capital Journal. “The Chase Center will do so by focusing on what unites us—”the historical ideas, traditions, and texts” of our common constitutional heritage—and do so in a way—“free, open, and rigorous intellectual inquiry”—that guides Americans to see each other as civic friends, united in the collaborative project of securing the common good for us all.”

President of Ohio State’s Association of University Professors Jani Pranav is critical of the decision to hire Strang.

“I think it does very little to inspire confidence that the center is going to be a space for intellectual diversity and free inquiry on campus,” he said. “I would say that Strang’s appointment confirms that S.B. 117 is going to produce the centers exactly as intended, which is a center for partisan thought and conservative thought.”

Strang will oversee the hiring and appointment of the center’s faculty, develop curriculum, and deliver academic programing, Ohio State Spokesman Chris Booker said in an email.

Senate Bill 117

The centers started in Senate Bill 117 and initially only included Ohio State and the University of Toledo. Sen. Jerry Cirino, R-Kirtland, and Sen. Rob McColley, R-Napoleon, introduced the bill in May 2023 and then Miami University, Cleveland State University and the University of Cincinnati were later added to the bill as well.

The bill was eventually woven into the state’s budget and Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signed the budget into law last summer. Cincinnati was later removed from the legislation and the money was appropriated to Wright State University.

Ohio’s budget allocates $24 million for the centers — $5 million each fiscal year to Ohio State, $1 million each fiscal year to Toledo and $2 million each fiscal year for each center at Miami, Cleveland State and Wright State.

Lee Strang

Strang worked with McColley on creating the bill and Strang was first director of Toledo’s intellectual diversity center — the Institute of American Constitutional Thought and Leadership located in the college of law.

He first had the idea for the center back in 2019 after visiting the Georgetown Center for the Constitution and Princeton University’s James Madison Program.

Strang helped back the failed effort to raise the minimum threshold for constitutional amendments that was voted down last summer during Ohio’s special election. He has previously supported banning abortion care.

“(Strang) kind of hides his political motivations for taking these undemocratic legal positions, and that doesn’t really inspire confidence for someone who’s going to be open minded and interested in intellectual diversity,” Pranav said.

Strang also helped found and serves as the board president of the Toledo charter school Northwest Ohio Classical Academy — which offers “classical” education for K-12 students.

Ohio State

The tentative plan is for the Chase Center to start offering classes next fall, Strang said in an email.

The Chase Center will offer courses that will help students in two different ways, Strang said.

“They will provide students with knowledge of Americans’ common civic heritage,” he said in an email. “For example, a course on the American Civic Tradition would cover the important people, history, documents, and institutions that all American citizens should know. Second, courses will help students hone the skills they need to flourish as citizens in our pluralistic Republic. For instance, a course on civil discourse would expose students to the arguments and ideas surrounding important issues of law and policy, while equipping students with the habits of productively arguing across differences with fellow citizen.”

The Chase Center will have at least 15 tenure-track faculty members.

University of Toledo

Toledo’s Institute of American Constitutional Thought and Leadership began offering classes last summer and will offer a mix of undergraduate and law classes to students this fall — including American Liberalism, Democracy in America, Lincoln’s Statesmanship, the Ohio Constitutional Law and the death penalty.

The center will add a major and a minor in the next couple of years, Strang said.

In Strang’s absence, the executive director of the institute Michael Gonzalez will be the interim director while a nationwide search is conducted for a new director.

The institute’s seven-member academic council will conduct the search and submit a list of finalists to the university president, who will appoint the new director.

Cleveland State University

Since Cleveland State is still in the early stages of creating the center, they do not know when or what kind of classes will be offered, university spokesperson Reena Arora said in an email.

The center will be in the Levin College of Public Affairs and Education and the legislation calls for having at least ten faculty members.

The Ohio Senate recently approved seven members of their Academic Council in June who will make recommendations for an executive director to their President Laura Bloomberg. However, three of the members are from out-of-state and one wrote a 2011 article titled “Straight Is Better: Why Law And Society May Justly Prefer Heterosexuality.”

Miami University

No director has been named yet for Miami’s intellectual diversity center which will be housed in the College of Arts and Science.

Whoever is the director will be able to hire faculty for the center and come up with classes that will be offered, university spokesman Seth Bauguess said in an email.

Wright State

Wright State’s Board of Trustees appointed six members to the center’s Academic Council in June.

Follow OCJ Reporter Megan Henry on Twitter.

Ohio Capital Journal is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Ohio Capital Journal maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor David Dewitt for questions: info@ohiocapitaljournal.com. Follow Ohio Capital Journal on Facebook and X.

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose’s voter purge disproportionately goes after voters of color, Ohio civil rights organizations argue.

More than half of Ohio voters who might be purged from the state’s voter rolls are registered in counties where a majority of the population is people of color, said Ohio Unity Coalition Executive Director Pierrette Talley.

“It appears to me that this purge disproportionately targets voters of color, many of whom have long been disenfranchised from the political process, either because of discriminatory barriers that prevent them from exercising their power to vote or people’s life circumstances that have prevented them from being able to fully participate in our democracy,” she said during a Tuesday press conference.

Last month, LaRose published a list of 158,857 inactive voter registration who were eligible to be removed from the Statewide Voter Registration Database — meaning they would be purged from voter rolls and not able to vote in the upcoming Presidential election. County board of elections had until Monday to finish their voter purge.

LaRose’s office did not respond to questions about when they would have a final list of purge voters or about the accusation the purge disproportionately affects voters of color.

“What our politicians should be focusing on is expanding voting rights rather than trying to restrict them,” said Bria Bennett, the communications director for Ohio Organizing Collaborative.

A registered voter could be on the list if they filled out a change-of-address form with the U.S. Postal Service signaling they have moved or they have not voted at their registered address in the past four years after being marked for removal by a county’s voter registration system. The voter purge is part of Ohio’s process of updating its rolls and removing voters who have moved out-of-state or died.

There has to be a better way to clean Ohio’s voter roll, said Deidra Reese, voter engagement director at the Ohio Organizing Collaborative.

“This ability to take people off the rolls is saying people who have affirmatively registered to vote will not be able to vote simply because of a procedural issue, that’s just not fair,” she said. “It is not proper to say people who meet those regulations should be taken off the roll. … We just want people who are eligible to actually be able to vote and not have barriers and particularly not to disproportionately impact voters of color.”

Talley is disappointed the voter purge is happening.

“People should be allowed to opt out of any election and they should certainly not live in an environment where if you don’t exercise your right to vote that you lose your right to vote,” she said.

Voting is an essential part of democracy, said President of the Ohio Conference NAACP Tom Roberts.

“By definition, democracy means people rule and our democracy works best when every voter can participate in this democracy and voting is one of the most public ways of sharing the work of a democracy,” he said.

A voter whose registration has been purged can regain their ability to vote by reregistering on the Secretary’s registration website or by visiting their county board of elections.

The deadline to register to vote in the Nov. 5 election is Oct. 7.

Follow OCJ Reporter Megan Henry on Twitter.

Ohio Capital Journal is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Ohio Capital Journal maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor David Dewitt for questions: info@ohiocapitaljournal.com. Follow Ohio Capital Journal on Facebook and X.

As a tenth generation Appalachian, Ivy Brashear sees J.D. Vance’s 2016 memoir “Hillbilly Elegy” as a “really one-sided and simple view of the region.”

In an effort to help broaden people’s view of Appalachia, she decided to share her own narrative as part of a collection of writings in the 2019 book, “Appalachian Reckoning: A Region Responds to Hillbilly Elegy.”

“(Hillbilly Elegy) isn’t the only story that you should look at,” Brashear said. “You should broaden your view and see what other stories exist in (Appalachia).”

Appalachian Reckoning is divided into two parts that feature many diverse contributors — the first half is responses commenting on Hillbilly Elegy and the second part is a compilation of narratives and images from people who tell their own personal stories about Appalachia.

“This is a book born out of frustration,” the introduction reads. “This is a book born out of hope. It attempts to speak for no one and to give voice to many. … It is meant to open a conversation about why that book struck such a deep nerve with many in the region, but it is not meant to demonize J. D. Vance.”

Appalachian Reckoning was edited by Anthony Harkins and Meredith McCarroll, and published by West Virginia University Press.

“Our interest was in making clear that Appalachia was a huge, diverse place with many different stories and many different voices,” Harkins said.

Appalachia is a 13 state region that extends from New York all the way down to Mississippi. 32 Ohio counties are in the Appalachian region.

Hillbilly Elegy

“Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis” chronicles the challenges Vance faced growing up in Middletown, Ohio — which is not part of Appalachia. Vance’s mom and her family were from Eastern Kentucky, which is part of Appalachia.

Hillbilly Elegy has been experiencing a recent resurgence since Republican Presidential Nominee Donald Trump picked Ohio Senator Vance as his running mate, soaring to the top of the best-sellers on Amazon. The book was previously a New York Times bestseller and was made into a Ron Howard movie.

But Vance’s memoir has faced criticism for generalizing Appalachia and the working class.

“It has been a continuation of the shaping of the conception of the region for the rest of the world, the rest of the country, I think, in mostly negative ways in ways that reinforce notions of the people as violent and ignorant and lazy and responsible for their own problems in ways that really does not explain the socio-economic history of the place and how it became and how it is,” Harkins said.

Hillbilly Elegy has influenced how people from outside the region view Appalachia, he said.

“It has framed the region through this one prism and hidden a lot of the more complex, diverse area parts of the story,” Harkins said. “It reinforces the idea that it is a monocultural space and hides a lot of the range of voices and experiences.”

Brashear said it essentially reduces Appalachia down to a caricature.

“When you paint with a broad brush over an entire very complex, very diverse place, you lose a lot of the nuance of what it means to be a part of that place, be from that place, to advocate for that place, to fight for that place, and to really feel rooted in that place,”she said. “When you lose that nuance and lose that humanity, it really makes it hard for other people to relate, and it makes it hard for other people to see that this place is worth investment too.”

Vance’s memoir has reinforced stereotypes about Appalachia, said Tiffany Arnold, Ohio University’s Appalachian Studies Certificate Programs Coordinator.

“Hillbilly Elegy has hurt the region, Vance has hurt the region because people choose to believe rhetoric that reinforces what they already believe about us because if they believe that we are what they think, they can continue to use us as their scapegoats for anything they think is wrong with this country and not take responsibility for the institutional and systemic poverty that has existed here for generations, and Vance has certainly reinforced stereotypes that already existed,” Arnold wrote in an email to the Capital Journal.

Appalachian Reckoning

Brashear wrote about her Kentucky family for her chapter in Reckoning titled, ‘Keep Your “Elegy”: The Appalachia I Know Is Very Much Alive.’

“I come from a culture and a family of dignity and grace and laughter and joy — none of which exists in J.D. Vance’s fictitious Appalachia,” she wrote in her chapter. “Hillbilly Elegy actively and intentionally ignores and excludes the real-life, lived experiences of all but a minority of Appalachian people.

Brashear writes how she does not discount the struggles Vance experienced in his childhood.

“However, I do take great issue with the ways in which his narrative of the region erases and erodes any Appalachian experience outside his own non-Appalachian experience by reinforcing repeatedly that Appalachian “hillbilly” culture is somehow deficient and morally decrepit, and that it is something to be overcome and escaped from without looking back,” she writes.

Bob Hutton, an associate professor of Appalachian Studies at Glenville State University in West Virginia, wrote his response to Elegy in a Reckoning chapter titled ‘Hillbilly Elitism.‘

“Vance shares the view that poor whites are bound by their regressive culture,” Hutton wrote in his essay. “Vance’s view of poverty has profound racial and geographic limits that curtail his ability to understand it. … His book ultimately illustrates the oxymoron capitalism and its defenders require: any hard-working individual can rise to the top, but, at any given time, far more individuals must remain on the bottom.”

Harkins said the response to Appalachian Reckoning over the years has been encouraging.

“So many people … wanted to see more voices presented, and and we also tried very hard with that book to have as much of a range of voices and texts and approaches as possible,” he said.

Follow OCJ Reporter Megan Henry on Twitter.

Ohio Capital Journal is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Ohio Capital Journal maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor David Dewitt for questions: info@ohiocapitaljournal.com. Follow Ohio Capital Journal on Facebook and X.

Ohioans need to be making at least $20.81 an hour working a full-time job to be able to afford a “modest” two-bedroom apartment, according to a new report by the National Low Income Housing Coalition and the Coalition on Homelessness and Housing in Ohio.

This is a 9% increase compared to last year’s report — which was $19.09 an hour, said COHHIO Executive Director Amy Riegel.

“Wages for Ohio’s most common jobs have increased significantly since the pandemic,” she said. “Employers are trying to keep pace with inflation, but the skyrocketing cost of rent has effectively erased these wage gains, pushing affordable homes out of reach for a large swath of Ohio’s workforce.”

Of the 10 jobs with the most employees in Ohio, only general operations managers and registered nurses earn more than $20.81 an hour, according to the 2024 Out of Reach Ohio report. Fast food workers, stockers, cashiers, retail salespeople, laborers, customer service representatives, assemblers, and home health aides all make less than $20 an hour.

“That is creating a great divide between what people earn and what they are able to afford,” Riegel said.

Ohio’s minimum wage is $10.45 an hour, meaning someone with a minimum wage job would have to work 80 hours a week to be able to afford a two-bedroom apartment. The Fair Market Rent for a two-bedroom apartment in Ohio is $1,082, according to the report.

Renters in Ohio’s three biggest cities need to be making even more, according to the report.

Columbus renters need to earn $25.04 an hour, Cincinnati renters need to be making $22.98 an hour, and Cleveland renters need to earn $21.31 an hour.

“We must act now to address these needs and to help our communities provide the support that is necessary to be able to help people reach housing stability,” Riegel said.

Ohio landlords filed nearly 108,000 eviction cases last year — the most since 2015 — and homelessness in Ohio increased 7% in 2023 over the previous year, according to COOHIO.

Rising rents can be especially tough for aging Ohioans and people with disabilities living on a fixed income.

“Ohioans who worked hard for 40 years or more should be enjoying their golden years,” Riegel said. “Instead, many are rationing medications and wondering how they’re going to feed themselves and pay the rent.”

It’s no secret the country is experiencing a housing crisis, particularly when it comes to finding affordable housing.

“Addressing the challenge requires long-term federal investments in affordable housing,” NLIHC President and CEO Diane Yentel said in a statement. “As evidenced during the COVID-19 pandemic, federal policies and resources play a pivotal role in establishing a robust housing safety net, preventing evictions and homelessness, and mitigating housing instability among renters with the lowest incomes.”

The U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled that cities can enforce bans on people sleeping outside, despite having nowhere else to go. The high court upheld an Oregon city’s policy of penalizing homeless people who slept outside because the city did not have adequate shelter.

The case is expected to have broad ramifications for how cities respond to homelessness.

What’s happening at the Ohio Statehouse?

Last year’s state budget created Ohio’s housing tax credit program and the single-family housing tax credit program.

Five bipartisan lawmakers formed the Senate Select Committee on Housing, which conducted hearings across the state for nearly a year to learn more about the housing challenges communities are dealing with.

They recently released a report with 23 recommendations that includes ideas on increasing opportunities for homeownership, consumer protection for renters and homebuyers, alternative forms of housing, tax policy, increasing density, capacity-building grants for local governments, zoning technical assistance, third-party review of services, and modifications to the Ohio Housing Finance Agency.

“We are seeing increased interest in what is happening in housing at the state level,” Riegel said. “However, what we are seeing is that there still isn’t a great interest. There still isn’t a lot of dedication to addressing the needs of those who are extremely low income, those who may be on fixed incomes, and to those who are the most vulnerable within our communities.”

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