GOP civil war explodes in House District 89 as Steve Kraus launches write-in bid against Caleb Stidham

SANDUSKY, Ohio — Former state Rep. Steve Kraus is asking Republicans in Ohio House District 89 to skip the name printed on their November ballot and write in his instead.

Kraus announced the write-in campaign in a graphic posted to Facebook that splits the screen between himself and Caleb Stidham, the Erie County treasurer and county Republican Party chairman who was nominated by a six-member committee on which he sat and voted. Stidham’s half of the graphic is labeled “POLITICAL INSIDER” and lists “Establishment Pick,” “Special Interests,” “Backroom Deals” and “Questionable Ethics.” Kraus’s half is labeled “POLITICAL OUTSIDER” and lists “Anti-Establishment,” “Your Interests,” “Transparent Networking” and “Highly Ethical.” Across the middle, in block capitals: “DISTRICT 89 DESERVES A CHOICE.” Along the bottom: “WRITE IN STEVE KRAUS.”

The first objection came from a supporter. “I support Steve, but I’m afraid this will split the conservative vote and allow a Dem to take the seat,” Richard Russell wrote in the comments.

Kraus answered that the split had already happened, and that it was not his doing.

“I understand your concern, however, it’s the establishment that didn’t allow the voters a choice in who the candidate would be that is splitting the vote,” he wrote. “Call/text Secretary of State Frank LaRose and tell him no for Calab.”

Another commenter, David Desser, replied to Russell that the warning was familiar and had stopped working. “yeah where I live they tell us that too. And now I’m an old man and we always get the rino,” he wrote. “why wouldn’t they keep nominating rinos if rinos keep winning because we never split the vote?”

Six days to file, and the ballot is not settled

Ohio law gives Kraus until the end of Monday. Under section 3513.041 of the Ohio Revised Code, a write-in candidate must file a declaration of intent by 4 p.m. on the 72nd day before the election, and in a district that spans more than one county the filing goes to the board of elections in the most populous county. House District 89 covers Erie, Ottawa and Huron counties, so that is the Erie County Board of Elections. County election calendars set the deadline for the Nov. 3 general election at 4 p.m. Monday, Aug. 24.

Write-in votes are counted only for candidates who have filed. TiffinOhio.net could not confirm whether Kraus has done so.

The deadline lands before the question of who else will be on the ballot has been answered. The Erie County board deadlocked 2-2 on Aug. 14 over whether to certify Stidham as the Republican nominee, sending the decision to LaRose, whose ruling under state law is final. He has until Friday, Aug. 28. That is four days after the window for Kraus to get his name on the write-in list closes — and it is also the deadline for anyone to file a protest against a write-in candidacy.

How the fight started

The seat opened Aug. 4, when state Rep. D.J. Swearingen, R-Huron, delivered a letter to the Erie County board withdrawing from the November ballot after four terms, saying he was under consideration for a new role and that continuing his campaign would not have been fair to voters.

Because the district spans more than one county but fewer than all of them, state law handed the replacement decision to a district committee made up of the chairperson and secretary of each county Republican central committee in the district — six people, choosing for roughly 175,000 residents. Stidham was one of three applicants. He was also one of the six entitled to vote. The committee met the afternoon of Aug. 10 and picked him, 4-2.

Erie County board Chairman Edward J. Leonard, a Democrat, voted against certification and read a position statement into the record. “After reviewing the circumstances of the Republican District Committee meeting at which Caleb Stidham was selected, I have concluded that the meeting was not conducted in accordance with Ohio law,” he wrote.

Stidham has rejected the conflict-of-interest claim. “There seems to be some confusion; there is no conflict of interest because I did not lead or chair the meeting that selected me as the candidate,” he told NBC4 in Columbus. Huron County Republican Chairman Sven Stahl chaired the Aug. 10 meeting because Stidham was a candidate. Stidham left the room while his rivals made their pitches, returned for deliberations, and voted.

Kraus had been attacking the process publicly before the committee ever met, and kept at it afterward. “Excusing it as ‘Legal’ is not the same as moral or ethically right,” he wrote in one exchange. “Elected officials are suppose to abstain from even the appearance of impropriety.”

In the same comment he asked: “And what about Honor? Is Winning by any means necessary worthy of the title ‘the Honorable State Representative’?” He closed it: “He’s NOT the kind of Leadership we need OR WANT!”

Kraus also invoked Ohio’s open-meetings law. “And not allowing the public to attend? Isn’t that what the Ohio Sunshine Law is all about, transparency?” he wrote. Ohio’s Open Meetings Act generally does not reach political parties, which courts have treated as voluntary associations governed by their own rules.

In a separate comment, Kraus assigned a motive. “Calab has a history of ‘not inviting’ people to meetings that he had a responsibility do, now he didn’t invite the public and it may cost the party the house rep seat,” he wrote. “All because of greed.”

He is not the only Republican making the cost argument in public. Consultant Jon Paul Morrow, who worked on the 2014 campaign that first put the district in Republican hands, argued this month that Stidham should have recused himself and may have handed the seat to the Democrats. Party officers and activists across the three counties had been warning about the same outcome before the vote.

The candidate asking for the write-in

The 2014 campaign Morrow worked on was Kraus’s. Kraus beat then-Rep. Chris Redfern, the sitting chairman of the Ohio Democratic Party, and took office in January 2015. He held the seat seven months. A jury convicted him of theft, a fifth-degree felony carrying an elderly-victim specification, and under state law the conviction cost him the office on July 27, 2015. He was acquitted of breaking and entering.

A court later sealed the conviction. When an Erie County resident sued to keep Kraus off the 2024 primary ballot, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled unanimously that he could run, sidestepping the question of whether a sealed conviction counts as expunged and holding instead that the office of state representative does not involve the kind of “substantial management or control” over public property that triggers disqualification. Kraus ran. Swearingen beat him in the March 2024 primary.

Whatever LaRose decides, one name is already settled on the November ballot. The Democratic nominee in House District 89 is Easton Retzke of Sandusky, who won his party’s nomination in the May 5 primary.