Tag: Ohio

I’m Robin Weirauch. I’m running for Congress in the December 11th special election in Ohio’s 5th District and I need your support!

When I heard that President Bush had vetoed the bill expanding SCHIP, I couldn’t believe it. The State Children’s Health Insurance Program helps millions of American children whose families are struggling.

I recently spoke with a single mother from our district that told me she has worked at least two jobs her whole adult life but has never had health insurance through her work. Her daughter has been covered by the SCHIP program since infancy.  She told me she wouldn’t know what she would do without the program.

Read the rest of the story and see my video message after the jump:

She was glad to have the choice with SCHIP between three plans so that she could, for example, choose a plan that would give vision coverage for her daughter, which she has needed most of her young life.  She was not aware of the President’s veto of the expansion of the program or of the fact that the President’s budget did not provide enough funding to cover all those already in the program. She would be in serious financial trouble if her daughter’s healthcare coverage through SCHIP were not available.

She has to pay for her own insurance coverage and is forced to put off the regular checkups that are recommended until she can afford to pay the deductible.  She delays her vision checkup and replacing her glasses for much longer than recommended as she must save up to be able to afford it. If she also had to pay for her daughter’s coverage, she wouldn’t be able to take care of her own health needs.

People often ask me what difference one Representative can make in Congress? But when a 15-vote margin will decide whether American children in need will receive health care or be struck by the business end of George Bush’s veto pen, it becomes evident that every vote counts.

This is where I need your help.  We all know that the online community can  bring much needed attention to competitive special elections.  Senator Sherrod Brown and Governor Ted Strickland both won this district and I believe that we will win this special– but I need your support! 

While my Republican opponents Bob Latta and Steve Buehrer are focused on tearing each other down, I’m focused on the issues that matter to working families. Where would the Republican candidates be on this critical issue? Would they side with the bipartisan coalition fighting for children or with the President who denies them care? Voters deserve to know. They know where I stand– for kids, every time.
Please visit my website to learn more and support our campaign today!

Thank you!

Robin Weirauch

(crossposted to Dkos)

President Kennedy once invoked the old axiom that “a raising tide lifts all boats.”

He might have been thinking about the fortunes of Democrats in the State of Ohio. What an INCREDIBLE change since 2004, when Ohio, thanks in large part to “values voters” who turned out to support an idiotic Hate Amendment to the state Constitution, thereby returning the Shrub to the White House by 218,000 votes.

First came 2006: Sherrod Brown goes to the Senate and Ted Strickland leads a near sweep of statewide offices (notable exception: the state Supremes, now all neo-con.) But we only picked up one US House seat, by Zach Space, in OH-18.The GOP thinks that they can take Zach out. FAT CHANCE! Zach raised $274519.00 with $591905.47 Cash on Hand. It’s a VERY tough District but Zach can get the job done.

So let’s review how things are going heading into the US House elections. It’s pretty amazing. There are FOUR open seats, three by retirement, and one death. That’s out of a total of 18 Districts in the state.

And all of the open seats had been held by Republicans.

And unfortunately for the GOP, in OH-02, Mean Jean Schmidt DIDN’T decide to retire!

Folks,in the last several election cycles, it was not uncommon for Democratic Congressional challengers to raise so little money that they didn’t even have to file ANY reports (let alone quarterly.) Let’s take a gander at today’s FEC filings:(my how things have changed!!!!)

First things first, Robin Weirauch is already up and running for the OH-05 special election following the death of Paul Gillmor. She had her crew have been out working HARD. She has been endorsed by most of the county Democratic Party organizations and with the withdrawal of her only significant primary challenger, is overwhelmingly the presumptive nominee. (Because it’s a special election, the FEC reporting schedule is a little different.)

In OH-01, State House Minority leader Steve Dreihaus is taking on Rep Steve Chabot. Driehaus raised $120612.31 with $251011.77 CoH. Steve is a veteran campaigner who is going to run an excellent campaign.

In OH-07, GOP Rep. Dave Hobson has announced his retirement and the DCCC and ODP are working to recruit a top level candidate for the District.It’s very tough District but as an open seat, everything changes. Stay tuned!

In OH-14, former appellate Judge Bill O’Neill has set fundraising records for a Democrat in the District.His totals for his first quarter of fundraising:$102872.00 with $77976.74 on hand.

In OH-15, where Rep. Deb Pryce has decided not to run again, Franklin County Commissioner Mary Jo Killroy raised $342423.64 this quarter, with $383659.05 CoH. So far, the GOP has gotten nothing but rejections for their attempts to find SOMEBODY to run for this seat, following Pryce’s decision not to run again.

In OH-16, where Ralph Regula FINALLY made his decision to retire public,  Air Force Major and State Senator John Boccieri was able to raise $118857.83 with $224847.24 CoH.

Once again, OHIO is clearly going to be the compelling story of this election cycle.

Another one bites the dust.

Republican Rep. Dave Hobson announced his retirement today, just days before his 71st birthday:

Rep. David Hobson announced at 5 p.m. Sunday that he will retire at the end of this term. […]

He made his announcement at a birthday party surrounded by staff, former staff and community leaders.

Hobson’s exit makes him the third Ohio Republican in the House to call it quits (Deborah Pryce and Ralph Regula being the others), and the 12th in the nation.  His district, however, is fairly red — with a PVI of R+6, Bush carried it by a 57-43 margin over Kerry.  It will be a tough district for a Democrat to win, but the surging fortunes of Democrats in the state could spark an interesting race here with the right kind of candidate.

Remember, Democrat Zack Space pulled off a victory in an Ohio district that’s just as red last year.  Granted, his GOP opponent was deeply flawed, but who knows what kind of Club For Growth-style stooge the local GOP might spit out for us here.

Race Tracker: OH-07

(Hat-tip: Buckeye State Blog)

According to the Buckeye State Blog, Presidential candidate and Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich is set to face a major new primary opponent for his Cleveland-based House seat:

Dean DePiero, Mayor of Parma – Ohio’s seventh largest city with 80,000 residents – is tossing his hat into the Primary carnival to take out Democratic Congressman and presidential wannabe Dennis Kucinich. While BSB followed up on rumors of Dean’s interest back in May, nothing ever came of it. Until now.

Over the weekend I spoke with two reliable sources. One source confirmed that he had spoken with Dean directly, and Dean claimed to be committed to the race. Another source confirmed that throughout the summer (notably August) DePiero had been busy cultivating donors. Also, I’ve heard multiple whispers that a poll may’ve been commissioned already, but I don’t have further info there.

I have no details on kick off, entrance, official word from Dean or any of that. Calls placed to DePiero’s campaign office on Wednesday have gone unreturned. However, I repeat, one of my sources spoke with DePiero directly, and Dean claimed he was in the race.

DePiero, a former state representative and Ohio House Minority Leader, would offer Kucinich his stiffest challenge yet, forcing the candidate to spend less time on the Presidential trail and more time in his own district.  This could have huge implications on the local and national level.

Check out the Buckeye State Blog for more analysis and details.

The GOPers have started eating their wounded.

Now there is a move afoot to oust Alex Arshinkoff, the chair of the Summit County GOP, and one of our state’s major GOPer powerbrokers.  And it’s being lead by a powerful state Senator to boot.

h/t to Jeff at OhioDailyBlog

John Boccieri in OH-16

Allow me to reccomend State Senator (and Air Force Reserve Major) John Boccieri.

John has been endorsed by VoteVets.org, General Wesley Clark and Governor Ted Strickland, who spoke at our campaign kick-off event:

“As a former Congressman, I know that it takes a strong leader like John Boccieri to stand up for Ohio families in Washington. John Boccieri understands the problems facing our communities and he is the right leader to fight for this area in Congress.  He’s been fighting to turn around Ohio as a state Senator and he will fight to turn around Ohio as a Member of Congress.” 

As others have mentioned, this Saturday, June 30, is the end of the quarter for FEC fundraising. We’re hoping that we can keep the momentum building that we’re enjoyed so far. If you can help with financial support through ActBlue, it would be GREATLY appreciated.

Sincerely,

Earl Britt
Web assistant
http://johnforcongress.com

The plethora of opportunities for House Democratic challengers in Ohio next year is a topic that both CQ Politics and MyDD’s Jon Singer looked at recently. Between both sources, we can identify no fewer than seven potential offensive targets for Democrats this cycle. The following chart lists each possible targeted district by its PVI, the incumbent’s margin of victory in 2006, and the Kerry/Bush and Gore/Bush margins in 2004 and 2000, respectively:

CD	Incumbent	PVI	’06 Margin	Kerry ’04	Bush ’04	Gore ’00	Bush ’00
OH-01	Chabot	R+0.5	4	49	51	46	51
OH-02	Schmidt	R+13.1	1	36	64	34	63
OH-03	Turner	R+2.9	17	46	54	45	52
OH-12	Tiberi	R+0.7	15	49	51	46	52
OH-14	LaTourette	R+2.2	18	47	53	44	52
OH-15	Pryce	R+1.1	<1	50	50	44	52
OH-16	Regula	R+3.6	17	46	54	42	53

With the exception of the 3rd, these districts have been trending more Democratic on the Presidential level since 2000. Despite shrewd gerrymandering by Ohio Republicans, with the right challengers, each of these seats could come into play.

• OH-01: The DCCC thinks it has their man to finish what John Cranley started in his challenge to Republican Steve Chabot in 2006. State Rep. and Minority Whip Steve Driehaus, “a Democrat with a history of winning over Republican voters”, has thrown his hat in the ring. On the one hand, Driehaus has a suburban political base that can help wear down Chabot in his strongest territories. On the other hand, Driehaus may lack the broader name recognition of Cranley, who was an at-large councilor in Cincinnati. On balance, though, Driehaus’ resume looks good, and he should prove to be another credible challenger.
• OH-02: No doubt about it; Jean Schmidt is a political time bomb set to go off every six months or so with another bizarre comment about bringing nuclear waste into her district or deriding the outrage over the Walter Reed scandal as “overblown” criticism. Jean Schmidt could very well be the worst politician of the decade, which is the only reason why Team Blue has a shot at winning this R+13 district. 2006 candidate Vic Wulsin is game for a rematch, and while it doesn’t seem to take much to incite Schmidt into inflicting another wound on herself, the Democratic nominee in this district will have to deal with running against the Presidential headwind of a solidly Republican district. A tough challenge, to be sure, but Schmidt is destined to underperform, especially if she gets another primary challenge.
• OH-03: This Dayton-based district was represented by Democrat Tony P. Hall from 1978-2002, but has since been occupied by Republican Mike Turner. Whatever hope Democrats had in sparking an upset last year unfortunately went down in flames after the Democratic nominee, Stephanie Studebaker, was arrested in a domestic dispute just three months before election day. Prosecutor Dick Chema was the last-minute replacement, and perhaps unsurprisingly fell short by roughly 17 points. Given that this district’s Republican lean is less than heavy, a well-organized challenger with a good profile could perhaps do to Turner what Democrat Jason Altmire did to “rising star” Republican Melissa Hart in Pennsylvania last year, who held a similarly Republican-leaning seat with a long history of voting for Congressional Democrats.
• OH-12: Republican Pat Tiberi convincingly repelled Swing State Project hero and near-octogenarian Bob Shamansky by a 15-point margin last November, but he did have to empty his $3 million war chest to do it. Tiberi shouldn’t be able to escape 2008 with a free pass, especially in a trending Democratic district like this one.
• OH-14: Democrats have an eager challenger to Republican Steve LaTourette: William O’Neill, a judge on the 11th District Court of Appeals in Ohio. O’Neill’s recent claim to fame was winning 41% of the vote for the Ohio Supreme Court on a $1 budget in 2006, in principled opposition to the mixing of campaign contributions and judicial service. However, O’Neill claims he won’t be nearly as stingy in his campaign against LaTourette. He intends to raise $1 million for the race, and will resign from the bench on June 15th and has already been in contact with the DCCC, according to comments attributed to him on the Buckeye State Blog. LaTourette, despite some family values hypocrisy and a district trending more Democratic on the Presidential level, has yet to face a top-shelf challenge this decade (no, Capri Cafaro doesn’t count). If Judge O’Neill can bring the noize, this might be another unexpected defense for Republicans next year.
• OH-15: After watching the disappointments of Lois Murphy and Diane Farrell in their four-year campaigns last cycle, I’ve become rather skeptical of the viability of most House rematches, barring special circumstances like scandal (e.g. Pombo/McNerney), and major strategic reorientation (e.g. Hodes/Bass, Boyda/Ryun). But Democrat Mary Jo Kilroy ran a strong challenge against Deborah Pryce last year, which is why I’m somewhat ambivalent about the brewing primary battle between her and fellow Franklin County Commissioner Paula Brooks. Pryce could be on unstable ground in 2008, but we’ll need to sort out our side of the fence first.
• OH-16: At age 82, Republican Ralph Regula is ripe for retirement. But even if this seat doesn’t open up, Democrats plan on making an aggressive challenge after the no-profile, no-money Democrat Thomas Shaw scored a surprising 41.6% against the 34-year incumbent. According to the Buckeye State Blog, State Senator John Boccieri, an officer in the Air Force Reserve and a veteran of four tours in Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom, is strongly considering a bid for this seat. With a strong electoral track record and an excellent profile, Boccieri could prove to be a top-tier Democratic recruitment in the next cycle.

Seven districts, seven pressure points. Democrats probably won’t win all of them, or even many of them, but that doesn’t mean that it wouldn’t be wise to push on all of these targets hard to keep Congressional Republicans focused on putting out as many brushfires as possible.

Race Tracker: Ohio

This is the fifth in a series of diaries depicting the Democratic victory in this year’s midterm elections.

Already covered have been New England, NY, NJ/MD/DE, and Pennsylvania.

Today’s diary will focus on the Buckeye state, where we find that there must be something in the water, any water.  We know that the coasts lean blue, but this is also increasingly true of Ohio River Valley.First up are the seat control charts, and yes grey means that the race is still in dispute not that some third party won.

Of   3,757,640  votes cast in 2006 US House races in Ohio,    1,970,127 (52.4%) were cast for Democrats, while 1,779,461 (47.4%) were cast for Republicans. While the only  certified Democratic pickup is in the OH-18, two other races the OH-15 and OH-02 are both still in dispute, Democrats now hold 7 (38.9%) of Ohio’s 18 Congressional districts.  

While it is neccessary to remember that seats are apportioned according to population not voter registration, and that differing turnouts mean that state totals weigh some districts more heavily than others because of these differences the degree of gerrymandering is apparent in the disparity between vote totals and the party control of seats.  The problem is that the composition of Ohio’s House of Representatives delegation isn’t very representative of the voting intentions.  

If Ohio’s House delegation were apportioned by proportional representation, Democrats would control 9 of Ohio’s 18 House seats.  Dependent on the outcome of recounts in the OH-15 and OH-02, this may still come to pass.  I’d like to point out something I found highly disturbing when researching this diary.  On the election results page of the Ohio Secretary of State page, provisional ballot totals and percentages of provisional counted as valid are given for 2004, while the 2006 results give an aggregate figure for provisionals and absentee ballots.  

I find this highly suspicous, and this technicality has the stink of bullshit upon it, because it could serve to obscure the true quantity of provisionals ballots in the two contested districts.  And this could serve to obscure evidence of voter suppression in  the application of Ohio’s new voter ID law.  The Secretary of State’s office needs to release disaggregated figures listing the number of provisional ballots seperate from absentee ballots.

Voter Turnout by County, Ohio 2006 General

The darkest shade of red indicates a turnout of less than 40%, medium red 40-45%, pink 45-50%, light blue 50-55%, medium blue 55-60%, dark blue more than 60%.

Looking at our only confirmed victory, the OH-18, we can see  a general trend, areas with the highest turnout (the Toledo area and SE Ohio) tend to be the areas where Democrats won, while lowest turnout was reported in the Cincinnati area where Republicans narrowly won.  The Democratic victory in the OH-18 by Democrat Zack Space represents a real blow to Republicans.  In 2006, Space took 62% of the district vote for a 23.9% margin over Republican Joy Padgett.  This represents a 28.1% improvement the 33.9% 2004 Democratic vote share. This is Bob Ney’s old seat, this is what happens when the incumbent congressman is serving prison time. This is what a wave looks like. Bye-bye Republicans.

The following map shows Democratic 2006 gains over their 2004 Democratic performance in the district (in % terms), improvements of less than 5% will be displayed in light blue, under 10% in the darker blue, and over 10% in the darkest blue.  Republican gains will be shown in the same manner, with the light red signifying a gain of less than 5% and so on. Races that were not contested in either of the years will be displayed in gray.

Looking more closely at the margin of victory in 2006 races,      Democratic defends and pickup opportunities emerge, the following map displays the margin of victory in 2006 races.  The deepest blue represents and Democratic margin of victory over 10%, the medium color represent more than 5%, while the lightest blue indicates that the Democratic candidate won by less than 5%.  Corresponding measures of Republican victory margins display progressively darker shades of red at the same intervals.

What emerges is a map to guide our 2008 strategy. In this series I have created a race tier system that is I will explain in the next few sentences.Tier 0 races are those where the Democratic candidate won by a margin of less than 5%, the presumption being that incumbency grants an advantage of 5-10% that with the fundraising advantage that comes with holding office should be sufficient for these candidates to defend their seats without funding from the party.  The assumption that incumbency gives a 5-10% advantage drives the classification of the pickup categories.  Tier 1 races are those where the incumbent won by less than 5% in 2006, while tier 2 races are those where Republicans won by less than 10%.  It’s really quite simple.

Tier 0

Race      D%      R%     Margin    2006 D Cand.

No races meet the criteria for this tier.

Tier 1

Race    D%    R%    Margin    2006 D Cand.

OH-2    49.4  50.6  1.3       Victoria Wulsin

OH-15   49.1  50.9  1.8       Mary Jo Kilroy

Tier 2

Race    D%    R%    Margin    2006 D Cand.

OH-01   47.2  52.8  5.6       John Cranley

One final thing that I’d like to point out before we head to the running totals for 2008 tiers is the result of Ohio’s minimum wage ballot measure. Of 3,607,184 votes cast, 2,025,997 (56.2%) voted for the measure, while 1,581,187 (43.8%) voted against the measure.  Overall, support was strongest where Democrats won in the Ohio River Valley and on the Lake Erie coast. The yes vote was the highest in Lawrence county in SE Ohio where 71.2% voted yes, and lowest in central Ohio’s Holmes county where only 31.2% voted for the minimum wage measure.

I’ve created chart below to keep a running total of races that I’ve classifed in each tier for 2008.

Tier 0

CT-02, NY-19, NH-1

Tier 1

CT-04, NJ-07, NY-25, NY-26, NY-29, OH-2, OH-15, PA-06,

Tier 2

OH-01, PA-15

States Covered

CT, MA, MD,ME, NH, NJ, NY, OH,PA, RI, VT