Four months later, some of the opposition he encountered on his right flank has not gone away.

Casey Putsch, the Republican who challenged Ramaswamy in the primary, declared Monday that he still would not support his party’s nominee and suggested Republicans should consider an independent candidate instead.

“As a lifelong Republican, I said on the campaign — ‘I wouldn’t support Vivek Ramaswamy with a gun to my head,’” Putsch wrote on X. “Amy Acton is no leader, but the Republican Party needs knocked down for 100% selling us out.”

“How about an independent?”

Then on Tuesday, Putsch escalated his criticism while responding to TiffinOhio.net’s reporting on the extraordinary concentration of billionaire money behind the main super PAC supporting Ramaswamy.

Federal campaign-finance records show V-PAC: Victors, Not Victims raised nearly $41.8 million through June 30. Five billionaires supplied about $37 million of it — roughly 88% of everything the group raised during that period.

“Because they want an ROI,” Putsch wrote. “Vivek is here to SELL US OUT.”

Putsch did not provide evidence in the post that the donors had been promised anything in return or that Ramaswamy had agreed to advance their interests. But the comments represent another escalation from a former Republican rival who has continued attacking the GOP nominee months after the primary ended.

And the resistance to Ramaswamy from portions of the right extends beyond Putsch.

Even before Republicans voted in May, The Associated Press reported that Ramaswamy was encountering “growing headwinds” within parts of the GOP base, with conservative voters voicing frustration over issues including data centers, the Jeffrey Epstein files, the war with Iran and the rising cost of living.

The concern inside Ramaswamy’s campaign at the time was not necessarily that conservative voters would cross over and support Acton. It was whether enough dissatisfied Republicans might simply stay home.

Ramaswamy’s running mate, Ohio Senate President Rob McColley, warned Republicans before the primary that complacency could prove more dangerous than either Acton or the national political environment.

Conservative audiences have confronted Ramaswamy

The tensions have repeatedly surfaced in places where a Republican nominee would ordinarily expect a receptive audience.

At an April 21 Turning Point USA event at Ohio State University, WOSU reported that more than two dozen people lined up to question Ramaswamy on subjects including immigration, Israel and data centers.

One woman criticized the effect of data centers on farmland. After Ramaswamy defended the industry, she shouted, “Vote Casey Putsch” into the microphone.

“It’s a free country,” Ramaswamy responded.

The confrontation was mild compared with what happened three months later.

On July 29, Ramaswamy appeared at the Young Americans for Liberty national convention at Xavier University in Cincinnati. Video from the event showed attendees loudly booing as he took the stage.

The heckling continued during the appearance as audience members challenged him on issues including Israel and immigration. Ramaswamy ultimately left the stage about 14 minutes into what had been scheduled as a 30-minute appearance, according to contemporaneous reports.

The episode was striking not because Ramaswamy encountered protesters from the left, but because the hostile reception came at the national convention of a conservative and libertarian youth organization.

Immigration, religion and identity have exposed another fault line

A report published Tuesday by Reason describes another source of tension between Ramaswamy and some conservative Ohio voters: immigration, religion and competing ideas about American identity.

The reporter described attending a January gathering of Republican activists in southwest Ohio where a discussion of H-1B visas and immigration became contentious. Attendees challenged Ramaswamy over his support for an immigration system more favorable to highly skilled workers and over his rejection of the idea that Americans with deeper ancestral roots in the country should hold a more privileged place in American identity.

Ramaswamy, the Cincinnati-born son of Indian immigrants, has repeatedly rejected that conception of American identity, arguing instead that being American is rooted in allegiance to the country’s founding principles rather than ancestry.

The same reporter attended an Ohio Faith & Freedom Forum in Middletown on Aug. 17, where Ramaswamy addressed Christian conservatives as a Hindu candidate running against Acton, who is Jewish. Unlike the earlier gathering, the August audience appeared largely receptive to his argument that voters should focus on shared political values rather than a candidate’s personal religion.

That distinction matters: the evidence does not show that Republican voters have rejected Ramaswamy wholesale. He won the Republican nomination decisively, maintains the support of the state party and prominent conservative leaders, and has drawn large crowds at campaign events around Ohio.

But it also shows that winning the nomination did not eliminate the ideological and cultural disputes that surfaced during the primary.

Putsch is not a neutral messenger

Putsch’s continued attacks also come with important context.

His primary campaign drew condemnation for rhetoric targeting Ramaswamy’s Indian heritage and Hindu faith. The Associated Press documented several examples, including Putsch depicting Ramaswamy as an insect being sprayed with pesticide and challenging him to play “cowboys and Indians.”

Ramaswamy responded during the primary by publicly condemning racial and religious identity politics on the right, arguing that American citizenship and commitment to the nation’s founding ideals — not race, ancestry or religion — should determine who belongs in the country.

But Putsch is also no longer the only evidence of discontent on Ramaswamy’s right.

The former primary challenger remains openly opposed to him. Conservative voters have confronted him over immigration and data centers. A Turning Point USA audience member used her question to promote his Republican rival. And months after the primary, attendees at a Young Americans for Liberty convention greeted the Republican nominee with sustained boos and heckling.

At the same time, Ramaswamy has retained significant institutional conservative support. Ohio Republican Party Chairman Alex Triantafilou dismissed the online backlash during the primary, while prominent conservative organizations and Republican officials have continued supporting Ramaswamy’s campaign.

The result is a Republican nominee who decisively captured his party’s nomination but enters the final stretch of the general election with some of the fractures exposed during that contest still visible.

Putsch’s message this week made clear that, at least for one of Ramaswamy’s former Republican opponents, the primary did not settle the matter.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

“No corner of the lunch box is insulated from the Trump administration’s economic policies,” the organization said in a report on research into rising costs for families during the back-to-school season.

The organization said the price of typical lunch staples increased nearly 11% in the past year.

Groundwork’s data found that packing school lunches will cost families more than $3,800 during the upcoming school year, an increase of $400 from 2025.

“In every aisle of the grocery store, parents are in store for higher prices: fresh blueberries have surged 47.7% over the past year, while deli staples have also become more expensive, with sliced ham and turkey both up roughly 12%,” the report says. “Even pantry staples are costing more, with sandwich bread up 21.8%, apple juice up 20%, and animal crackers up 15.7%.”

Both the Trump administration’s tariffs on goods imported into the United States and a surge in fuel prices since the start of his war in Iran are to blame for the price jumps, Groundwork says.

In July, after previous tariffs Trump imposed either were struck down as unconstitutional or expired, the administration announced new tariffs of 10%-12.5% on products from 59 countries and the European Union. A coalition of 25 U.S. states filed suit in August against the Trump administration over the new tariffs, demanding they be canceled and refunded. The new tariffs, according to the lawsuit, affect more than 99% of imports to the U.S.

Groundwork’s report notes that due to Trump’s war in Iran, the price of oil has skyrocketed, driving up the price of diesel and the costs of petroleum-based plastic packaging. CNBC reported that the national average price for a gallon of diesel fuel reached a record $5.85 per gallon on Sept. 4, a 60% increase over the price a year ago.

According to the nonprofit Engine Technology Forum, some 76% of commercial trucks in the U.S. run on diesel, adding more to the cost of shipping food to grocery stores and increasing consumer prices. 

The war in Iran is also constricting the supply of fertilizer, which is driving up food prices even further, according to the organization.

The Groundwork Collaborative report notes that while families are having to pay higher prices, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act signed by Trump in July 2025 is creating more obstacles to feeding children.

“By making it harder for low-income families to qualify for and retain food assistance and health care benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and Medicaid, the law reduces the number of children who automatically qualify for free meals,” the report says.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The lawsuit, filed May 16, 2024, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia by investors and entities connected to the failed conservative financial-services startup GloriFi, accuses Ramaswamy and numerous other wealthy investors and business figures of participating in a scheme to misappropriate GloriFi’s ideas and confidential information and use them to create competing companies.

No court has found that Ramaswamy stole GloriFi’s business plan, misappropriated its trade secrets or committed racketeering. But the allegations against him are unusually specific, and parts of the chronology can be independently verified through federal securities records and contemporaneous reporting.

According to the 141-page federal complaint, GloriFi founder Toby Neugebauer discussed bringing Ramaswamy into the company in an executive capacity in the fall of 2021. On Nov. 2, 2021, Neugebauer allegedly offered Ramaswamy 30% of a proposed GloriFi asset-management venture called “WhiteRock” if Ramaswamy would become its CEO.

The proposed business was designed as a conservative counterweight to BlackRock and other major asset managers. The lawsuit says WhiteRock would offer low-cost exchange-traded funds while using its shareholder voting power to advance what GloriFi characterized as pro-America, pro-capitalism and anti-ESG priorities.

The complaint says the business intended to begin with energy ETFs.

Months later, Ramaswamy launched a company built around a strikingly similar public mission.

‘Monopoly board pieces’

The lawsuit says that on Nov. 3, 2021 — one day after the WhiteRock offer — Ramaswamy texted Neugebauer about money he needed to reserve for “two other ‘monopoly board pieces’ we also need to get off the ground.”

According to the complaint, Ramaswamy was referring to an internally produced GloriFi graphic depicting the company’s planned financial-services businesses as spaces on a Monopoly-style board. The graphic is reproduced in the federal complaint and includes a space labeled “GloriFi Asset Management,” which the plaintiffs say represented the WhiteRock business.

The complaint says Neugebauer ultimately decided not to make Ramaswamy GloriFi’s co-CEO after further discussions, in part because Ramaswamy planned to devote significant time to a future presidential campaign. Neugebauer instead allegedly offered to make Ramaswamy GloriFi’s largest outside investor.

The lawsuit says Ramaswamy accepted that investment opportunity.

Forbes independently reported in 2024 that Ramaswamy was involved with GloriFi early in its development and quoted a person with knowledge of the relationship saying Neugebauer and Ramaswamy had “detailed conversations” about GloriFi’s ETF-management business.

Forbes also reported that GloriFi raised approximately $55 million from investors that included Ramaswamy, Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund, Citadel founder Ken Griffin, Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale and other wealthy financiers and business figures.

The relationship falls apart

According to the federal complaint, the relationship changed dramatically after Neugebauer decided against giving Ramaswamy the GloriFi leadership position.

The complaint alleges that on Nov. 8, 2021 — the day after Neugebauer says he told Ramaswamy and former Mike Pence chief of staff Nick Ayers that Ramaswamy would not become GloriFi’s co-CEO — Breanne Harmsen, an associate of Ayers, downloaded what the complaint describes as the entirety of GloriFi’s confidential and proprietary information from company servers.

The plaintiffs allege the download was performed on behalf of the defendants. The publicly available complaint does not establish that Ramaswamy personally ordered the download, received the files or knew it had occurred.

The lawsuit further alleges that Ramaswamy and other defendants subsequently began working on a competing effort it calls “Project Whitestone,” a name the plaintiffs explicitly contrast with GloriFi’s “WhiteRock.”

That allegation also has not been proven. The publicly available complaint does not include an underlying Ramaswamy or Strive document independently establishing that “Project Whitestone” was a name actually used by Ramaswamy’s side.

What happened next, however, is public record.

Strive launches months later

On May 10, 2022, Ramaswamy and his high-school friend Anson Frericks publicly launched Strive Asset Management. Strive’s launch announcement said the company had raised more than $20 million and would compete with major asset managers including BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street.

Strive said it planned to create investment funds whose shareholder votes would push American corporations to focus on what it called “excellence over politics.” Contemporary reporting described the venture as an effort to challenge large asset managers over their use of shareholder power on environmental and social issues.

The similarities alleged by the GloriFi plaintiffs did not stop with the broad anti-ESG concept.

Strive’s first ETF was focused on energy.

Federal securities records identify the Strive U.S. Energy ETF, ticker DRLL, as Strive’s first fund and give it an August 2022 inception date. Strive’s current fund records list Aug. 8, 2022, as the fund’s inception date.

When Strive publicly launched DRLL, the company described the energy fund as an alternative to ESG mandates imposed by large asset managers and said it intended to use shareholder engagement and proxy voting to encourage U.S. energy companies to invest more heavily in oil, gas and other energy production.

That sequence sits at the center of the lawsuit: GloriFi alleges that it had already described to Ramaswamy an anti-ESG ETF business intended to compete with BlackRock, beginning with the energy sector, before Ramaswamy launched Strive and made an energy ETF its first fund.

The plaintiffs contend the resemblance was not coincidence. They accuse Ramaswamy and others of taking the concept.

Ramaswamy has not been found liable for doing so.

Neugebauer invested in Strive, too

There is also an important fact that complicates the plaintiffs’ account: Neugebauer himself later agreed to invest in Ramaswamy’s new company.

According to the federal complaint, Ramaswamy initially described Strive to Neugebauer as something substantially different from WhiteRock. The lawsuit says Ramaswamy discussed a beer brand centered on American values as well as an actively managed hedge fund that would pick stocks.

Because GloriFi was not planning a beer company or an actively managed fund, the complaint says Neugebauer believed there was no conflict and agreed to invest in Strive effective March 3, 2022.

The lawsuit alleges that Strive then changed course before its public launch.

Instead of launching primarily as the beer business or actively managed hedge fund allegedly described to Neugebauer, Strive emerged in May 2022 as an asset-management company explicitly challenging ESG investing. Public trademark records also show Strive Enterprises filed applications for “Strive Asset Management,” “Excellence Funds” and “Excellence Capital” in April 2022, shortly before the company’s public launch.

The plaintiffs argue that this sequence is significant: Neugebauer says he invested when he believed Ramaswamy was building a different business, only to later see Strive launch an investment model he believed closely resembled WhiteRock.

Again, that is the plaintiffs’ allegation, not a judicial finding.

GloriFi collapses

GloriFi itself proved to be a spectacular business failure.

The company shut down in November 2022 and filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in February 2023. Forbes reported that GloriFi entered bankruptcy with roughly $40 million in liabilities and about $600,000 in assets after burning through more than $60 million in approximately 16 months.

Contemporaneous reporting and accounts from former employees described missed product launches, technology failures, heavy spending and serious internal management problems. Those facts complicate the lawsuit’s broader theory that GloriFi’s investors and competitors were responsible for destroying the company.

Several defendants have also forcefully rejected Neugebauer’s allegations. A spokesperson for Griffin called them “fabricated nonsense” in a statement to Forbes. Lonsdale told Forbes that he lost money on GloriFi, while representatives of Old Glory called allegations against that company unfounded. Other defendants either declined to comment or did not respond to Forbes.

At the same time, Forbes reported that two people with knowledge of GloriFi and the circumstances surrounding its collapse, along with several former GloriFi employees, defended substantial portions of Neugebauer’s account.

The RICO lawsuit never reached the merits

The Georgia lawsuit accused Ramaswamy and the other defendants of violations of Georgia racketeering law and the federal civil RICO statute, along with theft of trade secrets, conspiracy and other claims. Those causes of action are detailed both in the original complaint and in a later 97-page federal bankruptcy court opinion examining who legally owned the claims.

But the case soon collided with GloriFi’s bankruptcy.

U.S. District Judge Eleanor Ross initially stayed the Georgia litigation in July 2024 and then administratively closed the case on Oct. 3, 2024, pending the outcome of the related bankruptcy proceedings in the Northern District of Texas.

The Georgia court made clear that the parties were expected to report back after the bankruptcy matters concluded. As recently as October 2025, Ross was still requesting status information about the unresolved bankruptcy proceedings. The public docket was updated through August 2026 without showing a merits judgment against Ramaswamy.

Then, in June 2025, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michelle Larson issued a significant ruling over who actually had the legal right to pursue many of the allegations.

Larson found that the “vast majority” of the facts alleged in the federal and Georgia RICO claims described direct injuries to GloriFi itself, rather than injuries unique to Neugebauer.

The court specifically pointed to allegations that defendants interfered with GloriFi’s fundraising, illegally downloaded confidential or proprietary data, copied company products and converted GloriFi trade secrets.

That distinction was critical. Once GloriFi entered bankruptcy, causes of action belonging to the company generally became property of the bankruptcy estate and fell under the authority of the Chapter 7 trustee.

Larson concluded that the portions of the federal and Georgia RICO claims based on injuries to GloriFi belonged to the bankruptcy estate rather than Neugebauer. The portions involving alleged personal disparagement of Neugebauer were different because those alleged injuries were particular to him.

The bankruptcy court also found that Neugebauer and WPI Collateral Management had willfully violated the bankruptcy automatic stay by bringing claims that belonged to the estate without first getting permission from the bankruptcy court.

Larson permanently enjoined pursuit of the litigation in its existing form. But the judge expressly noted that Neugebauer and WPI could seek authority to amend or refile claims that were not derivative claims belonging to the bankruptcy estate.

That was a serious procedural setback for the plaintiffs.

But it was not a ruling that their central allegations against Ramaswamy were false.

The bankruptcy court did not find that Ramaswamy stole GloriFi’s intellectual property, participated in the alleged server download or committed racketeering. It also did not adjudicate those accusations in Ramaswamy’s favor on their merits.

Instead, the litigation was derailed largely by a different question: whether the people who filed most of the claims had the legal right to bring them in the first place.

A different origin story for a company central to Ramaswamy’s rise

The dispute is notable because Strive became a major component of Ramaswamy’s public profile before he entered presidential politics and later became the Republican nominee for Ohio governor.

At its launch, Strive presented itself as a challenger to BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street and argued that large asset managers were using ordinary investors’ money and shareholder voting power to push corporations toward political and social priorities.

That mission remained central to the company for years. In later materials filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Strive said Ramaswamy and Frericks founded the company in 2022 and credited it with helping roll back ESG and DEI mandates in corporate America.

Ramaswamy became one of the country’s most prominent critics of ESG investing, frequently pointing to Strive as a market-based alternative to the corporate behavior he condemned.

The federal lawsuit presents a sharply different account of how that business began.

According to the plaintiffs, months before Strive existed, Ramaswamy discussed becoming the public face of another company’s anti-ESG investment operation, was offered 30% of the venture, received an explanation of an ETF strategy positioned against BlackRock and exchanged a message about financing other pieces of GloriFi’s planned financial-services operation.

Months later, Strive publicly launched as an anti-ESG asset manager.

Its first ETF focused on energy — the same sector the lawsuit says GloriFi had planned to target first with WhiteRock.

Whether those similarities resulted from misappropriation, from investors and entrepreneurs independently pursuing similar ideas during the rise of the anti-ESG movement, or from some other explanation has never been resolved on the merits by a court.

But as Ramaswamy campaigns to become Ohio’s next governor, the allegation remains embedded in the federal court record surrounding one of the companies most closely associated with his rise: that the business model behind Strive was shown to him before Strive existed — and that its creator says Ramaswamy took it.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Every critical violation was marked corrected during the inspection. The findings included improperly held food, expired baby food, improperly stored food and failures to properly date refrigerated, ready-to-eat food.

One establishment, Fatheads in Republic, received two critical citations during a follow-up inspection.

218 Washington Street, Republic — Aug. 14

During a follow-up inspection, health district officials cited Fatheads for two critical violations and one non-critical violation.

Inspectors observed uncovered food on a counter and in a freezer and found ready-to-eat food in a cooler that had been kept beyond the permitted seven-day period.

Both critical violations were corrected during the inspection.

The report also noted that a previously cited issue involving the location of handwashing sinks had been corrected since the prior inspection.

Read the full story at https://tiffinohio.net/posts/9-seneca-county-food-facilities-critical-violations-august/.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Silver Springs: A Fleetwood Mac Experience will perform at 7 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 24, at the East Green Amphitheater.

The benefit concert was organized through an effort led by Bob Stein, owner of GW’s Fine Food & Spirits, who wanted to bring another live music event to Downtown Tiffin while raising money and collecting supplies for the Humane Society.

“The Humane Society does so much for our community, and I wanted to find a way to help,” Stein said. “We thought bringing in a great band would be something people would enjoy, and at the same time, we could raise money for a really good cause.”

Silver Springs performs the music of Fleetwood Mac, with the Sept. 24 show expected to include songs such as “Dreams,” “Landslide,” “Rhiannon,” “Go Your Own Way,” “The Chain,” “Gold Dust Woman” and “Don’t Stop.”

A beer garden with alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages will be available during the concert, along with snacks and a 50/50 drawing. Organizers said proceeds from the beer garden, beverage and snack sales and the drawing will benefit the Seneca County Humane Society.

Attendees are also being encouraged to bring supplies for the Humane Society. A collection truck will be stationed at the event, with organizers hoping to fill it with donations for animals in the organization’s care.

More than 50 local businesses and supporters have sponsored the concert, according to organizers.

Attendees are encouraged to bring lawn chairs or blankets. The concert begins at 7 p.m. at the East Green Amphitheater in Downtown Tiffin.

Those interested in sponsoring the event or making a donation can contact Stein at 419-934-0006 or Susan Wilkinson with Simply Shop Local at 419-934-0254 or simplyshoplocal@gmail.com. Sponsorships and donations are being processed through Simply Shop Local, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

According to the Ohio State Highway Patrol, on Sunday, Sept. 6, troopers working as Acton’s security detail “intercepted” Havas as he forced his way through the crowd toward Acton.

“Havas knocked multiple fairgoers over while trying to get towards Dr. Acton and was found to be in possession of a taser and two pistols,” the Patrol said in a statement. “Dr. Acton was unharmed during the incident.”

Havas was then turned over to the Mahoning County Sheriff. In its statement, the Sheriff’s office noted a set of brass knuckles were recovered from Havas as well but noted “no weapons were ever brandished.” On Monday, the Sheriff asked for anyone with photos or video recordings of the incident to contact the department.

Havas is a registered voter in Mahoning County. He last voted in the 2024 general election. While the county voter file doesn’t carry a party designation for him, the last time he voted in a primary he pulled a Republican ballot for the 2016 election.

Havas is also related to Andrew Havas, a former county campaign chair for Ohio Republican U.S. Sen. Jon Husted’s campaign. Andrew resigned that position after NBC News reported he previously served time in jail for sexual misconduct with a minor.

Reactions

After Sunday’s incident, Acton Communications Director Addie Bullock said Dr. Acton and her husband expressed gratitude for the “swift and decisive action of law enforcement and are praying for the recovery of those injured.”

“This kind of violence has no place in Ohio,” Bullock continued. “Dr. Acton will always stand up to the chaos, hate and vitriol that pits us against one another.”

Acton’s opponents in the governor’s race were quick to condemn Havas’ actions as well.

Republican Vivek Ramaswamy’s campaign stated “candidates should be able to meet with voters without having to worry about threats or violence. What happened today is completely unacceptable and has no place in politics, and we hope that no one was hurt.”

Libertarian Don Kissick said “whatever our political disagreements, violence is never an acceptable substitute for debate, elections, or the peaceful exchange of ideas.”

“Dr. Acton is my opponent in an election,” he went on, “but first and foremost she is a fellow Ohioan. I am relieved that law enforcement was there to intervene, and my thoughts are with Dr. Acton, her campaign, and everyone injured in this incident.”

Gov. Mike DeWine, who helped bring Acton to statewide prominence by tapping her to lead the Department of Health, said he and his wife Fran were thankful Acton wasn’t hurt “and we send our thoughts to those who were injured.”

DeWine thanked the Highway Patrol and other law enforcement for controlling the situation and insisted “Violence or the threat of violence at political or public events is always unacceptable.”

Attorney General Andy Wilson echoed DeWine’s praise of the patrol and stated, “political violence of any kind has no place in Ohio or our nation.”

On Monday, Acton was back on the campaign trail, taking part in Cleveland’s Labor Day Parade. She acknowledged “a rough day” in Canfield but described herself as scrappy.

“The number one thing I am fighting for is our common humanity,” Acton said. “That is what is at stake in this election. Everywhere I go, it doesn’t know party. Everyone is showing up, and they’re exhausted of the hate and the chaos and the vitriol and the purposely being pitted against one another.”

Follow Ohio Capital Journal Reporter Nick Evans on X or on Bluesky.

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The Trump administration quickly appealed the order to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday.

Then Sunday, the administration also asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the preliminary injunction, saying Talwani rushed it without considering the actual text of its final rule.

“The district court’s continuing prejudgment of the rule is baseless, and an immediate stay is warranted,” U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote in a Sunday application to the court.

Sauer described the rule as containing “only modest envelope-design and addressee-information requirements for federal-election ballots sent via U.S. Mail.” He added that USPS had long recommended the design requirements it was seeking to codify in the rule.

The Supreme Court will consider the application on its emergency docket. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson on Sunday asked the states and voting rights groups challenging the rule to file their response to the application by Wednesday. It’s unclear when a ruling would come.

Friday injunction

Talwani, who was appointed by President Barack Obama, issued a preliminary injunction late Friday, 60 days before Election Day, blocking the U.S. Postal Service rule from going into effect while court challenges play out. The injunction converts a 14-day pause she ordered a week prior.

The Massachusetts federal judge voiced several serious concerns about the policy, including that it infringes on states’ constitutional power to administer elections and Congress’ power to legislate election policy.

The rule, which the Postal Service published last month based on a Trump executive order in March, would disenfranchise voters who depend on mail voting, give states the impossible task of overhauling their election systems ahead of a fast-approaching election and assert power the agency does not have under the U.S. Constitution, Talwani said.

Not an election regulation, USPS says

The administration and a handful of GOP state attorneys general have defended the rule as regulating mail, not elections. 

A statement from U.S. Postmaster General David Steiner restated the claim earlier Friday.

The portions of the rule establishing technical standards for ballot envelopes were based on longstanding best practices and were not “breaking new and uncharted ground,” Steiner wrote.

Similarly, a more controversial provision requiring states to send the Postal Service a list of eligible voters was also not complicated for the agency, he said, noting that USPS would not amend the lists.

“The USPS does not edit, change, review or question the contents of the list—the list is merely a list of voters that a State says are receiving a ballot through the mail,” he wrote. “So basically, the State provided list is a manifest identifying the recipients of ballot mail.”

Clash with law passed by Congress

Talwani said Friday the federal government’s denial that the rule is an election regulation “rings hollow.” 

“Throughout its body of election legislation, Congress has never delegated its Elections Clause power to the USPS,” she wrote. “Unauthorized by the Elections Clause, the Final Rule clashes with Congress’s statutory scheme, and is unconstitutional where it intrudes not only on Congress’s Elections Clause powers but also that power left to the States.”

In addition to the constitutional principles the rule violates, it is unworkable ahead of the Nov. 3 midterm elections that will determine control of Congress, she said. 

All states allow some form of mail-in voting. The first ballots were sent Friday, with North Carolina starting to mail ballots to certain voters. 

Sauer noted that ballots had begun to “enter the mailstream,” with more states set to send ballots in the coming weeks.

That added urgency for justices to act, he said. If courts eventually allow the rule to take effect and states have not taken action to comply, it could threaten voters’ ability to cast mail ballots in those states, he said.

“There is a grave risk that States may not have taken the necessary steps to comply, due to the false sense of latitude created by the court’s improper injunction, potentially depriving those States’ citizens of the ability to vote by mail,” he wrote.

In a statement, Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell, one of the Democratic attorneys general who sued to block the rule, said Talwani’s order would keep the commonwealth’s election administration on track.

“This order protects our ability to effectively deliver mail ballots to all residents relying on them to make their voices heard in the November election,” she said. “Voters should continue to vote-by-mail as usual and know that this system is safe and secure.”

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

D.C. Superior Court Judge Todd Edelman raised concerns about President Donald Trump’s public pressure campaign on the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, following a quiet earlier move by U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro  to dismiss the charges.

Trump, who oversaw the multi-million-dollar renovation of the pool, has blamed vandals for the damage.

“The president of the United States is pressuring your office… to recharge Mr. Hearn (on) what you have decided is meritless,” said Edelman, who was nominated by former President Barack Obama. 

Government lawyers could not answer whether the Trump administration might again try to charge Hearn, of Bethesda, with damaging the reflecting pool. Pirro’s motion for dismissal was without prejudice, which means the case could be filed again.

“I don’t know what the future will bring,”  Michael Spence of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia said. “Ten minutes from now that decision could change.” 

Hearn has pleaded not guilty to the charges. 

Reflecting pool drama

Hearn’s case has preoccupied Trump, who faces public backlash and protest as he’s moved to reshape the historic landmarks and landscapes of the nation’s capital. 

That has ranged from moving forward with a triumphal arch that dwarfs the tallest structure in the district, the Washington Monument, to removing iconic cherry blossom trees along the East Potomac Park.  

Over the summer, the Trump administration charged Hearn, an Olympic canoeist, with more than $1,000 worth of damage to the reflecting pool on June 19. 

When Pirro asked the court to dismiss the charges, Trump was angered. Trump said that Pirro “choked” and “folded like an umbrella” and pushed for charges to be refiled.

“Frankly, I think she choked because the judge was really vicious. Instead of going after the people that did it, the judge went after her and went after her department, and I guess she choked,” Trump told reporters. “I don’t know what the hell happened.”

Pirro said her office wouldn’t have sought charges if the Interior Department, which manages the Lincoln Memorial, had initially shared more information about repair work on the reflecting pool.

Supporters rally

Attorneys for Hearn, as well as dozens of supporters, gathered outside D.C. Superior Court before the hearing. 

They included Maryland Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin, who slammed the Trump administration for initially bringing felony charges against Hearn. 

“Stop setting up our citizens for fraudulent purposes,” said Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee. 

After the hearing, Hearn gave a brief statement. 

“This is not about me, this is about defending democracy,” he said. 

One of his attorneys, Norm Eisen of Democracy Defenders Fund, said if his client could be charged, then “every American is at risk.”

Edelman said he would make a decision soon.

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

School bus driver shortages are often the result of recruitment, retention, financial, and operational challenges happening at the same time, said President-Elect of the National Association for Pupil Transportation Melody Coniglio. 

“Transportation is one of the first and last services a student receives each school day, so when there are not enough drivers, the effects can quickly be felt by students, families, staff, schools, athletics, and the district as a whole,” said Coniglio, who is also West Geauga Local School District’s director of transportation. 

There are 17,008 active bus drivers across the state as of Wednesday, said Ohio Department of Education and Workforce Spokesperson Lacey Snoke. 

Columbus City Schools, the state’s largest district with about 45,000 students, is working to fill bus driver vacancies. 

Columbus has 425 yellow bus and van routes and 395 active bus drivers and 68 contract drivers to bus 32,450 students — including 8,552 charter and nonpublic students as of Tuesday, said district spokesperson Michael Brown. 

The district wants to have 500 drivers. 

“Since school has started, my son’s bus has been late picking up and dropping off,” said Phillip Floyd, the parent of a Columbus City Schools second grader. 

“When I say late, over 20 minutes late.”

As a result, his son has been late or almost late to school every morning. 

“Our kids should be getting to school on time,” Floyd said.

The school bus is supposed to pick Floyd’s son up at 8:37 a.m. and instead it’s been picking him up closer to 8:55 a.m. and is getting to school some days as the bell is ringing at 9 a.m. or after the school day has already started. 

“He’s really frustrated about getting to school late because my son really loves school,” Floyd said.  “He’s missing him out on his morning work that he really wants to do. This is out of his control.”

Floyd also said the bus driver forgot to drop off his son one afternoon, so his son rode the bus an additional two hours. 

“We’re freaking out because where’s our child?” he said. “Your job as a parent is your child’s safety, and you’re not knowing where your child is. … It’s a feeling that I just can’t even put into words.”

Mande Stedman’s fifth grade son has only ridden the Columbus City Schools afternoon bus once, but he got home nearly two hours late. His drop off time is 4:47 p.m., but he got home at 6:35 p.m.

“I was so relieved to see my son and started crying because of how panicked I had been,” she said in an email. 

Her seventh-grade daughter doesn’t use the morning school bus because her pick-up time would be 5:52 a.m.  

Ohio requires public school districts to provide transportation for eligible students attending nonpublic and community schools — something Coniglio said can “add another layer of complexity” since those schools can go beyond the school district’s boundaries. 

“From an operational standpoint, those miles and minutes matter,” she said.  

“A bus and driver assigned to transport even a small number of students outside the district may not be available to serve another route during that same period.”

Patrick Henry Local Schools in northwest Ohio buses 500 students who attend their school district and 15 students who do not attend public school, said Superintendent Josh Biederstedt. 

The district has 12 full-time bus drivers and four substitutes for 12 routes and three non-public routes, he said. 

“We offer our current employees a financial incentive to get their Commercial Driver’s License and become a sub driver,” Biederstedt said in an email. 

“Additionally, we offer current employees an incentive for referring new bus drivers that either become a sub or full time driver.” 

Retention is an important factor. 62% of bus drivers and aides reported feeling unsupported when dealing with challenging student behavior according to the Ohio School Bus Safety Working Group survey. 

“Recruiting new drivers will not solve the shortage if districts are unable to retain the qualified, experienced drivers they already have,” Coniglio said. 

About 22,000 Ohio students were determined to be impractical to transport last year, Coniglio said. 

“When a district determines that transportation for an eligible student is impractical after considering the factors required under Ohio law, the district may offer the family payment in lieu of providing transportation,” she said. 

“If Ohio did not have the Payment in Lieu of Transportation option available to districts, I believe the statewide driver shortage and its operational impact would be considerably more visible,” she said. 

Follow Ohio Capital Journal Reporter Megan Henry on X or on Bluesky.

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Now, commissioners are wrestling with how to regulate submetering companies, as AEP Ohio and Nationwide Energy Partners spar over whether state law has a good answer for the practice. Meanwhile, the Ohio Consumers’ Counsel insists the ratepayers caught in the middle shouldn’t become “collateral damage.”

“The residents of the apartments neither created nor control the issues raised in the AEP Ohio’s complaint against NEP,” the OCC wrote in a commission filing, “and they should not bear its costs or consequences.”

How we got here

The nature of submetering is at the heart of this ongoing conflict. Companies like Nationwide Energy Partners buy energy wholesale and then sell it on to residents living in multi-unity complexes at retail rates. The PUCO initially determined the company was not operating as a utility because it was the landlords who were providing power.

The state supreme court soundly rejected that interpretation.

“Regardless of whether the landlords are in the ‘business of supplying electricity,’ there can be no question that NEP is in that business,” Justice Patrick DeWine wrote for a unanimous court.

The court noted it’s not the first time the PUCO has struggled with how to classify submetering companies. Back in 2020, the commission decided they simply fell outside its jurisdiction. In that case, the Ohio Supreme Court said no, the submetering companies are in fact your problem, and returned the matter to the commission.

In its 2020 decision the court itself noted large-scale submetering companies didn’t really exist when the underlying state laws were drafted. Lawmakers have been working on a fix for years and in June, they sent legislation to Gov. DeWine’s desk.

He vetoed it, calling the submetering business model “flawed.”

So it’s a utility, right?

The latest supreme court decision puts the ball back in the PUCO’s court, with a mandate to treat NEP as a utility while considering two other complaints. In addition to operating as a utility, AEP Ohio objected to NEP doing business within its territory and providing retail electric service without proper permitting.

To AEP Ohio, this is an open and shut case. An Ohio law known as the Certified Territories Act grants utilities like AEP the exclusive right to deliver power within a given region. It’s undisputed that NEP was operating within AEP’s territory. Another Ohio law prohibits companies from providing power without prior approval from the PUCO — something NEP didn’t have.

Not so fast, NEP insists. Even if the state supreme court says it’s a utility, that doesn’t mean it fits within the Certifies Territories Act’s definitions.

“The (Certified Territories Act) applies only to entities supplying ‘electric service’ to ‘electric load centers’ through ‘distribution lines.’ That is not NEP,” the company wrote.

NEP claims an “electric load center” under state law is the apartment complex — not the individual apartments. Because NEP provides service behind the complex’s master meter, the theory goes, the law doesn’t apply to them. Similarly, NEP doesn’t own the lines so it falls outside the law.

In its reply, AEP urged the commission to “follow the Governor’s lead,” and “end the predatory anti-consumer practices that constitute unlawful resale and violate the Certified Territory Act.”

The utility argued NEP is “rewriting” the statute to include ownership of distribution lines and attempting to upend the idea of exclusive jurisdictions underpinning Ohio’s electric distribution system.

The fact that NEP doesn’t fit neatly into existing statute is not an excuse to not regulate them.

“In the tax context, for example, the fact that a taxpayer has invented a novel form of tax shelter does not place it beyond the reach of the tax laws,” AEP wrote. “Likewise, the fact that NEP developed a novel business model for delivering electric service does not place it beyond the reach of a statute directed at electric suppliers.”

Remember the residents

In its initial filing, AEP described first rejecting NEP’s bid to convert five apartment complexes to submetered service. The PUCO’s eventually ordered AEP to go ahead with the conversions.

In all, the change affected some 1,171 residences. AEP noted 510 of them had selected an alternative competitive power provider, 56 were using an AEP-run budget billing program, and three were using Ohio’s Percent of Income Payment Plan.

By switching to a submetered arrangement, the residents lost out on those options.

The Ohio Consumers’ Counsel insists that shouldn’t have happened.

In its filing, the Consumers’ Counsel is blunt: NEP shouldn’t be allowed to continue operating. But if it does, providing it must provide the same legal rights and protections that other utility customers get. At minimum, every resident deserves PUCO-approved rates, access to payment plans, protections against discrimination or unlawful shutoffs, and the ability to bring complaints before the commission.

“The residents of the Apartments are residential utility consumers,” the Consumers’ Counsel wrote. “They deserve the protections provided for them by law, regardless of which public utility is providing their electricity.”

Follow Ohio Capital Journal Reporter Nick Evans on X or on Bluesky.

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office and Ohio State Highway Patrol have both described Patrick Havas, 38, forcing or pushing his way through a crowd toward Acton before troopers assigned to protect the Democratic gubernatorial nominee stopped him. Multiple people were knocked over. Havas was arrested. Authorities say he was carrying two pistols and other weapons.

The firearms were not drawn. Acton was not injured. And investigators have not publicly established Havas’ motive or said what he intended to do if he reached Acton.

Those qualifications are part of the law-enforcement record. So is the physical confrontation.

Nevertheless, national political figures have begun casting doubt on the incident, while at least one demonstrably false claim about Havas being released from jail has circulated widely online. State Rep. Gary Click, a Republican representing Seneca and Sandusky counties, joined the speculation Monday, writing on Facebook that “something about this story doesn’t seem to be adding up.”

Click did not cite evidence contradicting the accounts provided by either law-enforcement agency.

What the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office says

According to the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office account provided to WPXI, Havas entered the Mahoning County Democratic Party tent at about 2:30 p.m. Sunday while using his cellphone to record Acton, who was speaking to people gathered there.

“As he was entering the tent, Havas started pushing his way through the crowd,” the sheriff’s office said.

Acton’s security detail, made up of Ohio State Highway Patrol troopers, confronted Havas. Two people were knocked to the ground during the confrontation, according to the sheriff’s office, and Havas was taken into custody.

Mahoning County Sheriff Jerry Greene provided additional detail to CBS News, saying Havas “aggressively shoved his way through the crowd toward Acton” while holding up his cellphone.

Greene said Havas knocked over two older people on mobility scooters as he moved forward before Acton’s State Highway Patrol security detail stopped him.

After Havas was arrested, authorities recovered two handguns and brass knuckles, according to Greene. The sheriff said the firearms were never brandished.

What the Ohio State Highway Patrol says

The Ohio State Highway Patrol separately described Havas moving through the crowd toward Acton.

According to The Associated Press, citing the patrol, Havas forced his way through the crowd, knocking over multiple people as he moved toward Acton before troopers stopped him.

The patrol said Havas had two pistols and a Taser.

In a statement independently reported by NOTUS, the patrol said Havas “knocked multiple fairgoers over while trying to get towards Dr. Acton” and confirmed that Acton was unharmed.

The sheriff’s office has said its detectives are investigating the incident while State Highway Patrol troopers conduct a threat assessment. Authorities have not publicly announced a motive.

That distinction matters: law enforcement has established that the confrontation occurred and that Havas was moving toward Acton, but investigators have not said why he was doing so or what he intended to do if he reached her.

What police have not said

The available evidence does not support exaggerating what happened either.

Authorities have not said Havas fired a gun, pointed one at Acton or removed one from its holster. The Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office specifically said the firearms recovered after his arrest were never brandished. Acton was not physically injured.

Authorities also have not announced that Havas intended to shoot Acton or publicly identified another motive for his actions.

Those questions remain under investigation.

But uncertainty about motive is different from uncertainty about whether the encounter occurred. Two law-enforcement agencies say Havas forced or pushed his way through the crowd toward Acton. People were knocked over. State troopers intervened. Havas was arrested while carrying multiple weapons.

The campaign and law-enforcement accounts are not contradictory

Some online commentary has portrayed a difference in wording between Acton’s campaign and law enforcement as evidence that the initial account was exaggerated. The available statements do not show such a contradiction.

Acton’s campaign said an “armed individual lunged” toward her. Law enforcement subsequently confirmed that Havas was armed and that he moved forcefully through the crowd toward Acton.

The Ohio State Highway Patrol said Havas “forced his way through a crowd towards” Acton and knocked multiple fairgoers over while trying to get toward her. The patrol said he was carrying two pistols and a Taser.

Sheriff Greene similarly told CBS News that Havas “aggressively shoved his way through the crowd toward Acton.” Greene also said Havas’ firearms were never brandished.

Those statements are not mutually exclusive. Describing Havas as armed means he possessed weapons; it does not mean he drew or fired them. And the fact that his firearms remained holstered does not contradict the law-enforcement finding that he moved aggressively through the crowd toward Acton.

Nor does the absence of a drawn firearm mean there was no physical confrontation. Authorities say multiple people were knocked over as Havas pushed through the crowd, and he was subsequently booked on two counts of assault and one count of disorderly conduct.

Havas was not released “with no bail”

One of the clearest false factual claims to spread after the incident came from national right-wing activist Laura Loomer.

Loomer claimed Havas had “already been released by police with no bail.” Mediaite documented the claim Monday.

Public records and subsequent reporting directly contradict it.

Havas remained in the Mahoning County Jail with no bond Monday, according to NOTUS, citing the Ohio State Highway Patrol and jail records. Local reporting based on Mahoning County jail records likewise showed Havas remained incarcerated with no bond set.

The claim confused “no bond” with being released without paying bail. They are not the same thing. In Havas’ case, the available jail record showed that he remained in custody.

Republican officials also accepted the law-enforcement account

The description of what occurred has not come solely from Acton, her campaign or Democratic officials.

Republican Attorney General Andy Wilson issued an official statement Sunday describing what happened as “attempted violence” and specifically praising the State Highway Patrol officers protecting Acton.

“Having worked closely with the Ohio State Highway Patrol, I have the utmost faith in her executive protection detail and am grateful for their quick action,” Wilson said.

Republican Gov. Mike DeWine provided an account consistent with law enforcement, saying officers responded when “a man tried to forcefully push himself toward Dr. Acton as she was speaking and injured other attendees at the Mahoning County Democrat booth.”

“We are grateful for the quick work of the Ohio State Highway Patrol and other law enforcement on the scene at the Canfield Fair,” DeWine said.

Acton’s Republican opponent, Vivek Ramaswamy, also condemned the incident.

“Candidates should be able to meet with voters without having to worry about threats or violence,” Ramaswamy communications director Connie Luck said in a statement reported by CBS News. “What happened today is completely unacceptable and has no place in politics.”

Click casts doubt without presenting contrary evidence

Click took a different approach Monday.

In a Facebook post reviewed by TiffinOhio.net, Click began by saying that “violence is never a political solution.” He then wrote that “something about this story doesn’t seem to be adding up” and invoked the Jussie Smollett case while raising the possibility that Acton’s campaign itself could somehow be responsible for a diversion.

Click said it was “too early to say” and wrote that he was “not making any accusations.”

But the post did not identify a factual statement made by the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office or Ohio State Highway Patrol that Click believes is wrong. It also did not present evidence contradicting either agency’s description of Havas forcing his way through the crowd toward Acton.

The most complete publicly available account therefore remains the one supported by law enforcement and the records produced after Havas’ arrest: Havas forced or pushed his way through a crowd toward Acton, multiple people were knocked over, State Highway Patrol troopers stopped him, police arrested him while he was carrying multiple weapons, and he remained jailed afterward.

The weapons were not drawn. Acton was not injured. And what investigators have not yet established is why Havas did it.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The incident began around 1:39 a.m. when Tiffin police were called to a disturbance in the 800 block of West Market Street involving a large group of people, according to police and sheriff’s dispatch records. One person involved left the scene before officers arrived, and a Nissan pickup was reported traveling west out of Tiffin at a high rate of speed.

Seneca County deputies picked up the pursuit as the truck continued through the county. Dispatch records show speeds climbing from about 90 mph to more than 100 mph, eventually reaching as high as 127 mph.

During the pursuit, deputies reported that the truck repeatedly ran stop signs, traveled in the wrong lane, went off the roadway and into fields, and at times turned its headlights off while continuing to flee. Deputies also attempted to deploy spike strips as additional law enforcement units, including Ohio State Highway Patrol troopers, responded.

Read the full story at https://tiffinohio.net/posts/127-mph-chase-seneca-county-truck-rolls-occupant-ejected/.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Through June 30, Federal Election Commission records show V-PAC: Victors, Not Victims — the super PAC devoted to electing Ramaswamy — raised $41,774,674.63. Five billionaires supplied $37 million of that amount, or roughly 88 cents of every dollar the group raised.

Pennsylvania trading billionaire Jeff Yass gave $20 million. New York financier Ross Stevens gave $6 million, while Elon Musk and software billionaire Ratmir Timashev each gave $5 million. Hedge-fund billionaire Bill Ackman gave another $1 million. None listed an Ohio residence in the filings.

And the money has apparently continued pouring in. Signal Ohio reported Aug. 27 that Yass had made another contribution of at least $10 million to V-PAC, citing Politico and a source familiar with the group. If confirmed in the committee’s next federal filing, that would put Yass alone at at least $30 million behind the effort to elect Ohio’s next governor.

There is no public evidence that Ramaswamy has promised any of the donors official action in exchange for their money. V-PAC is an independent-expenditure super PAC, meaning it can accept unlimited contributions but is legally prohibited from coordinating its spending with Ramaswamy’s campaign.

Still, the concentration of the money raises questions because several of the billionaires underwriting Ramaswamy’s election have political or financial interests touching two major policy fights Ohio’s next governor will help shape: taxpayer-funded private education and the explosive growth of artificial intelligence and hyperscale data centers. Ramaswamy has made both issues significant parts of his political agenda.

Ramaswamy’s biggest donor has made school choice a political mission

Jeff Yass is not simply a Republican billionaire who occasionally writes campaign checks. Taxpayer-funded school choice has become one of his defining political causes, and The Washington Post has reported that he has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on political causes since 2015, with school vouchers and other school-choice programs at the center of much of that activity.

Yass has intervened in state political contests around the country to help candidates who support expanding alternatives to traditional public schools. Ohio is not new territory: Signal Ohio previously reported that Yass and his wife helped finance Ohio Republican legislative candidates during the 2024 fight that ultimately pushed then-House Speaker Jason Stephens from power.

Now Yass has committed at least $20 million in publicly filed contributions — and reportedly at least $10 million more — to the outside group working to make Ramaswamy governor. Ramaswamy, meanwhile, has explicitly called for “universal school choice” and has argued for expanding families’ ability to use public funding outside traditional public schools.

Ohio already allows families across the income spectrum to receive taxpayer-funded EdChoice scholarships toward private-school tuition. When News 5 Cleveland asked Ramaswamy whether millionaires should receive taxpayer-funded private-school vouchers, he did not directly answer the question, instead defending educational choice and dismissing the question as a “slapstick” gotcha.

TiffinOhio.net has also previously reported that Ramaswamy’s campaign biography emphasizes his public-school upbringing while omitting the name and private-school status of St. Xavier High School, where he spent all four years of high school. St. Xavier participates in Ohio’s EdChoice scholarship program.

Yass is not the only major V-PAC donor with a history involving privately operated education. Ackman, who gave V-PAC $1 million, previously invested $20 million through his charitable foundation in the Turner-Agassi Charter School Facilities Fund. Forbes reported that the fund financed dozens of charter-school facilities and produced financial returns for investors.

That investment dates back years and does not establish that Ackman is seeking any particular Ohio education policy today. But it adds another connection between a major Ramaswamy super PAC donor and the broader school-choice and charter-school movement.

Other megadonors are deeply involved in AI and computing infrastructure

A second pattern runs through artificial intelligence, electricity and data centers. Ohio is in the middle of a major debate over hyperscale facilities — enormous computing campuses capable of consuming extraordinary amounts of electricity and requiring significant new energy infrastructure.

Ramaswamy spent months publicly welcoming that growth. As TiffinOhio.net previously documented, he repeatedly praised Ohio’s emerging AI data-center boom during public appearances in March and April 2025.

“We have an AI data center boom in the state of Ohio, which is great,” Ramaswamy said during one April appearance. “I’m all for it, I’m strongly in favor of it.”

His position became more conditional as public resistance to data centers grew. Ramaswamy later released an “Ohioans-First” proposal that would impose conditions on future developments, including requiring projects to generate enough value to provide nearby residents free electricity and lower property-tax burdens. The proposal does not call for ending data-center development; it establishes conditions under which Ramaswamy says the projects should proceed.

Several of the billionaires spending millions to elect him are directly involved in the AI economy or the enormous computing and energy infrastructure supporting it.

Elon Musk: $5 million

Musk gave V-PAC $5 million in May. His artificial-intelligence company xAI built Colossus in Memphis, one of the world’s largest AI computing installations, and xAI says the system has reached 200,000 interconnected GPUs with plans for substantially greater capacity.

Facilities of that scale are part of the reason utilities and state governments are confronting rapidly increasing electricity demand from artificial-intelligence computing. Musk also has an existing relationship with Ramaswamy: President Donald Trump initially selected the two men to lead the government-efficiency initiative that became known as DOGE before Ramaswamy departed and focused on his Ohio gubernatorial campaign.

Ross Stevens: $6 million

Stevens, who gave V-PAC $6 million, has an even more direct connection to the physical infrastructure behind AI. He founded Stone Ridge Holdings Group and NYDIG, which now describes itself as a vertically integrated power-and-compute operation involved in artificial intelligence, high-performance computing and bitcoin mining.

NYDIG’s website says the company develops, finances and operates “the power and compute behind frontier AI” and reports a power-and-compute development pipeline exceeding 3 gigawatts. One of Ramaswamy’s largest individual political benefactors therefore leads a company actively developing the type of industrial-scale power and computing infrastructure at the center of the national data-center expansion.

Ratmir Timashev: $5 million

Timashev’s connection to Ohio is different. Although his contribution records list an out-of-state residence, he attended Ohio State University, built software companies in Columbus and has donated heavily to the university.

His current business ambition is also closely tied to artificial intelligence. Forbes reported in June that Timashev plans to invest $100 million over five years through his Oh.io venture operation to attract 100 AI startups to Columbus. The publication also noted central Ohio’s existing concentration of data centers and companies supplying power and cooling equipment to the industry.

Timashev therefore has substantial and longstanding ties to Ohio, unlike some of V-PAC’s other major donors. But his $5 million contribution also means one of the people investing most heavily in making Ohio a national AI center is helping finance the outside effort to elect the state’s next governor.

Ohio’s next governor will help shape what happens next

Those overlaps matter because the next governor will have significant influence over both education and energy policy. The governor signs or vetoes state budgets that determine how billions of education dollars are distributed among traditional public schools, charter schools and private-school voucher programs, while executive agencies administer major portions of the state’s education and economic-development policies.

The governor also appoints members of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio, which regulates the state’s investor-owned utilities and makes decisions affecting electricity rates and large power users. At the same time, state government will continue confronting questions involving data-center taxation, energy infrastructure, economic-development incentives and the effect massive new electricity loads could have on Ohio consumers.

TiffinOhio.net has previously reported that Ramaswamy’s personal financial holdings include investments in companies connected to the broader data-center economy. His latest proposal to require data-center developers to create enough economic value to provide nearby households free electricity has also drawn questions from energy experts about how the arrangement would work.

None of those facts establishes that V-PAC’s donors are seeking favorable government treatment. They do, however, make their extraordinary level of financial support relevant to voters trying to understand who is financing the race and what policy interests those donors have.

Ramaswamy’s campaign has been asked about the billionaire money before

Ramaswamy’s campaign has already had opportunities to explain the concentration of billionaire support. After Musk, Timashev, Ackman and Stevens contributed a combined $12 million to V-PAC during the second quarter, the Ohio Capital Journal reported that both V-PAC and Ramaswamy’s campaign committee failed to respond to multiple requests for comment.

Case Western Reserve University law professor Atiba Ellis told the Capital Journal that voters should examine the motives behind major contributions. Discussing Musk’s $5 million donation, Ellis said voters should “inquire about what his motives are in terms of influencing this election.”

There are also conventional explanations for much of the support. Yass is one of the country’s largest Republican political donors and regularly supports candidates who favor school choice. Musk previously worked alongside Ramaswamy, while Timashev has longstanding personal, philanthropic and business connections to Ohio. Wealthy donors may support Ramaswamy simply because they agree with his political and economic agenda.

Nor is outside political spending unique to Ramaswamy. National Democratic organizations are spending millions of dollars to support Democratic nominee Amy Acton. What distinguishes V-PAC is how concentrated its financing has been: through June, five billionaires supplied $37 million of the committee’s $41.77 million in receipts.

That leaves several questions the campaign could answer directly. Has Ramaswamy discussed Ohio’s voucher program or further school-choice expansion with Yass? Has he discussed data centers, artificial intelligence, electricity policy or state economic-development incentives with Musk, Stevens or Timashev? Have any of the donors or companies associated with them sought commitments from Ramaswamy involving taxes, regulation, energy infrastructure or state incentives?

And more broadly, why are a handful of billionaires willing to spend tens of millions of dollars helping determine who becomes Ohio’s next governor — and what policies do they hope a Ramaswamy administration would pursue?

Those questions do not presume an improper arrangement. But with five billionaires accounting for nearly nine out of every 10 dollars V-PAC raised through June, they are questions Ohio voters have reason to ask — and ones Ramaswamy and his campaign can answer.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The sequence puts new scrutiny on the state Republican Party’s decision to elevate Loomer, a far-right activist and conspiracy theorist whose rhetoric has drawn condemnation from Democrats, civil-rights advocates and Republicans alike.

On Saturday, Loomer posted an allegation from an unidentified person she described as a “Democrat strategist” who she said had attended an Acton campaign event with former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.

Loomer claimed the unnamed source told her Acton’s breath smelled of alcohol and that she was slurring her words. Loomer did not identify the person making the allegation or provide independent evidence establishing that Acton had been drinking.

The official Ohio Republican Party account amplified the allegation anyway.

“Legitimate questions persist,” the party wrote, accusing the media of providing cover for Acton before adding: “Loomer broke the last bombshell—that Acton’s daughter called police. Now this.”

Loomer then reposted the Ohio GOP’s message to her own audience.

By Sunday afternoon, Acton was at the Canfield Fair when 38-year-old Patrick Havas forced his way through a crowd toward her, according to the Ohio State Highway Patrol.

The patrol said Havas knocked multiple fairgoers over while trying to reach Acton and was found carrying a Taser and two pistols. The Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office said two handguns and brass knuckles were recovered and that the weapons were never removed from their holsters.

Havas was arrested and booked on two counts of assault and one count of disorderly conduct. Acton was not injured.

Republican Gov. Mike DeWine said the man “tried to forcefully push himself toward Dr. Acton as she was speaking” and condemned violence or threats of violence at political events. Republican gubernatorial nominee Vivek Ramaswamy’s campaign also condemned the incident.

Loomer took a different approach.

In a series of posts after the arrest, Loomer accused Democrats of lying about the incident, compared Acton to Jussie Smollett and suggested the confrontation was being exaggerated to distract from her allegations about Acton and alcohol.

“Amy should change her name to Amy Smollett,” Loomer wrote, invoking the actor convicted of falsely reporting a hate crime.

Loomer argued that Havas merely being armed did not mean he had attempted to use a gun and accused Democrats of pretending someone had planned a mass shooting. She continued referring to Acton as “Drunk Amy” and subsequently questioned whether Acton appeared sober in video from the weekend.

Other posts from Loomer characterized reporting surrounding the incident as “fake news.”

Democratic strategist Mike Nellis, who has spent two decades working in Democratic politics, argued that months of rhetoric directed at Acton helped create the environment surrounding Sunday’s incident.

“Vivek Ramaswamy and other MAGA hacks like Donald Trump Jr and Laura Loomer have been lying about Amy Acton for months — calling her a ‘leftwing psychopath,’ an alcoholic, a socialist and other hateful slurs. I imagine that’s more than likely responsible for this attack. Every Republican must condemn this now,” Nellis said.

Law enforcement has not said Havas drew a firearm, threatened Acton with one or planned a shooting. Authorities also have not publicly identified his motive.

But law enforcement has independently confirmed that Havas forced his way through the crowd toward Acton, knocked people to the ground and was carrying multiple weapons when officers intervened.

The Associated Press described Havas as an “armed assailant” who charged toward Acton, citing the Ohio State Highway Patrol’s account of the confrontation.

The episode came just hours after the Ohio GOP had held Loomer up to its followers as a source of information about Acton.

It also was not Loomer’s first appearance in the state party’s attacks on the Democratic nominee.

In August, Loomer promoted records concerning a 2019 domestic-disturbance call at Acton’s home, declaring that Acton was “getting LOOMERED.” The Ohio GOP subsequently used the same episode in its own attacks on Acton, highlighting a dispatch-record statement that Acton’s daughter had told authorities her mother had been drinking and throwing things.

The Sept. 6 exchange went further by explicitly crediting Loomer by name: “Loomer broke the last bombshell,” the Ohio GOP wrote.

That decision came less than a week after Loomer faced renewed national condemnation for racist attacks on prominent Black women.

Reuters reported Aug. 31 that Loomer attacked Florida Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Angie Nixon with racist language and had made similarly racist and misogynistic comments about Nixon, U.S. Reps. Ilhan Omar and Ayanna Pressley, former U.S. Rep. Cori Bush and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.

The condemnation crossed party lines.

Former Republican U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene denounced Loomer’s rhetoric, while other prominent Republicans have previously criticized her public statements. U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham has described Loomer’s record of comments as “beyond disturbing,” and Republican Sen. Thom Tillis has called her a conspiracy theorist.

Loomer has also publicly described herself as a “proud Islamophobe” and has a long history of inflammatory statements and conspiracy theories. Reuters reported last week that she has nearly 2 million followers on X and remains a prominent supporter of President Donald Trump despite holding no formal administration position.

The Ohio Republican Party did not immediately respond to TiffinOhio.net’s request for comment.

TiffinOhio.net asked the party whether it stands by its decision to amplify Loomer, whether it considers her a credible source, whether it condemns her recent racist remarks and whether it agrees with her characterization of the Canfield Fair incident.

The party also did not immediately say whether it intends to continue amplifying Loomer’s material in the Ohio governor’s race.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Not everyone is thrilled with his decision to question an incoming 197-acre data center complex in Conesville, Ohio, just outside of where he lives in Coshocton.

For Frank, pursuing what this data center complex could mean for the community in which he grew up is worth the side-eye, as are the sleepless nights spent researching the project and its implications for the place he calls home.

“To me, the biggest thing is just Coshocton to me is home,” Frank said. “I love it. I love the people here. And there’s a lot of things that I sit up and I think about, and I think this is just not who we are as our community.”

The data center complex, Frank said, doesn’t fit in the blue-collar area of Coshocton and Conesville. It’s an Appalachian region that’s hemorrhaged jobs following the closure of a string of industrial plants, including one owned by General Electric, and a coal plant that once employed hundreds of people. 

Frank, a licensed social worker who has also worked in telecommunications, filed a lawsuit against the Coshocton Port Authority because, he said, he doesn’t believe there was enough public information provided about the project before it began. Like other opponents of data centers, he brought up concerns about the potential environmental footprint, including the vast water and electric resources used by the data centers, which could drive up Americans’ utility bills, and the limited number of permanent jobs that data centers typically create.

He questions the process by which data centers are approved and built, how public money is involved, and whose voices are heard. In addition to questioning his own local government’s support for the project, he pointed to the tax breaks that major corporations like Google, Amazon and Meta have landed from lawmakers in Ohio, which is home to the country’s fifth-largest number of data centers, according to the Pew Research Center.

From 2017 to 2024, Ohio provided about $2.5 billion in tax incentives for data center development, according to a report prepared for the Ohio Chamber of Commerce Foundation. Gov. Mike DeWine in May paused tax incentives for data center projects, saying it was necessary to do so to allow state lawmakers time to study their growth. In 2025, sales tax exemptions for data center companies cost the state more than $1.5 billion, far more than the state had originally projected, according to reporting from Signal Ohio.

According to Cleveland.com, between 2014 and 2018, Republican Gov. John Kasich’s administration signed agreements with Amazon, Meta, and Google, granting them 100% sales tax exemptions for up to 40 years if the companies met specific investment criteria.

U.S. Sen. Jon Husted served as Ohio’s lieutenant governor under DeWine from 2019 until 2025, when he was appointed to the seat left vacant by Vice President J.D. Vance. He’s running in the Nov. 3 election to finish the last two years of Vance’s Senate term. Husted has championed data center projects and backed tax breaks for companies building them. For example, he backed Google’s plan to build a $600 million data center in New Albany. For that project, Google received a 15-year property tax abatement and a 15-year sales tax exemption that were expected to save the company $43.5 million, according to a 2019 report from Ideastream Public Media.

Linda Moodie, a county leader for Conserve Ohio, an all-volunteer group working to collect signatures on a petition for a ballot measure that would ban large-scale data centers in the state, said residents are often outraged by the tax deals.

“There’s people kind of digging into what’s going on with local city councils and state representatives, and even the governor, and they just feel like their voices aren’t being heard,” Moodie told the Ohio Independent. “And there’s deals being done that don’t necessarily benefit the people of the state, and they’re benefitting the large companies.”

Mark Gavin Sr., an Ohio resident and the owner of the consulting group On The Mark Advocacy & Campaigns, which has collaborated on climate justice initiatives in the state, criticized the public money involved in data centers in written testimony provided to state lawmakers for a June 1 committee hearing. In his testimony, Gavin said the money lost to data center sales tax exemptions could have funded a variety of projects benefiting the public. 

“That money did not go to schools. It did not fix roads. It did not lower anyone’s electric bill,” Gavin said. “It went to some of the wealthiest corporations on the planet, and Ohioans got nothing in return.” 

Molly Bryden, the climate and sustainability researcher with Policy Matters Ohio, a nonprofit research institute, also criticized the tax breaks.

“Much of this exemption is going to the richest companies in the world,” Bryden said in testimony submitted to state lawmakers. “They are spending hundreds of billions of dollars putting up data centers as fast as they can, world-wide.”

More than anything, Frank said, he just wants the truth when it comes to data centers, especially the one coming into his community. He wants to know how much water it will use, what the neighboring residents will have to pay for utilities once it starts operating, and how it will change the place he loves. 

“There’ll be times when I’m sitting here at home, and I get upset and angry because I’m like, people deserve to know what’s going into their communities when it’s something that could affect the water, could affect the power, could affect your utilities,” Frank said. “People might not be able to pay. It could hurt the real estate in our community. I mean, we don’t know what the long-term outcomes are.”

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

That 57% statistic was even higher for households with children, which stands at 65%, according to the Ohio Association of Foodbanks annual report which surveyed 2,644 food pantry visitors from April 18 to May 22 this year.

“Ohioans are facing real, real challenges and difficult choices every day, and that those choices are putting them in situations that we know are untenable,” Ohio Association of Foodbanks Executive Director Joree Novotny said. 

Utilities were not the only trade-off. In  63% reported choosing between paying for transportation or food, and 59% said they were forced to choose between clothes and personal hygiene products or food. Another 48% said they had to choose between affording medicine or food, and 45% had to decide between paying their rent or mortgage or paying for food.

Households with children saw additional trade-offs as well, with 30% choosing between paying for education or food and 23% choosing between affording childcare or affording food. 

“There’s a lot of trade-offs that are being considered and often being made,” Novotny said. 

“We have to remember that someone making a choice sacrificing medicine to afford food, or wrestling with being able to put gas in the car to get to work, or put food on a table for their kids, or, even many making choices to regularly skip meals to stretch the resources that they do have, that reinforces concerns about what that means for the health and well-being of individual families and collective communities longer term.” 

Slightly more than half (52%) said at least one person in their household skipped a meal during the past year and 59% said they had to skip a meal every month, according to the report. 

When it comes to households with seniors, 53% reported visiting food pantries more than 12 times per year.

Food is often the first thing people cut back on, Novotny said. 

“You still have to put gas in the car to get to work to keep your job,” she said. “You still have to pay the rent, keep utilities running, but food is a thing you can sacrifice.”

Who was surveyed

Of those surveyed, 46% said there was at least one senior over the age of 60 and 46% said there was at least one child under the age of 18. 

Slightly more than half of those surveyed had annual household incomes below $20,000 and 69% reported having an income below $30,000. 

Nearly a third of those surveyed said they got an extra job to make ends meet. 

About half (49%) had Medicaid coverage and 76% had someone in their household living with a health condition including high blood pressure, diabetes, or heart disease. 

A little less than half (45%) received Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits. Of those households receiving SNAP, 24% said their benefits lasted one week or less.  

More than 100,000 Ohioans — including more than 50,000 children — have lost their Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits since President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” made the largest cuts to food stamps in the history of the program. 

Follow Ohio Capital Journal Reporter Megan Henry on X or on Bluesky.

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The sale of the 500-acre parcel about a mile away from the Colorado River’s Horseshoe Bend — one of the most visited natural landmarks in the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area — to Huntley LLC for $7 million specifies that the company intends to build a 1 gigawatt data center.

Residents have been pushing back and launched a petition earlier this year to stop the planned data center from being built. 

About 5 miles south of the city, a group of tribal leaders began to take notice. The proposed data center borders the LeChee Chapter of the Navajo Nation, located in the northwest corner of the Navajo Reservation. 

Like most of Arizona, the community has run into challenges from severe drought conditions this year. After learning how much water it could take to cool the thousands of servers housed in the massive facilities, members of the tribe grew increasingly concerned about the proposed data center.

The LeChee Chapter also passed a resolution opposing Page’s decision to sell the land to the developers. 

“Water is precious to us,” said Irene Whitekiller, president of the LeChee Chapter. “ … Water is used for everything, like with holy water in church and traditional ceremonies. But with a data center coming in, it’s going to take a lot.”

Data center developments are continuing to spread throughout the country as the demand for digital processing power grows — especially as artificial intelligence systems become more prevalent. But in addition to concerned residents, some federal, state and local officials are worried about how data centers could drive up utility bills, strain water resources and hurt the environment.

And now, tribal communities are grappling with the fact that more developers are eyeing their land for future data center projects.

“Because of the history with treaties, removal actions and those sorts of things, tribal lands are probably more pristine and not as developed as other state, federal or local government lands,” said Tana Fitzpatrick, the associate vice president of tribal relations at the University of Oklahoma and a member of the Crow Tribe in Montana and a descendent of the Lakota Sioux, Ponca and Chickasaw nations. 

“That might be one of the reasons why tribes are finding that people are coming and wanting to build data centers on their lands.”

Some tribal leaders are also concerned about President Donald Trump’s ability to alter regulations related to federal lands. While most of Trump’s executive orders don’t apply to federal land belonging to Native nations or reservations, Whitekiller said that could change.

In July, for instance, Trump issued two executive orders to revise the boundaries of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument and the Bears Ears National Monument so the lands could be “put to a higher-priority use,” such as extracting minerals to invest in national security. The orders faced backlash from environmental advocacy groups and Native nations.

“We’re trying to educate our people to say no to this kind of thing (data centers) because we want the land the way it is. This is a federal land that we live on, but Trump doesn’t respect that,” Whitekiller said.

In March, the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma became one of the first Native nations to enact a complete moratorium on data centers. Honor the Earth, a national nonprofit organization advocating for the protection of Indigenous sovereignty and the environment, has helped communities like the Seminole Nation organize against data center development on their land.

Some companies see tribal land as a regulatory dream, said Ashley Leitka, an enrolled member of the Absentee Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma and the director of the department of sovereignty and self-determination at Honor the Earth. She is also part of the Oglala and Sicangu Lakota nations.

While municipalities are pushing back against data center developers by tightening codes and enforcing stricter regulations, she said some companies are hoping that tribal nations will be more lenient. As sovereign, self-governing nations, tribes are not required to follow all state and local laws.

“These companies are really preying upon the lack of economic diversity in our tribal nations,” Leitka said. “The reality is our tribal leaders are given a mandate to care for their nations, and whenever there’s opportunities, it’s pretty difficult for them to assert why they would not consider it. I just think it’s several things happening at the same time — that makes tribal nations prime targets.”

A handful of other tribes have taken action against data centers. In July, the Kickapoo Tribe of Oklahoma’s Business Committee formally declared its opposition to construction and operation of data centers on its lands. 

And in August, following a report detailing the impact of data centers on economy and environment, the Cherokee Nation announced it would be banning hyperscale data center development on tribally owned and trust lands, according to the nation’s official news site.

However, some tribes are considering how data centers could help their people. Colusa Indian Energy, for instance, has become one of the only tribally owned microgrid companies helping lead data center partnerships with Native nations.  

And in the past few years, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Indian Energy Policy and Programs has encouraged tribes to consider data center projects by offering financial and technical resources to assist.

Data centers are a significant way to bring economic opportunities to tribal communities, said Eric Mahroum, the office’s director. Mahroum said data centers also offer a number of jobs to community members.

“I think that’s why a lot of private companies are approaching tribal lands and the tribal governments to partner with them,” he said. “And we’re here to help them with that. I’ll be the first to say that there’s a lot of private companies and a lot of bad players that want to take advantage of the tribes. But then there’s a lot of great players that want to help the tribes.”

As more communities push data center developers out and states consider rescinding tax breaks, some of the country’s top tech developers and data center companies see tribal land as an easier option.

Microsoft, for instance, recently proposed a data center project in Fernley, Nevada, about a 10-minute drive from the boundary of the Pyramid Lake Paiute Reservation, according to Honor the Earth’s Data Center Tracker. The company’s community-first AI initiative outlines steps Microsoft will take to be a “good neighbor” in the communities where they build, according to an unsigned written statement from the company.

In the meantime, tribal leaders have expressed the need to continue studying the impacts of data centers through task forces. And now, more Native nations are considering moratoriums to allow time for more discussions, said Fitzpatrick, of the University of Oklahoma.

“In general, every tribe is their own sovereign nation,” Fitzpatrick said. “Regardless of the issue, every tribe is going to have their own ways of governing, choosing their priorities and looking at their citizens’ priorities.”

This story was originally produced by News From The States, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Ohio Capital Journal, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Patrick Havas, 38, of Canfield, was arrested Sunday at the Mahoning County Democratic Party tent at the Canfield Fair after authorities said he pushed through a crowd toward Acton and knocked multiple people to the ground.

His brother is Andrew Havas, a Republican operative and registered Statehouse lobbyist whose political activities became a statewide issue earlier this summer after his criminal history surfaced.

The Daily Beast also independently reported the sibling relationship Sunday evening.

The family connection adds a new layer to an incident already drawing national attention, but there is currently no evidence that Patrick Havas’ actions Sunday were connected to his brother, Andrew Havas’ political activity, his contributions to Ramaswamy or Acton’s previous criticism of those contributions.

Law enforcement has not publicly announced a motive.

Ohio State Highway Patrol troopers intercepted Patrick Havas after he forced his way through the crowd toward Acton, according to an OSHP statement reported by The Washington Post.

“Havas knocked multiple fairgoers over while trying to get towards Dr. Acton, and was found to be in possession of a taser and two pistols,” the patrol said.

Havas was booked into the Mahoning County jail on two counts of assault and one count of disorderly conduct. Acton was not injured.

The incident came less than two months after Acton publicly criticized Ramaswamy over campaign contributions from Patrick’s brother.

TiffinOhio.net reported in July that Andrew Havas gave Ramaswamy’s gubernatorial campaign $10,102.54 through five contributions between February and June 2025.

Campaign-finance records show the contributions included $2,602.54 on Feb. 28, separate $2,000 and $1,000 contributions on April 11, $2,500 on June 5 and $2,000 on June 18. Transparency USA’s compilation of Ohio campaign-finance records also lists $10,102.54 in contributions from Andrew Havas to Ramaswamy.

Acton directly criticized Ramaswamy for accepting the money after Andrew Havas’ criminal history became public.

“Ohioans deserve leaders who exercise good judgment and who put integrity first,” Acton wrote in July. “I find it appalling that Vivek Ramaswamy accepted over $10,000 from Andrew Havas.”

Andrew Havas had also served as U.S. Sen. Jon Husted’s volunteer Franklin County campaign chair before resigning in July after NBC News asked Husted’s campaign about a 2009 guilty plea in Mahoning County.

Andrew Havas, who was 22 at the time of the underlying incident, was originally charged with sexual misconduct with a minor in a case involving a 15-year-old, according to court records previously reviewed by NBC News. The charge was later reduced to misdemeanor assault, to which Havas pleaded guilty in 2009.

He was sentenced to 90 days in jail, fined and ordered to have no contact with the minor.

Husted campaign spokesperson Amy Natoce said at the time that Andrew Havas had not disclosed the case to the campaign.

“Upon learning the facts, we immediately accepted his resignation as a campaign volunteer,” Natoce told NBC News.

Andrew Havas is also registered as an Ohio lobbying agent. State lobbying records currently list multiple organizations for which he is registered as an agent.

Patrick Havas, meanwhile, is listed as a Republican in voter records reviewed by TiffinOhio.net.

Mahoning County Democratic Party Chair Christopher Anderson said Sunday that he did not know why Patrick Havas was at the Democratic Party tent and said determining his intent was a matter for law enforcement.

“I don’t know why he was there — that’s for law enforcement to discover,” Anderson told The Vindicator.

Ramaswamy’s campaign condemned Sunday’s incident.

“Candidates should be able to meet with voters without having to worry about threats or violence. What happened today is completely unacceptable and has no place in politics, and we hope that no one was hurt,” campaign Communications Director Connie Luck said.

Gov. Mike DeWine likewise condemned the incident and said law enforcement would conduct a thorough investigation.

Patrick Havas remained in the Mahoning County jail Sunday evening and is expected to appear in court after the Labor Day holiday.

Authorities have not publicly identified a motive for Sunday’s incident, and no evidence has emerged connecting Patrick Havas’ actions to his brother’s political activities, campaign contributions or Acton’s previous criticism of Andrew Havas.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Patrick Havas, 38, of Canfield, was jailed after authorities said he pushed toward Acton while she was visiting the Mahoning County Democratic Party tent and knocked two people to the ground.

Voter-registration records reviewed by TiffinOhio.net list Havas as a Republican.

Ohio does not require voters to declare a political party when they initially register to vote. Instead, Ohio law determines a voter’s party affiliation through participation in partisan primary elections. A voter affiliates with a party by requesting that party’s primary ballot, and county boards of elections update party-affiliation records based on that voting history.

Havas’ Republican affiliation does not establish a motive for Sunday’s incident. Authorities had not publicly said Sunday evening why Havas approached the Democratic Party tent or whether his actions were politically motivated.

Mahoning County Democratic Party Chair Christopher Anderson similarly cautioned against speculating about Havas’ intent.

“I don’t know why he was there — that’s for law enforcement to discover, but I’m grateful that the Ohio State Highway Patrol and local law enforcement officials stopped the situation before anything could happen, if malice was his intent,” Anderson told The Vindicator.

Havas was arrested by Mahoning County Sheriff’s deputies Sunday afternoon and booked into the Mahoning County jail on assault and disorderly conduct charges, according to jail records cited by The Vindicator.

Mahoning County Sheriff Jerry Greene said two older adults were knocked to the ground as Havas pushed toward the front of the tent where Acton was visiting. Havas had two guns in his possession when he was taken into custody, according to reporting from WFMJ carried by WPXI.

Mahoning County Democratic Party Vice Chair Maria Pappas separately told The Vindicator that Havas had a gun, a stun weapon and brass knuckles when he was arrested.

Acton’s campaign said Havas lunged toward the Democratic nominee for governor, injuring multiple people.

“While attending the Canfield Fair, an armed individual lunged at Dr. Acton, injuring multiple people. Dr. Acton and Eric are grateful for the swift and decisive action of law enforcement and are praying for the recovery of those injured,” Acton campaign Communications Director Addie Bullock said in a statement Sunday.

Acton was not injured. Gov. Mike DeWine said he spoke with Acton afterward and described the incident as a man trying “to forcefully push himself toward Dr. Acton as she was speaking” before injuring other attendees.

The incident was also reported nationally by The Associated Press, which said Acton was unharmed and authorities were investigating.

Republican gubernatorial nominee Vivek Ramaswamy’s campaign condemned the incident.

“Candidates should be able to meet with voters without having to worry about threats or violence. What happened today is completely unacceptable and has no place in politics, and we hope that no one was hurt,” Connie Luck, communications director for Vivek for Ohio, said in a statement reported by local media.

Havas remained in the Mahoning County jail Sunday evening, with no bond set. He is expected to make an initial appearance in Mahoning County Court in Canfield after the Labor Day holiday.

TiffinOhio.net previously reported on the incident as it unfolded Sunday afternoon.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Patrick Havas, 38, of Canfield, was taken to the Mahoning County jail following the incident at the Mahoning County Democratic Party tent, where Acton was visiting Sunday afternoon.

Mahoning County Sheriff Jerry Greene said Havas is expected to face two counts of assault and one count of disorderly conduct, according to reporting from WFMJ carried by WPXI.

Greene said two older adults were knocked to the ground as Havas pushed toward the front of the tent, where Acton was visiting. Havas reportedly had two guns on him when he was taken into custody.

Mahoning County Democratic Party Vice Chair Maria Pappas separately told The Vindicator that Havas had a gun, a stun weapon and brass knuckles when he was arrested.

Acton’s campaign initially described the encounter as an armed individual lunging at the Democratic candidate for governor and said multiple people were injured.

“While attending the Canfield Fair, an armed individual lunged at Dr. Acton, injuring multiple people. Dr. Acton and Eric are grateful for the swift and decisive action of law enforcement and are praying for the recovery of those injured,” Acton campaign Communications Director Addie Bullock said in a statement released Sunday.

“This kind of violence has no place in Ohio. Dr. Acton will always stand up to the chaos, hate and vitriol that pits us against one another,” Bullock said.

Acton was not injured.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine said he spoke with Acton after the incident and said a man “tried to forcefully push himself toward Dr. Acton as she was speaking” and injured other people at the Democratic Party booth.

“Fran and I are thankful that Dr. Amy Acton was not hurt, and we send our thoughts to those who were injured,” DeWine said. “Violence or the threat of violence at political or public events is always unacceptable.”

Mahoning County Democratic Party Chair Christopher Anderson said Havas knocked volunteers to the ground before his arrest.

“What happened at our tent today during today’s visit from Dr. Acton is reprehensible and should be condemned by leaders on all sides of the aisle,” Anderson said.

Anderson said he did not know why Havas was at the tent and cautioned against drawing conclusions about his intent.

“I don’t know why he was there — that’s for law enforcement to discover, but I’m grateful that the Ohio State Highway Patrol and local law enforcement officials stopped the situation before anything could happen, if malice was his intent,” Anderson told The Vindicator.

The Ohio State Highway Patrol was providing security for Acton and assisted local law enforcement during the incident.

Acton remained at the scene afterward. A photograph provided to TiffinOhio.net by a fair attendee shows Acton, a physician and former Ohio Department of Health director, helping tend to one of the people who was injured.

Republican gubernatorial nominee Vivek Ramaswamy’s campaign also condemned the incident.

“Candidates should be able to meet with voters without having to worry about threats or violence. What happened today is completely unacceptable and has no place in politics, and we hope that no one was hurt,” Connie Luck, communications director for Vivek for Ohio, said in a statement reported by local media.

Havas was being held in the Mahoning County jail Sunday. No bond had been set, according to The Vindicator, and he is expected to appear in Mahoning County Court in Canfield after the Labor Day holiday.

Authorities had not publicly identified a motive Sunday evening.

This is a developing story and will be updated as additional information becomes available.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

President Donald Trump’s response to low stocks and high prices, to the disappointment of domestic beef producers, has been to open American markets to cheaper imports. Last month, the president announced that as of Sept. 1, the United States would waive tariffs on up to 300,000 metric tons of imported ground beef for 90 days. In a Truth Social post, he said, “This deal will reduce prices for Americans while giving space for our Great American Beef Herd to grow again.”

CNBC reported that the beef, which was to be imported from so far undisclosed countries, was to be sold at 25% below current market prices.

In February, Trump signed an executive order authorizing the import of 80,000 metric tons of beef from Argentina. 

John Boyd Jr. is a fourth-generation farmer and cattle rancher in Baskerville, Virginia, and the founder of the National Black Farmers Association.

Boyd told the American Independent in an interview: “The only thing that we produce in this country that doesn’t require a pod, or adding something to it, or sending out the country and coming back is agricultural commodities like wheat and soybeans and corn, all this stuff, and beef. And he came right in as president, Trump did, and imposed tariffs that had an immediate impact on farmers and prices, and took a lot of farmers out.

“Then he comes in with this war in Iran that — we already had high input costs when he messed with all that stuff, and then all that went through the roof,” Boyd continued. “Then farm foreclosures, farm bankruptcy, farm suicide — all of these things escalated, and the number keeps going up. …. But he keeps saying he loves farmers. He gets away with it, and he’s ruining the agriculture sector in general, and the United States.”

Boyd, who said his family has been raising beef for over 100 years, said that raising beef is not merely an industry, and that there are more important considerations than low prices.

“There is an art and skill set of raising good beef. I was taught by two generations before me. My dad and my grandfather taught me how to raise beef cattle. They taught me how to select a bull,” he said. “They taught me how to select a herd for the turnout to drive calves. All of these things that I learned wasn’t learned in one season. It took me a long time to learn the art and skill set of raising beef, good healthy beef that people would want to eat. “

It’s the kind of know-how that becomes harder to find with each passing year. 

“We’re losing a generation of farmers. So we’re losing these kind of guys that can really know how to raise beef,” Boyd said. 

He said that the beef being imported from undisclosed countries is not being inspected the way it should be. “We’re not checking this beef. [Neither] the president nor the agriculture secretary has answered where in the Sam Hill this beef is coming from, but they’re going to allow it to come to the United States and infiltrate our food sector,” he said. “I see it as a national security issue.”

Importing beef also imperils the industry, he said, putting more farmers in jeopardy of losing their cattle farms due to lower sales. 

“You’re going to give up the freedom to farm here, which means you won’t have the selection in your supermarkets, because we’re going to be begging other regions of the world to feed us,” Boyd said. “And, you know, he who controls the land controls the man, controls the food. And if you don’t have a food supply in this country to feed your people, then you’re at liberty to beg others to feed you, which is a very dangerous position for the United States.” 

Asked by reporters in August about his plan to increase beef shipments into the United States, Trump said: “Well, we want to get the beef prices down, so we’ll get them down a little bit, and that’s what people want. That’s what the voters want, and that’s what I want. The ranchers are great. They’re my people. I love the ranchers. They’ve done a fantastic job, but they admit that we need a little help, and in order to get the prices down, so that’s what we’re doing.”

Boyd said he wishes people would ask the Trump administration why American farmers are losing their farms due to its policies. 

“It’s 100 degrees today in Virginia, but I’m going to be out here in it, doing the best I can in it. So it’s a very hard occupation, and to get treated the way that we’re treated in this country is — man, it’s deplorable,” he said. “That’s the only word I can use to describe it.“

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The report found two campaigns within a larger political “clipping” network that offered additional compensation for favorable Ramaswamy content.

Participants in the broader operation were also instructed to use U.S.-based proxy servers and conceal that they were posting from outside the country, according to The Atlantic.

The result is political content that can appear in Americans’ TikTok, Instagram and YouTube feeds without viewers necessarily knowing that the person posting it may be overseas or financially incentivized to promote a particular candidate.

Who is funding the Ramaswamy-focused effort remains unclear.

The Atlantic reported that the network did not publicly identify the source of money behind the Ramaswamy campaigns, and its investigation did not establish that Ramaswamy or his campaign directly paid for the operation.

Ramaswamy’s campaign did not immediately respond to requests for comment from TiffinOhio.net.

TiffinOhio.net asked whether the campaign, any campaign consultant, vendor or subcontractor had paid for, coordinated with, supplied content to or otherwise participated in the operation described by The Atlantic. The campaign was also asked whether it knew who was financing the Ramaswamy-specific payments.

Ramaswamy campaign has repeatedly touted ‘grassroots’ support

The revelation comes as Ramaswamy’s campaign has repeatedly portrayed enthusiasm for his candidacy as an organic grassroots movement.

In announcing its 2025 fundraising totals, the campaign said Ramaswamy had received “overwhelming grassroots and donor enthusiasm.” Campaign manager Jonathan Ewing pointed to the campaign’s average contribution and said the operation was “driven by grassroots energy.”

The newly reported clipping operation raises a different question: how much of the pro-Ramaswamy political content appearing organically in voters’ social-media feeds is actually organic at all?

The Atlantic’s reporting describes an organized system in which participants can be compensated for generating views on political clips, with additional incentives available for content favorable to Ramaswamy.

That distinction may be invisible to the person watching the video.

A voter encountering a favorable Ramaswamy clip on TikTok or Instagram may see what appears to be another user’s spontaneous political commentary. The Atlantic’s investigation shows that at least some favorable Ramaswamy content is instead being encouraged through financial incentives.

Who is paying remains unanswered

The Atlantic traced portions of the broader clipping ecosystem to material uploaded by people who appeared to work for Enclave & Key, a Las Vegas marketing company whose founder, Blake Wynn, has publicly described knowing Ramaswamy.

The magazine did not establish that Enclave & Key funded the Ramaswamy campaigns or determine who ultimately supplied the money.

That distinction is significant. There is currently no public evidence establishing that Ramaswamy’s campaign directly financed the operation.

But there is now evidence that someone is paying additional money for favorable Ramaswamy social-media content — and neither the report nor Ramaswamy’s campaign has identified who that is.

For Ohio voters, that leaves a basic transparency question unanswered as the gubernatorial race heads toward November: when apparently grassroots political content praising Ramaswamy appears in their social-media feeds, who is actually behind it?

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

“If you certainly are not willing to debate then you certainly can’t lead the state,” Ramaswamy said this week after Democratic gubernatorial nominee Amy Acton declined invitations to debate him, according to the Ohio Capital Journal.

Ramaswamy has repeatedly attacked Acton over the decision. In a Statehouse News Bureau interview Thursday, he called debates “a basic part of the job interview” and said Acton should “show up.”

But Ramaswamy did not follow that standard when he was the overwhelming favorite in Ohio’s Republican primary earlier this year.

Casey Putsch, the Republican who challenged Ramaswamy for the nomination, publicly called on Ramaswamy to face him in a debate.

“Debate me,” Putsch said in one public challenge. He later campaigned on the message: “Vivek won’t debate me.”

Ramaswamy never debated him.

Putsch was not merely a write-in candidate or outside agitator. He qualified for the Republican gubernatorial primary ballot alongside Ramaswamy and Heather Hill. Official Republican primary ballots listed all three tickets.

Putsch went on to receive nearly 18% of the Republican primary vote. Ramaswamy won easily.

There was no Republican gubernatorial debate.

And the contradiction predates Ramaswamy’s campaign for governor.

Ramaswamy once called ducking debates “fundamentally uncourageous”

In May 2023, when Donald Trump was considering skipping Republican presidential primary debates, Ramaswamy argued that a frontrunner had an obligation to face his opponents.

“I think it would be fundamentally uncourageous for Donald Trump to refuse to debate,” Ramaswamy said during an interview on the Guy Benson Show on Fox News Radio.

Ramaswamy went further, saying Republicans “should be unafraid of open debate” and arguing that voters did not want “somebody who’s uncourageous and ducks debate.”

Then Trump decided to skip the first Republican presidential debate.

By August, Ramaswamy had changed his position.

Asked on CNN about his earlier criticism, Ramaswamy said he now had “no issue” with Trump skipping the first couple of debates, although he said he would object if Trump refused to participate throughout the entire debate season.

Three years later, when Ramaswamy himself was the dominant Republican candidate for Ohio governor, Putsch wanted a debate.

Ramaswamy did not give him one.

Now that Ramaswamy wants a debate and Acton does not, the standard has changed again: refusing to participate, he says, means a candidate “can’t lead the state.”

Another candidate is still waiting for Ramaswamy to debate him

The inconsistency has continued into the general election.

Libertarian gubernatorial nominee Don Kissick has also publicly pressed Ramaswamy to debate. The Ohio Capital Journal reported Friday that Kissick posted video of himself asking Ramaswamy to agree to a debate after an Ohio Conference of Teamsters event.

Kissick said he was “still waiting” for a commitment from both major-party candidates.

Ramaswamy, meanwhile, has accepted debate invitations from CNN and Cincinnati television station WLWT that would feature him and Acton.

Acton says she will not “platform” Ramaswamy

Acton’s campaign has not argued that debates are unimportant. Instead, it says the extraordinary volume and nature of the attacks Ramaswamy and groups supporting him have directed at Acton make sharing a debate stage with him counterproductive.

Campaign manager Phil Stein gave a lengthy explanation for the decision:

“Dr. Acton’s focus is on talking with Ohioans, not platforming a scam artist who spreads baseless lies about her and her family, uses AI to falsely paint her as someone with a substance abuse problem, and shames Dr. Acton for being sexually abused as a child while Vivek stands with predators and abusers. Ramaswamy and his billionaire buddies have spent more than $50 million on disgusting, inaccurate attack ads that have been condemned as the ‘most vile and repulsive lies’ Ohio has ever seen,” Stein said.

The statement came after months in which independent news organizations have repeatedly scrutinized factual claims in ads attacking Acton.

Cleveland.com found Ramaswamy’s COVID attacks omitted his own pandemic advocacy. PolitiFact rated his claim that Acton “called off” Ohio’s 2020 primary “Mostly False”, noting Republican Gov. Mike DeWine has repeatedly said the decision was his.

More recently, records examined by the Cincinnati Enquirer disputed a central claim in another Ramaswamy campaign ad blaming Acton for the isolation and death of a Republican activist’s mother. The woman lived in Kentucky and died after Ohio’s stay-at-home order had ended and after Acton had left her state post.

WEWS also examined ads portraying Acton as an alcoholic and drug abuser. Police records from a 2019 domestic call said both Acton and her husband had been drinking and that Acton had taken prescription medication, but the report did not say she was intoxicated and described the incident as a verbal dispute with no evidence of physical violence. Acton has denied having a substance abuse problem.

Ramaswamy has repeatedly declined to answer questions himself

Ramaswamy’s new insistence that candidates submit themselves to scrutiny also comes after months of reporting about questions his own campaign has left unanswered.

In August alone, Cleveland.com reported that Ramaswamy again refused to clearly state his position on guns and published another report documenting a non-answer on a major Ohio issue.

The publication later described the gubernatorial contest as having “a transparency problem” centered on Ramaswamy.

When Cleveland.com surveyed the gubernatorial candidates about marijuana policy, Ramaswamy did not provide a position. When the outlet asked candidates about expanding online gambling, Ramaswamy again remained silent.

That gambling question followed him into September. During a Statehouse News Bureau interview this week, Ramaswamy was directly asked where he stood on expanded gambling after interviewer Karen Kasler noted gambling-industry money supporting his election. Ramaswamy still did not take a position, saying only that he would “take a fresh look and a fresh perspective to this whole discussion.”

TiffinOhio.net previously documented additional unanswered questions involving Ramaswamy’s business record, campaign spending, security operation and continued ties to U.S. Rep. Max Miller.

Ramaswamy’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment for this story.

A standard that changes depending on the candidate

Acton’s decision not to debate has drawn criticism of its own. University of Akron political scientist David Cohen called the decision “political malpractice”, arguing that debates give voters an opportunity to compare candidates directly. The League of Women Voters of Ohio has similarly encouraged candidates to participate in nonpartisan candidate forums.

But that does not resolve the contradiction in Ramaswamy’s own record.

In 2023, when Trump considered avoiding his challengers, Ramaswamy said candidates who duck debates were “uncourageous.”

In 2026, when Republican Casey Putsch wanted to debate Ramaswamy, Ramaswamy never debated him.

Now Libertarian Don Kissick says he is still waiting for Ramaswamy to commit to a debate that includes him.

But when Acton declines to debate Ramaswamy, Ramaswamy says the decision proves she cannot lead Ohio.

The principle appears to depend on which side of the debate invitation Ramaswamy happens to be standing on.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

“Where are you on expanded gambling?” Statehouse News Bureau chief Karen Kasler asked Ramaswamy during an interview recorded Sept. 3 and published Friday. “Since actually gambling interests have been donating to get you elected.”

Ramaswamy did not say whether he supports or opposes gambling expansion.

“I’m going to take a fresh look and a fresh perspective to this whole discussion,” Ramaswamy responded.

Ramaswamy went on to say he would listen to lawmakers on both sides of the issue and wanted to protect young Ohioans from addiction. But he never stated whether he supports legalizing online casino gambling or otherwise expanding gambling in Ohio.

The question comes as a gambling-industry organization advocating for expanded online gambling has poured $650,000 into the super PAC supporting Ramaswamy’s election.

The Sports Betting Alliance gave $500,000 to V-PAC: Victors, Not Victims in 2025, then contributed another $150,000 in January 2026, according to federal campaign-finance filings reviewed by Signal Ohio.

V-PAC was formed by Ramaswamy allies and has spent money supporting his campaign for governor. The Federal Election Commission identifies the group as an unauthorized independent-expenditure-only committee, commonly known as a super PAC. The contributions did not go directly to Ramaswamy’s campaign, and federal law prohibits independent expenditure committees from coordinating their spending with candidates.

The Sports Betting Alliance is not simply an industry trade organization with a passive interest in Ohio policy. It says it is dedicated to expanding legal, regulated online sports betting and online casino gaming and lists Bet365, BetMGM, DraftKings, Fanatics and FanDuel among its members.

The group has also gone directly to Ohio lawmakers to push for gambling expansion.

In May 2025, Sports Betting Alliance representative Scott Ward testified before the Ohio House Finance Committee in support of legalizing internet casino gambling.

“I am here in support of legalization of igaming in Ohio,” Ward told lawmakers.

The alliance argued that legal online casino games would provide consumer protections, move gamblers away from illegal websites and generate additional tax revenue for the state.

That policy question is not hypothetical. Ohio lawmakers are currently considering competing proposals that would dramatically expand the types of gambling available online.

House Bill 298 would legalize and regulate internet gambling in Ohio and levy a tax on businesses offering it. Senate Bill 197 would also legalize internet gambling while permitting internet lottery gaming and online wagering on horse racing.

Neither bill has passed the General Assembly. But if lawmakers approve gambling-expansion legislation during the next gubernatorial administration, Ohio’s governor could ultimately be asked to sign or veto it.

Ramaswamy has had months to establish where he stands.

Signal Ohio reported in April that Ramaswamy had not publicly taken a position on sports betting as gambling-industry money flowed into V-PAC. A Ramaswamy spokesperson did not respond to the outlet’s request for comment at the time.

The September interview gave Ramaswamy a direct opportunity to answer the question himself — on camera and immediately after Kasler explicitly raised the financial support from gambling interests.

He instead promised a “fresh look.”

Earlier in the same interview, Ramaswamy had stressed the importance of candidates answering questions from voters.

“I do think it’s really important that candidates actually take voter questions and tell the voters where we’re at,” he said.

On gambling expansion, Ramaswamy still did not tell voters where he is.

Ramaswamy’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment from TiffinOhio.net.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The Republican nominee for governor was photographed Friday in the stands at the U.S. Open in New York City as Labor Day weekend got underway. The photos were circulated separately by Democratic nominee Amy Acton’s campaign and the Ohio Democratic Party, both of which said Ramaswamy flew to New York aboard a private jet.

The trip comes exactly two months after Ramaswamy left Ohio for Paris on the Fourth of July, the nation’s 250th birthday.

Ramaswamy did spend part of July 4 in Ohio, appearing at events in Lancaster and Upper Arlington. But that night, at about 10:20 p.m., a Bombardier Global 5000 linked to Ramaswamy departed John Glenn Columbus International Airport for Paris, according to flight-tracking data previously reported by TiffinOhio.net. The aircraft landed at Paris-Le Bourget the following morning, and Ramaswamy subsequently traveled to Geneva before returning to Ohio on July 12, according to an analysis of flight records and his public schedule by The Rooster.

His appearance in New York on Friday also came just four days after Ramaswamy himself called attention to how rarely he said he leaves Ohio.

Speaking Monday at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s annual summit in Las Vegas, Ramaswamy told the audience he was “making a rare exception” to leave the state. By Friday, he was outside Ohio again, this time watching the U.S. Open as the holiday weekend began.

Recent reporting based on flight records has raised questions about just how rare Ramaswamy’s out-of-state travel has been. In July, The Rooster calculated that Ramaswamy had spent 79 of the first 201 days of 2026 outside Ohio — about 39% of the year to that point. The newsletter said it cross-referenced federal flight records for two aircraft associated with Ramaswamy against his known public appearances and excluded stretches when the aircraft traveled without evidence that Ramaswamy was aboard.

His air travel has also become a significant campaign expense. An Ohio Capital Journal review of campaign-finance reports found that Ramaswamy’s gubernatorial campaign had spent nearly $690,000 leasing aircraft since he launched his campaign. Nearly $560,000 went to V Leasing LLC, which lists as its address a house owned by Ramaswamy, while nearly $130,000 went to TVPX Aircraft Solutions, according to the report.

Ramaswamy’s campaign has previously defended his use of private aircraft, saying air travel allows him to reach voters throughout Ohio’s 88 counties. The campaign has also said in response to earlier reporting that Ramaswamy personally pays for some private air travel. The nearly $690,000 identified by the Ohio Capital Journal represents aircraft-leasing expenditures reported by his gubernatorial campaign and does not establish that every trip aboard an aircraft associated with Ramaswamy was campaign-funded.

Acton’s campaign seized on the latest trip Friday, pointing specifically to the four-day gap between Ramaswamy’s “rare exception” comment and his appearance in New York.

“The only thing billionaire scam artist Vivek Ramaswamy is interested in serving is himself,” Acton campaign spokeswoman Addie Bullock said in a Friday statement.

Labor Day falls Monday, Sept. 7. Ramaswamy faces Acton in the Nov. 3 general election for governor.

Ramaswamy’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Daniel Jeremiah Kalmbach, 31, is featured with his partner in “Couple Renos Waterfront Home on Buckeye Lake, OH,” an episode of Lakefront Bargain Hunt Renovation that premiered Sept. 1.

The series originally premiered on HGTV in 2017 and remains listed on HGTV’s website. Its new 2026 season is airing on Magnolia Network, according to Warner Bros. Discovery.

The Buckeye Lake episode presents Kalmbach as one half of a “young Ohio couple” looking to leave Columbus behind for a waterfront property. The episode synopsis says the couple wants a home large enough for their “future family” and plans to renovate a rundown property into their “perfect forever home.”

What viewers are not told is that Kalmbach is now awaiting a scheduled Sept. 22 trial in Miami-Dade County on a life-felony kidnapping charge and a first-degree felony aggravated battery charge.

TiffinOhio.net has learned the television network did not know about those pending charges before the episode aired.

The network is now reviewing the situation following TiffinOhio.net’s inquiry.

Episode filmed before Kalmbach was charged

The production timeline makes clear that Kalmbach was not facing the current criminal charges when the episode was filmed.

TiffinOhio.net has learned filming for the Buckeye Lake episode took place between January and October 2025, and the completed episode was delivered in November 2025.

Kalmbach’s criminal case did not begin until months later.

Kalmbach was first arrested in Miami on Feb. 23, 2026, on charges of false imprisonment and battery by strangulation. In April, Miami-Dade prosecutors replaced those two third-degree felony counts with substantially more serious charges: kidnapping with a weapon and aggravated battery involving great bodily harm and a deadly weapon.

The formal charging document alleges Kalmbach confined a woman between Feb. 21 and Feb. 23 using scissors and a knife. Prosecutors allege he struck her, cut her hair and cut her with a knife, causing great bodily harm or permanent disfigurement.

Kidnapping is ordinarily a first-degree felony under Florida law. Because prosecutors allege a weapon was used, the kidnapping count was reclassified as a life felony under Florida’s felony-reclassification statute, which provides that a first-degree felony may be elevated to a life felony when a weapon is used.

Kalmbach has pleaded not guilty. The allegations have not been proven in court, and he is presumed innocent.

TiffinOhio.net reported Aug. 11 that his jury trial had been reset for Sept. 22 after two postponements earlier in the summer.

Another arrest followed in July

The episode also reached television after Kalmbach was arrested a second time this summer in a separate case.

Miami Beach police arrested Kalmbach on July 14 at the W South Beach hotel on allegations of domestic-violence battery and violating a domestic-violence injunction.

According to the sworn arrest affidavit, police were dispatched after the alleged victim’s sister contacted the hotel front desk to report a domestic dispute. Two hotel employees told officers they heard the woman screaming and crying, and the responding officer reported observing redness on the left side of her face and on her left forearm, along with a broken cup and items scattered across the room.

A records check also showed that Kalmbach was subject to a non-expiring domestic-violence protective order obtained by the alleged victim, according to the affidavit.

Kalmbach denied that an argument or physical contact had occurred. The alleged victim also told officers that no threats or harm had occurred, according to the affidavit. Kalmbach nevertheless was arrested on two first-degree misdemeanor counts.

He pleaded not guilty and demanded a jury trial in that case as well.

From Ohio politics to reality television

Kalmbach is familiar to voters in north-central Ohio and comes from the family behind one of the region’s longstanding agricultural businesses.

He is the son of Paul Kalmbach, CEO of Kalmbach Feeds in Upper Sandusky. The company says it was established in 1963, remains a second- and third-generation family-owned business and grew from a small grind-and-mix mill into a regional animal-nutrition company.

His father is now also awaiting action on a presidential nomination.

President Donald Trump nominated Paul Kalmbach on June 1 to serve as U.S. ambassador to Paraguay. As of Friday, the U.S. Senate continued to list the nomination, PN1022-19, among civilian nominations pending in committee.

Daniel Kalmbach entered electoral politics in 2024 when he challenged incumbent state Rep. Kevin Miller in the Republican primary for Ohio House District 69. Miller defeated Kalmbach in the March primary.

Kalmbach’s campaign drew support from several prominent Republican politicians and organizations. His campaign was endorsed by U.S. Reps. Jim Jordan and Bob Latta, while Americans for Prosperity-Ohio endorsed him as one of its preferred Ohio House candidates.

State Rep. Gary Click, a Vickery Republican, contributed $1,000 to Kalmbach’s campaign on Feb. 20, 2024, according to campaign finance records previously reviewed by TiffinOhio.net. The financial relationship later went in the other direction: Daniel Kalmbach donated $350 to Click’s campaign in May 2025. Kalmbach Feeds had previously donated $250 to Click’s committee in 2021, and Paul Kalmbach contributed another $250 in 2024.

Now, as Daniel Kalmbach awaits trial on a charge carrying the possibility of life imprisonment if he is convicted, television viewers are being introduced to a markedly different chapter of his life: renovating a lake house and planning what the program describes as a home for a “future family.”

As of Friday, HGTV’s website still listed the Buckeye Lake installment as part of the show’s current season. It was not immediately clear whether the network’s review would affect future broadcasts or streaming availability of the episode.

Kalmbach has not been convicted of any offense in either pending criminal case. He is presumed innocent.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Under his data center pledge, Ramaswamy says residents living near a newly built data center “will no longer pay for their home’s electricity.” His campaign says the idea is simple enough that “the mechanics are straightforward.”

Energy experts examining the proposal have reached a very different conclusion.

A former commissioner of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio says the pledge is not based in reality and called it a “politically convenient stunt.” A researcher who has spent decades studying computing and energy says he is not sure how it would work. The president of the Ohio Chamber of Commerce says the plan is so undefined that its economics cannot yet be understood.

And an examination of Ohio electric bills and the regional power grid reveals a more basic problem: generating electricity is only part of what Ohioans pay for, and privately generated power does not simply spill onto the public electric grid and erase thousands of household bills.

‘It’s just a gimmick’

Ramaswamy unveiled the pledge Aug. 6 as political opposition to massive data center development continued to intensify across Ohio.

His plan would create what he calls a “benefit zone” around a new data center. The campaign says excess electricity from generation built alongside the facility would be credited to residential customers inside that zone. Alternatively, the data center company could directly reimburse residents for their electric bills.

Ramaswamy’s campaign offered an example: a 1,000-megawatt power plant could supply 700 megawatts to a data center while the remaining 300 megawatts “flows to the grid” and is credited to nearby households. The campaign claims even 100 megawatts of excess capacity could power 75,000 to 100,000 homes and says most Ohio counties could fit entirely within one of its benefit zones.

“The mechanics are straightforward,” Ramaswamy’s campaign said.

Ashley Brown, a former PUCO commissioner and retired executive director of the Harvard Electricity Policy Group, told The Toledo Blade otherwise.

Brown called the proposal a “politically convenient stunt” and said there was no evidence of serious policy work supporting it.

“They’re not even remotely serious,” Brown said. “It’s just a gimmick to get them through the election.”

Brown’s objections are not primarily political. They begin with one of the most basic unanswered questions in the proposal: What exactly does Ramaswamy mean by “free electricity”?

About half your electric bill isn’t generation

Electricity generation is only one part of an Ohio household’s electric bill.

The Office of the Ohio Consumers’ Counsel, the state agency representing residential utility customers, explains that Ohio electric bills consist primarily of generation, transmission and distribution costs.

Generation, the electricity itself, typically accounts for about half of a bill. Transmission and distribution, the infrastructure required to move that electricity across the grid and ultimately into a home, typically account for roughly the other half.

Distribution pays for local power lines, substations, meters, maintenance, billing and other infrastructure. The Consumers’ Counsel says those charges continue as long as a home remains connected to the grid.

Its consumer guide to electric bills is even more explicit: customer, transmission and distribution charges must still be paid to the utility regardless of how a customer’s electric generation is obtained.

That distinction exposes a hole at the center of Ramaswamy’s pitch.

If his promise means a data center supplies only the electricity generation itself for free, homeowners could still receive substantial utility bills for transmission, distribution and other delivery costs.

If Ramaswamy instead means exactly what his campaign says — that residents “will no longer pay for their home’s electricity” — then the data center would have to cover much more than the cost of producing power.

Ramaswamy’s own proposal acknowledges that possibility by saying companies could simply reimburse residents for their electric bills. But that would transform the promise into an open-ended requirement for a private company to pay potentially tens of thousands of complete household utility bills.

The published plan does not specify a maximum household usage, a maximum dollar reimbursement, how long the obligation lasts, what happens if electricity prices spike or how a company’s obligation changes as the population within the benefit zone changes.

Brown questioned why a company contemplating a multibillion-dollar investment would voluntarily accept an expense that could fluctuate for reasons outside its control.

The business group that endorsed him can’t make out the economics

That concern is not confined to Ramaswamy’s political opponents.

The Ohio Chamber of Commerce PAC endorsed Ramaswamy in July, with Chamber President and CEO Steve Stivers praising his approach to taxes, energy development and economic growth.

Weeks later, Stivers told The Blade that Ramaswamy’s free-electricity proposal was “so undefined” that he could not reach a clear opinion on it.

Stivers pointed directly at questions Ramaswamy has not answered: How large is a benefit zone? What happens if the power plant does not generate enough electricity to cover everyone within it? Would the data center then have to make an additional cash payment to residents?

The lack of specifics, Stivers said, makes it difficult to understand the economics.

That assessment is especially striking because it comes from the leader of an organization that endorsed Ramaswamy less than a month before he released the plan.

The electricity does not simply ‘flow to the grid’

There is another problem with Ramaswamy’s supposedly straightforward example.

His campaign describes a 1,000-megawatt plant supplying a 700-megawatt data center and says the remaining 300 megawatts simply “flows to the grid.”

But Signal Ohio found that exporting excess power from a private, behind-the-meter generating plant onto the broader electric grid requires the plant to connect to that grid and obtain corresponding approvals.

Ohio is part of PJM Interconnection, the regional grid operator serving all or portions of 13 states and Washington, D.C. The rules governing giant data centers that locate alongside their own power plants have become complicated enough that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ordered PJM to develop new rules governing such arrangements.

FERC said the rules are necessary to address grid reliability, consumer costs and the relationship between large loads and the generating facilities beside them.

In other words, the unused 300 megawatts in Ramaswamy’s campaign example do not automatically become a pool of free electricity that can be assigned to every house surrounding a data center.

Signal also identified another unanswered question: Ramaswamy’s pledge does not make clear whether a new data center would actually be required to build more generating capacity than it needs in the first place.

If a facility builds enough generation only to satisfy its own enormous demand, there may be little or no excess electricity available to support the promise.

‘I’m not sure how it would work’

Jonathan Koomey, a researcher who has studied computing, electricity consumption and energy efficiency for decades, reached much the same conclusion when asked about Ramaswamy’s plan.

“I’m not sure how it would work,” Koomey told the AP.

Koomey specifically pointed to distribution costs, which still have to be paid to move electricity into residential homes.

He also said he was unaware of another state operating a comparable program.

The criticism undercuts one of the central selling points of Ramaswamy’s rollout. His campaign does not describe the free-electricity component as an aspiration that still needs to be designed. It describes the mechanics as settled and straightforward and predicts that entire counties containing data centers could pay nothing for electricity.

Nearly a month later, significant questions about those mechanics remain unanswered.

Free power could create another cost problem

Brown also warned that completely eliminating the marginal cost of residential electricity could have an unintended consequence.

Electric rates give customers an incentive to conserve power. If electricity usage becomes effectively unlimited and free to the household, Brown said consumption could increase. Higher demand can require still more generation, transmission and distribution investment, increasing costs elsewhere on the system.

That concern comes as the Ohio Consumers’ Counsel warns that data centers are already driving extraordinary electricity demand and may require major investments in transmission lines and substations.

A hyperscale data center can consume as much electricity as 100,000 homes, according to the agency.

The Consumers’ Counsel has advocated a considerably narrower approach to protecting Ohio families: make exceptionally large users pay the costs they create.

In testimony before state lawmakers in June, Consumers’ Counsel Director Maureen Willis said the principle should be straightforward: when massive electric loads require significant new investment in generation, transmission or distribution, the customers creating those costs should bear them.

That is fundamentally different from requiring a data center not only to pay its own infrastructure costs, but to assume the residential electric bills of an entire surrounding community.

The campaign says a businessman can make it happen

Ramaswamy’s published plan offers little explanation of how the unanswered financial and regulatory questions would be resolved. Instead, his campaign argues that major technology companies will agree to the terms if Ohio’s governor demands them.

The pledge says Ramaswamy is confident hyperscale data center operators would be willing to “fully cover the cost of power” for nearby residents and argues that making it happen requires “the acumen of a businessman, not a bureaucrat.”

His plan also promises a day-one executive order halting approval of new data center projects until the General Assembly enacts the framework into law.

Brown questioned whether an Ohio governor has the constitutional authority to impose such a sweeping halt in the first place.

The AP reported Aug. 27 that Ramaswamy’s campaign did not provide additional details when asked about the proposal for its story.

Ramaswamy’s campaign also didn’t immediately respond to TiffinOhio.net’s request for comment.

The promise itself remains remarkably simple: Let a data center into your community and your electric bill disappears.

The system required to make that happen is anything but.

A former Ohio utility regulator calls the proposal an election gimmick. An independent energy researcher says he does not know how it would work. The leader of the state’s largest business organization, which endorsed Ramaswamy, says the economics remain undefined. Ohio’s consumer advocate says generating electricity accounts for only about half of a typical bill. And regional and federal regulators are still developing rules governing the very grid arrangements Ramaswamy presents as straightforward.

Ramaswamy has promised Ohioans free electricity. What his campaign still has not provided is a detailed explanation of how Ohio would actually deliver it.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

There were 161,385 fewer people in Ohio enrolled in the Affordable Care Act marketplace in February 2026 compared to 2025, according to data analyzed by KFF. That represents a 32% decline, which Protect Our Care, a social welfare nonprofit, noted in a series of state fact sheets released Aug. 18.

Congress and former President Joe Biden included the premium subsidies in the 2021 American Rescue Plan Act for two years. In 2022, the Inflation Reduction Act extended those subsidies through the end of 2025. The Republican-led Congress failed to extend the subsidies before they expired. In January, 17 House Republicans joined House Democrats to pass a bill to extend them, but the Senate has not acted on it.

In a November social media post, President Donald Trump said he would only support a program that let individuals negotiate their own insurance plans, adding, “Congress, do not waste your time and energy on anything else.” He told reporters that he’d rather give money to people directly rather than to insurance companies, without explaining how that would work, NBC News reported. 

National enrollment in the Affordable Care Act roughly doubled from 2021 to 2025, according to KFF. But in 2026, enrollment dropped in every state except New Mexico, which replaced the expired tax credits with state subsidies. 

Survey results that KFF published in March show 40% of returning marketplace enrollees said their monthly health insurance premiums are a lot higher this year compared to last. Another 23% said their premiums were somewhat higher. 

Protect Our Care published the state fact sheets as part of Sick of It! Fix Health Care Now campaign to fix healthcare, which the nonprofit said is its largest grassroots campaign to date, featuring town halls and a coast-to-coast bus tour this fall. 

Beyond information on Affordable Care Act enrollment, the fact sheets include the number of healthcare providers in each state that are at risk of or have announced cuts or closure, and those that have closed following the passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act last summer. The Congressional Budget Office estimated in July 2025 that the budget law would cut Medicaid spending by about $1 trillion over a decade. 

A Protect Our Care Ohio fact sheet in mid-August listed 38 healthcare providers at risk of cuts or closures or already closed in the state. That number had risen to 39 as of early September. 

“Every day that health care becomes more expensive, a family is forced to make an impossible choice between putting food on the table and staying covered, a senior is forced to ration their medication, and an expectant mother has to travel farther to access maternity care,” Protect Our Care president Brad Woodhouse said in a statement. “From Alaska to Florida, these people are our neighbors, our parents, our kids, and they’re sick of paying the price for Republicans’ greed.”

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Strive Inc. reported a $523.5 million net loss during the first half of 2026, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The company also recorded a $523.8 million unrealized loss on digital assets during the same period.

The losses provide a real-world example of the volatility at the center of an Ohio policy debate Ramaswamy has embraced.

House Bill 18, known as the Ohio Strategic Cryptocurrency Reserve Act, would amend state law governing all five of Ohio’s public retirement systems to explicitly allow their boards to invest in qualifying exchange-traded products, including products providing exposure to cryptocurrency.

Ramaswamy called the proposal a “thoughtful & powerful bill” after it was introduced.

The legislation would not require any Ohio pension system to purchase Bitcoin or another cryptocurrency-linked investment. Investment decisions would remain with the individual retirement boards, which are subject to fiduciary obligations.

But the bill makes an important distinction between state-controlled funds and pension assets.

HB 18 would limit the state treasurer to investing no more than 10% of certain state funds in qualifying digital assets. The provisions applying to Ohio’s public retirement systems contain no comparable percentage limit.

Ohio’s five pension systems collectively oversee roughly $284 billion in assets. At that scale, even relatively small allocations could involve billions of dollars.

A 1% allocation would equal approximately $2.84 billion. A 50% decline in an investment of that size would represent a loss of approximately $1.42 billion.

No Ohio pension system has announced plans to make an investment of that size. The calculation illustrates the scale of potential exposure rather than predicting what any retirement board would do.

Strive’s recent results illustrate the volatility involved.

The company has increasingly centered its strategy on Bitcoin and has continued accumulating the cryptocurrency despite the losses reported earlier this year. In an Aug. 31 SEC filing, Strive disclosed the purchase of another 1,800 Bitcoin between Aug. 24 and Aug. 28 at an average price of approximately $79,431.

The purchases brought Strive’s holdings to 23,156 Bitcoin as of Aug. 28.

For a public pension system, losses on an investment would not translate directly into an equivalent reduction in an individual retiree’s monthly check. Ohio’s major public retirement systems provide defined benefits based on formulas established under state law.

Investment performance nevertheless affects the financial condition of those systems. When asset values decline while pension obligations remain, funding gaps can widen and create pressure for increased contributions, changes to benefits or other measures intended to strengthen the system.

That dynamic is not unique to cryptocurrency. The Pew Charitable Trusts found that investment losses contributed to a $439 billion increase in the nationwide funding gap for state pension plans between fiscal years 2021 and 2022.

Ohio has also seen the consequences of funding pressure within its pension systems. The State Teachers Retirement System has repeatedly tied decisions over cost-of-living adjustments and other benefit changes to the long-term financial condition of the fund. STRS Ohio has said that additional financial resources would improve the system’s ability to consider sustainable benefit changes.

Ramaswamy also retains a significant financial interest in Strive.

An Aug. 26 SEC filing lists Ramaswamy as beneficially owning 5,693,897 Strive shares, representing 6.6% of the class reported in the filing.

As TiffinOhio.net previously reported, Ramaswamy has also disclosed personal cryptocurrency holdings while publicly supporting Ohio policies favorable to digital assets.

There is no evidence that Ramaswamy has directed an Ohio pension system to invest in cryptocurrency, and HB 18 has not become law. The legislation remains pending in the Ohio House.

But Strive’s $523.5 million loss adds a new dimension to the debate over HB 18. The risks associated with cryptocurrency-linked investments are no longer hypothetical in the case of the company Ramaswamy helped build.

For Ohio’s public employees and retirees, the central question is whether pension funds built to provide long-term retirement security should be given explicit authority to take on that same exposure — and, if so, how much.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

From the moment he claimed victory in the Ohio Republican gubernatorial primary, Vivek Ramaswamy has built a campaign in part around a critique of his opponent’s leadership of the state’s COVID-19 response. 

The case has mostly focused on Ohio’s decisions early in the pandemic – led by Republican Gov. Mike DeWine and Ohio Department of Health Director Dr. Amy Acton, a physician who’s now running for governor as a Democrat – to close schools and businesses in the spring of 2020. 

Ramaswamy and the state Republican party have sought to ferry some of the lingering frustration and cynicism around COVID-19 into a race against an opponent they refer to as “Dr. Lockdown” or “Ohio’s Fauci,” a reference to longtime federal infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci, who advised President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden during the pandemic and is now a frequent punching bag and apparent criminal investigation subject of Republicans. 

The state GOP has been more unsparing, accusing Acton of “recklessness dressed up in authority” and “a record marked by unconstitutional overreach, preventable suffering, and lasting damage” to Ohio families. 

“Those kids in public schools will never get those two years of their education back. That’s unforgivable,” Ramaswamy said in a victory speech in May after a blowout primary victory. 

“Businesses were shuttered, and we actually chased business and entrepreneurs to states like Florida or Texas.”

But a review of state health orders shows Ohio’s pandemic response wasn’t all that different from that of pandemic “freedom” states like Texas and Florida through the entirety of Acton’s leadership of the health department during the pandemic. 

For instance, Ohio closed its K-12 schools in the Spring of 2020 on the same day as Florida. Also, while Texas and Florida were quicker to re-open restaurants, Ohio was quicker to re-open its first bars. 

Acton led the Ohio Department of Health for the first 94 days of the pandemic before she resigned June 11, 2020. In that time, Ohio acted more or less with comparable timing with dozens of states, Democrat and Republican, largely adhering to CDC guidance under the Trump administration in responding to what was then an emerging and novel health crisis. Ultimately, millions of Ohioans were infected during the pandemic, and more than 42,000 died.

“All the states were doing this,” said Sharona Hoffman, a co-director at the law and medicine center at Case Western Reserve University’s law school. “We were not anomalous in any way. Texas and Florida were doing the same thing. … It had nothing to do with Amy Acton.”

Republicans have criticized Acton for taking comparatively common steps to respond to the pandemic, and glossing over their Republican backing. For instance, some have castigated Acton for issuing a late-breaking order delaying the March 2020 primary election. But Ohio was one of at least 16 states to delay its primaries. And the order only came after a lawsuit on behalf of immunocompromised voters seeking to do the same, organized by statewide Republicans including DeWine and Secretary of State Frank LaRose, failed.  

Like other Republicans, Ramaswamy has distanced himself from things like his personal decision to get vaccinated against COVID-19 or his self-identification as an “adviser” to the state’s pandemic response. As recently as Saturday, he referred to Acton as a “bureaucrat who shut down our economy [and] who will do it again” if given the chance. 

The criticism comes despite insistence from DeWine, also a Republican, that the life-or-death policy choices of the day were his. 

While most health orders were signed by Acton – state law vests power in the health department director – Acton and DeWine rolled them out jointly at the daily pandemic-era press conferences that vaulted Acton to prominence. 

“The decisions that were made during COVID, they were my decisions, so no one should blame someone else if they don’t like it,” DeWine said recently. “The buck stops with me.”

Ramaswamy’s campaign declined to make the candidate available for an interview or answer questions on the subject of COVID-19. 

Acton’s campaign also declined an interview, emphasizing that DeWine has taken ownership of pandemic-era decisions and that Ohio acted in similar fashion as most states. 

“Dr. Acton is proud of the work she did alongside Governor Mike DeWine to put public health over politics, save lives, and keep Ohioans safe,” said Addie Bullock, an Acton spokeswoman. “Meanwhile, Vivek Ramaswamy made more than $2 billion from the COVID-19 vaccine, wanted to ‘segregate’ Ohioans based on their immunity status, and spent over $70,000 lobbying the federal government and White House on COVID drug approvals.”

Ohio, Florida and (most) California schools closed on the same day

On March 12, 2020, DeWine announced that Ohio would be the first state in the nation to close all public schools, effective March 16. 

The decision proved to be a watershed moment. Within 24 hours, dozens of states followed. These included ruby red political grounds of Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Utah and West Virginia. 

While Ramaswamy’s campaign regularly and correctly points out that Ohio was the first to “announce” a statewide closure, most states closed schools around the same time. 

Ohio and Florida both closed March 16, 2020, a Monday. California didn’t issue any statewide school closure at the time, but by that same day, districts enrolling 90% of California students had closed on their own accord. Texas schools were ordered to close that Friday. 

When lawmakers convened for the first time during the pandemic later that month, the Ohio General Assembly didn’t at all reverse Acton’s decision. Instead, lawmakers voted to relieve schools of certain testing and reporting requirements given the shutdowns.

The bill passed unanimously, including with a vote from Sen. Rob McColley, a northwest Ohio Republican who is now Ramaswamy’s running mate. 

States varied widely on contentious decisions around handling the 2020-2021 school year. In general terms, Republican states pushed more aggressively for open classrooms, while Democrats sought remote learning options. But these debates occurred well after Acton left and under a new state health director. 

Ohio’s bar shutdown? Shorter than sunny Texas’

Ohio closed its bars and restaurants March 15, 2020, in one of the most visceral intrusions into adults’ lives during the pandemic at the time. 

California, Florida and Texas’ bars and restaurants were all shuttered by March 20. 

In the bitter decisions over re-opening the economy, Ohio sat reliably mid-pack throughout. Restaurants re-opened outdoors on May 15, 2020, with some bars almost immediately drawing dense crowds that stirred unease in state officials. Indoor dining resumed six days later. That’s 61 and 67 days, respectively. 

Florida – its tourist towns in the midst of spring break – reopened its restaurants on May 1, 2020, and its bars June 5. That means its restaurants closed for 42 days and its bars for 81. 

Texas reopened restaurants on May 4, 2020, at between 25% and 50% capacity, and opened bars on May 22 that year. So Texas restaurants were closed for 42 days and bars for 64. 

The timeline is messier than partisan politics suggest. Florida and Texas were more aggressive opening restaurants than Ohio was, while more cautious with their bars. 

Ohio declined a mask mandate under Acton

Conservatives have repeatedly sought to connect Acton with pandemic-era, robin’s egg-blue cloth masks – a visceral symbol of one of the most unpopular elements of the pandemic among conservatives. 

But Ohio under Acton spurned a torrent of roughly two dozen progressive states that began imposing statewide mask mandates in April 2020. 

On April 27, 2020, DeWine announced that Ohio would join a wave of more than a dozen states and impose a statewide mask mandate at open businesses to slow the spread of COVID-19. 

But it never took effect, at least in the short run. The very next day, DeWine reversed himself, saying too many Ohioans found the notion of being forced to wear a mask “offensive.”

It wasn’t until July 2020, weeks after Acton resigned, that Ohio first required masks indoors, becoming roughly the 30th U.S. state to do so. 

What about closing churches?

A perennial myth of pandemic lore is that Ohio ordered the closure of churches during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The Ohio Republican Party on Tuesday posted on social media an image of a man holding a sign – created by conservative organization Turning Point USA – that says “Don’t Let Dems Shut Down Our Churches.” He’s standing next to a cardboard cutout of Acton, wearing a blue cloth mask. 

Rep. Adam Mathews, a Cincinnati Republican and attorney who serves in the General Assembly, in late July penned an op-ed with the headline “Amy Acton closed churches, kept abortions going. I am Catholic. That’s what matters.” (The headline was later corrected.)

However, Ohio never shut down churches during the pandemic. And Ohio’s Republican attorney general used the health department’s shutdown of “nonessential” medical procedures to include abortion clinics, an interpretation later overturned by federal courts. In other words, Acton’s health order was used as the legal basis to shutter abortion clinics until judges intervened. Mathews didn’t return a phone call.

DeWine, a religious conservative, asked that churches either refrain from convening in person or at least adopt social distancing measures, but he said it wouldn’t be enforced so as not to interfere with people’s constitutional rights to free exercise of religion. Acton’s health order was explicit on this point. 

“This Order does not apply to and/or excludes religious gatherings, gatherings for the purpose of the expression of First Amendment protected speech,” it states.

Dan Tierney, a DeWine spokesman, said in an interview Tuesday he recalled the administration taking a lot of heat on the issue, but, he said, it’s simply incorrect to suggest any official action closed a church in Ohio. 

He said some people perhaps mistook churches’ voluntary decision to close as the result of a health order. But on the other hand, the era was a hotbed of bad actors speaking untruths. 

“During covid, there was a lot of misinformation on a lot of things from all ends of the political spectrum,” he said. “This is not the first time we had to answer that [church closure] question. We had to answer it back then too.”

California, for its part, took a more aggressive stance and closed churches. The U.S. Supreme Court overturned the order, deeming it a violation of the First Amendment.  

A misleading nursing home ad

COVID-19 spread most efficiently in communal settings and hit older and infirmed populations the hardest. This combination left nursing homes uniquely vulnerable. 

Every state struggled with the same problems – not enough testing to detect the virus or personal protective equipment to slow its spread. States tried increasing pay for the care workforce, surging protective equipment into the facilities, and restricting visitors. 

Ohio, along with at least 30 other states, including Texas and Florida, banned nursing home visits in an effort to slow the spread of the virus, although research suggests the policy was ineffective. Other studies have found that no state emerged as a role model in their handling of nursing homes during the pandemic, where 39% of all COVID-19 deaths occurred.

A recent ad from the Ramaswamy campaign invokes Acton’s decisions on the subject. In the ad, a Republican activist named Linda Caudill says her mother was in a nursing home when “Amy Acton shut down the state.” She said her mother was old and couldn’t comprehend why her family couldn’t visit. 

“Amy Acton is to blame for this,” the ad states.

The ad criticizes Acton for the virus mitigation measures, while showing headlines about COVID-19-related deaths in Ohio nursing homes. 

What’s more, some of the claims of Caudill – who is arguably best known for a Columbus Dispatch photograph that captured her angrily screaming outside the Ohio Statehouse in April 2020 while DeWine and Acton gave a press conference – don’t seem to hold up either. A Columbus Dispatch fact check found that Caudill’s mother lived in Kentucky and died after Ohio lifted its stay-at-home order. 

Ohio Democrats called the ad a “scam,” and Democratic Party spokeswoman Katie Seewer accused Ramaswamy of resorting to “baseless and easily disproven lies because he’s desperate to salvage any thread of his failing campaign.”

Signal Statewide reached out to Caudill for comment. 

Andrew Tobias contributed reporting.

Signal Ohio is a nonprofit news organization covering government, education, health, economy and public safety.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The progressive think tank published its findings at the end of July in a report titled, “Care Matters: A 2026 Report Card on Care Affordability and Access.”

“Investments in care address needs across the lifespan, enabling people to live, learn, age, and work with dignity,” the report states. “Yet, the majority in Congress and the current administration have cut funding for vital care programs and pursued a sweeping deregulatory agenda that strips away hard-won policies that value care while also using unfounded attacks on program integrity to justify further disinvestment.”

Cuts in funding for Medicaid, Medicare, the Affordable Care Act, and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, were contained in the budget bill Trump signed into law in 2025. They are expected to cause long-lasting damage to the country’s caregiving infrastructure. As a result of the cuts, already vulnerable populations, such as older individuals and young children, will be left without the support they need, according to the foundation’s report.

For example, Medicaid is the primary source of funding for home- and community-based services, or HCBS, which allow people with disabilities and older individuals to receive care services at home rather than in an institution or nursing facility. Following Republicans’ nearly $1 trillion cut to Medicaid, several states have begun considering cuts to their HCBS programs, while others already have begun paring back their services.

In addition to the cuts in the budget law, the administration has weakened and repealed policies that reduced the cost of childcare, protected wages for homecare workers, and improved nursing home staffing requirements, the Century Foundation wrote.

Aging and disability care 

About 8.4 million people receive Medicaid-funded home or community services annually, according to an analysis from the Bipartisan Policy Center. Through those services, people with disabilities and older adults receive help with dressing, cooking and other daily activities. 

There have long been challenges for individuals seeking to access  this kind of care — hundreds of thousands of people are on Medicaid waiting lists for them — and that limited availability is now exacerbated by Republicans’ cuts to funding for healthcare, the Century Foundation said.

Since Trump signed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act into law in July 2025, nearly 30 states have proposed or enacted cuts to their home and community care programs, according to an HCBS impact tracker from George Washington University’s Milken Institute School of Public Health. 

Childcare and early learning

 Childcare workers were already struggling prior to the Republicans’ cuts, having long been paid low wages and often receiving no benefits through their jobs. These workers often rely on government programs like SNAP and Medicaid in order to afford food and healthcare, even when they’re employed full time, notes the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment at the University of California, Berkeley. They are likely to suffer substantial financial harm from the federal cuts to these programs, the Century Foundation report said.

Fair working conditions 

On average, care workers earn far less than the national median income. In 2025, for example, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, childcare workers made an average of $16.82 per hour, while the national median hourly wage was $24.51. Home health and personal care aides earned an average of $17.21 an hour in 2025. Those aides are often referred to as direct care workers, and they work with people with developmental and physical disabilities.

Care workers now potentially face losing their employment as well because in many instances the jobs they hold are funded by Medicaid.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

In a preliminary injunction, U.S. District Judge Deborah Boardman barred the Trump administration from carrying out the president’s executive order that would deny citizenship to babies born in the United States to parents deemed part of a designated terrorist organization or to parents who purposefully came to the U.S. to gain citizenship in what critics call “birth tourism.” 

The executive order also aimed to deny citizenship to children born to foreign diplomatic staff and children born in U.S. territories where Congress has not passed a law granting citizenship, which is only American Samoa.

In her order, Boardman said this summer’s Supreme Court ruling affirmed the country’s long understanding that babies born on U.S. soil were guaranteed American citizenship. 

“The 2026 Executive Order is almost certainly unconstitutional as applied to the certified class for the simple reason that the Supreme Court in Barbara already decided that the children in the class are citizens at birth,” she wrote, referring to the earlier case. “This Court must, once again, preliminarily enjoin enforcement of the President’s most recent attempt to strip the right to citizenship from them.”

The White House did not immediately respond to States Newsroom’s request for comment. 

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The Century Foundation, a progressive think tank, ranked states according to their paid family and medical leave programs in its recently released report “Care Matters: A 2026 Report Care on Care Affordability and Access.” 

States that scored the highest were Minnesota, Colorado, Maine, Maryland, Oregon and Virginia. The report explains that states received high marks for covering all workers; having an inclusive definition of family; offering broad eligible uses for leave, such as family caregiving needs; and offering more than 12 weeks of benefits, among other metrics.

“Such leave is vital to support parents’ bond with newborn children, and for individuals to take care of their own or a loved one’s serious illness,” the Century Foundation writes in its report. “This leave is vital for the health and well-being of families, and also supports families’ economic security during periods where they cannot work due to health care needs. “

Fourteen states and Washington, D.C., have paid family leave programs, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center. The other states that have mandatory paid family leave programs are California, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Washington, Delaware and Massachusetts. Virginia is the most recent state to pass paid family and medical leave legislation: Gov. Abigail Spanberger signed a paid leave bill into law in May.

 At the federal level, the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 allows eligible employees to take 12 weeks of unpaid job-protected leave, but there is no federal law that mandates paid leave. 

Virginia is the first state in the South to enact paid leave, the Century Foundation noted. According to a press release issued by Spanberger’s office in May, the program will cover more than three million workers in the commonwealth.

“Under this landmark law, hardworking Virginians will have the freedom to take care of loved ones, recover from illness, and spend time with their newborns — all with the confidence that they will keep their paychecks,” Spanberger said in the release. “Because no one should have to choose between spending time with their newborn and paying their bills. No one should have to drain their savings or fall behind on rent because a loved one gets sick. And no one should be forced to return to work while facing a serious illness.”

Spanberger added that the legislation will help small- and mid-sized businesses offer benefits they couldn’t previously afford. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonpartisan research group, noted the benefits of paid leave for businesses in a 2021 report that advocated for a national paid leave program.

“Paid leave benefits businesses by improving retention and productivity and boosting labor force participation,” the CBPP wrote.

The Century Foundation also ranked states on policies covering paid sick days as well as safe days, paid time off that can be used to recover from an illness, care for a sick family member, or respond to a public health emergency or domestic and sexual abuse.

The states that scored highest for their sick leave programs were Colorado, Minnesota, New Mexico, California and Michigan. All of those states’ policies cover most workers, use inclusive definitions of family, and include safe days in their program.

“It should be common practice that when someone is sick, has a sick child, or doctors appointments they need to get to, they should be able to take time off work without worrying about losing income or their jobs,” the Century Foundation wrote.

There are a total of 18 states that have paid sick day laws. The other states that have paid sick day laws are Alaska, Arizona, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, and Washington. The District of Columbia also has a paid sick leave law.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

In addition, data centers power AI chatbots that have been accused of engaging in sexual conversations with minors and failing to discourage them from suicide. Even among adults, excessive use of chatbots is causing “AI psychosis.”

On the other hand are undeniable benefits. The technology is already enabling tremendous strides in things like medical research and the other sciences. It’s also creating millions of construction jobs, and it’s integrating itself into everyday life in ways that make it more convenient.

But other questions are more ominous.

Who will lose their jobs to artificial intelligence? And how many more will be forced to work as living, breathing AI drones, monitored by GPS and biometric cameras as computers make humans labor right up to the limits of their ability?

As he reported and produced the podcast series “The Data Centers are Coming,” Danny Caine tried to address those questions.

Working with the antimonopoly group the Institute for Local Self Reliance, the former Kansas bookstore owner interviewed people in places like Virginia’s Data Center Alley and Memphis, Tennessee, where Elon Musk is accused of using more than a dozen unpermitted gas-fired generators to power his massive xAI center.

Growing opposition

In those places and hundreds of others, residents fear that their lives are being profoundly altered by projects over which they didn’t get much of a say. That might explain why opposition is growing so fiercely across the political spectrum.

“Data center opposition is a remarkably bipartisan issue,” Caine told the Capital Journal.

An example: In Box Elder County, Utah, 70% of voters went for Donald Trump in 2024, while in Minneapolis, voters went for Kamala Harris by a similar margin.  

“Both passed data center moratoriums,” Caine said. “This is everybody. You’ve got farmers out west and you’ve got socialists in New York City organizing on the same issue. I think they’re doing a really good job making sure there’s room for everybody. A part of it is that this is local. It hasn’t been polarized by national political rhetoric like immigration. This is people talking about what gets built in their community and how they should grow economically.”

Caleb Max, president and CEO of industry group the National Artificial Intelligence Association, said it’s a misconception that data centers don’t have to go through the permitting processes that other projects do. He also said communities are given advance warning and a chance to have their say.

“Data centers file the same permits and go through the same county zoning and board processes as any other large development and those processes end in votes by elected local officials,” he said in an email. “Projects have been modified, relocated, and voted down outright across the country, including in Ohio.”

Max cited plans to build an OpenAI data center in Effingham County, Georgia, as an example.

“Before construction began, the company published its commitments, held a public open house where residents questioned engineers directly, and is building a community compact out of that feedback,” he said, later adding, “Was the meeting contentious? Very. That is the process working, not failing.”

However, the public appears to have been informed of the $20 billion project pretty late in the game.

OpenAI got local government officials to sign nondisclosure agreements regarding the project on Feb. 2, WTOC reported. Then, on July 21, they signed a memorandum of understanding and finalized a huge tax break for the project, the TV station reported.

With the county already committed to the project, it was publicly announced on July 22, with construction planned to start before the end of the year.

The open house Max cited was held a day after that, according to the Effingham Herald. Hundreds packed the meeting and are now forming an opposition group — to fight a project their county officials have already bound them to.

In addition, The Current reported that Gov. Brian Kemp met in May with OpenAI and Georgia Power “with no mentions of data center construction on its briefing memo.”

Opposition to such projects appears to be spreading.

An Economist/YouGov poll released last month reported that just 24% of Americans now believe data centers are good versus 47% who say they’re not. 

Democrats were most opposed, followed by independents. More Republicans were in favor than opposed, but only by five percentage points, and 29% were undecided.

In addition, Politico polls conducted in January and July found that opinion has been shifting against data centers rapidly, so opposition seems likely to grow.

Tax breaks

One reason why opinion is shifting might have to do with the belated discovery of massive tax breaks that were given in virtual secrecy to companies controlled by some of the world’s richest people.

In June, The Columbus Dispatch wrote that before he left office in 2019, Ohio Gov. John Kasich quietly gave Google, Amazon and Meta huge tax exemptions lasting 40 years.

They were part of $2.3 billion in tax breaks the former governor handed out — supposedly to persuade companies to build in Ohio. However, they’re so desperate to build more “compute,” that Industrial Equipment News reports some are even looking at ways to build data centers in the ocean.

Max, of the Artificial Intelligence Association, agreed that the AI companies don’t need the tax breaks with which Ohio and other states have been so lavish.

“They do not need them,” he said. “Communities offer them because they want to compete for the investment, and Ohio has been good at it. Governor DeWine noted in May that previously exempted projects reported $27.2 billion in capital investment in 2025 alone.”

The investment is huge, but it will create relatively few jobs once construction is completed. Policy Matters Ohio estimates that the Google, Amazon, and Meta subsidies will cost Ohio taxpayers $1 million per permanent job created.

For Caine, news of the Ohio tax breaks came just as he and his team were finishing their podcast series. It might be part of a bonus episode, he said.

“That policy was basically a secret until somebody went and dug it up years later,” he said. “That’s one thing that really upsets people about this. Data centers are bad and people hate them. But they also hate that a lot of this is happening in secret. They don’t have any input. They feel like the first time they hear about this stuff, it’s a done deal.”

Affecting neighbors

When he traveled to Data Center Alley — a region in Northern Virginia containing about 300 of the facilities — Caine saw the effects they can have on people living close to them. Generators serving some are so loud that residents are spending thousands doing things like installing plexiglass over their windows to dampen the noise.

Caine said such noise forces people indoors — and away from the neighbor-to-neighbor organizing his group advocates. 

“One thing that’s really concerning is that if you make the neighborhood environment hostile via noise or pollution or whatever, people connect with each other less,” he said. “You’re driving people inside and away from connecting with each other. Big Tech people might not mind that. Instead of being outside connecting with people, you’re inside looking at your device. So just being outside organizing with your neighbors is a kind of rebellion against what Big Tech wants to build.”

Max, the AI industry spokesman, said focusing solely on those complaints ignores advancements in the industry.

“There is a vacuum mentality here, the assumption that data centers drain the water, the power supply, and the grid, and that often isn’t the case anymore,” he said. “On water, the industry has moved to closed loop cooling that recirculates water in a sealed system rather than evaporating it. New Central Ohio developments use air cooled closed loop chillers, Meta has committed to (be) water positive by 2030, and Amazon has a water neutral pledge.”

Max also touted a pledge by PJM, the electricity grid that serves Ohio and 12 other states, that data centers will pay for any additional generation they’ll require.

However, the Ohio Manufacturers Association and others are concerned that monopoly utilities are using data centers to inflate demand forecasts to justify construction from which they’ll profit. That can force up rates, and if they overbuild, ratepayers will be stuck holding the bag, critics say.

Many data centers are easing the strain on the electricity grid by generating their own power “behind the meter.”

But that comes with downsides of its own. The great majority burn fossil fuels and generate noise and greenhouse gasses.

And PBS and Floodlight report, they’re going up so fast that they’re overwhelming state and federal regulators that have been systematically starved of resources. In a separate investigation published last week, Floodlight and The Guardian reported that a Microsoft-backed data center in New Jersey fired up dozens of gas-powered generators without getting the required permits — an apparent violation of federal law.

Impact on average people

But perhaps the most important question is what will happen to Americans — especially the most vulnerable — once all these data centers are built and AI takes a central role in the workplace.

Many worry that it will make millions of jobs obsolete. Caine is also worried about the ones that will remain.

One need only look at the lives of the 1 million Americans who work for Amazon to get an  idea, he said.

“If you look at Amazon warehouse workers or delivery drivers, they’re completely at the mercy of the machines that control their rates,” he said. “Whether it’s all the biometric cameras in the Amazon vans, or the little GPS handheld things in the warehouse, they exist to make sure the machines keep running. It’s machines first, then humans.”

In other words, Caine is saying a dangerous line is crossed when AI doesn’t just work for people, but people also work for AI.

“When the human loses agency for the sake of the machine, it’s literally dehumanizing,” he said.

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

About 32,200 Ohio students are enrolled in 267 active LifeWise chapters across the state — about 43% of Ohio’s school districts, according to a LifeWise spokesperson. 

There are 240 more LifeWise chapters in process in Ohio, according to a new map on LifeWise’s website. 

“Ohio is LifeWise Academy’s home state, so we have deep roots and strong community support here,” according to a LifeWise spokesperson. “Ohio also has a long history of released time religious instruction, including the program in Van Wert that helped inspire LifeWise’s creation.”

LifeWise’s founder and CEO Joel Penton is from Van Wert in Northwest Ohio.

LifeWise is a non-denominational Christian program based in Hilliard that teaches religion to public school students during the school day at a special release time. It currently has 531 live chapters and 4,377 chapters in process nationwide, according to the map. 

Religious release time instruction must meet three criteria: the courses must take place off school property, be privately funded, and students must have parental permission. The United States Supreme Court upheld release time laws during the 1952 Zorach v. Clauson case.

Mercer County in western Ohio is the only county in Ohio where a LifeWise chapter is not live, launching or in the planning stages, according to the map. 

In January 2025, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signed a law passed by Republican lawmakers that mandates public school districts create a policy allowing release time for religious instruction. Ohio is one of 18 states with such a law, according to LifeWise. 

“LifeWise has been well received in Ohio communities as families see the positive impact it has on students’ behavior, academic performance and well-being,” according to a LifeWise spokesperson. 

But the program isn’t universally accepted in Ohio by any means. Some parents have said their students have been ostracized and bullied for not taking part in LifeWise, and some parents have said their child goes to a study hall in the school’s gymnasium while their classmates attend LifeWise.

“(LifeWise doesn’t) look at the effects of the Jewish students that are basically being forced into a gym, that are feeling punished because they don’t believe as such, and because they don’t believe, they don’t go,” said Kitty Schwanitz, an organizer for the Secular Education Association.  

She said LifeWise is spreading “very much almost the way that cancer spreads.” 

“(People) don’t realize what they’re getting, and that’s actually what we’re seeing a lot of,” she said.

“Parents are coming to us and going, I didn’t understand or realize what I was getting my kids into, and now they believe these things, and I’m horrified. … Parents are getting the buyer’s remorse of what LifeWise is.”

Indiana has the second most live chapters LifeWise with 63, followed by Illinois with 28, and Michigan with 19, according to the map. 

Texas has more than 400 chapters in process, Pennsylvania has more than 350 chapters in process, and Indiana has more than 200 chapters in process, according to the map. 

Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Maryland, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Louisiana, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Utah, Nevada, and Hawaii do not have any live LifeWise chapters, but all are building up chapters, according to LifeWise. 

Follow Ohio Capital Journal Reporter Megan Henry on X or on Bluesky.

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Another young child can’t use their hearing aids because the family ran out of batteries and hasn’t come to get replacements.

Yet another child’s cochlear implant surgery was delayed by several months. 

These patients’ families, all immigrants, have been afraid of showing up to the hospital after immigration officers flooded their communities in recent months, said their doctor, pediatric otolaryngologist Asitha Jayawardena, a head and neck surgeon at Children’s Minnesota. 

Clinicians like Jayawardena say immigration arrests and detentions are taking a particularly acute toll on children’s health as families isolate at home. He’s seen some cases — such as the child with the neck infection — worsen because fearful parents aren’t coming in. 

“Without a doubt, it oscillates between being infuriating and absolutely disheartening,” Jayawardena said about the chilling effect. 

As the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement leads to sweeping arrests, healthcare workers say those actions have hit children hard — including children who are U.S. citizens and those in families without arrests.

Many healthcare providers report that since January 2025, they’ve seen a surge in missed pediatric appointments, delayed preventive care, and sick or injured kids going without treatment. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests have continued to climb — with a record 51,000 arrests in July — and experts predict continued unhealthy outcomes among children, causing collateral damage that could extend for years. 

Healthcare workers told Stateline that in addition to the physical healthcare fallout, they’ve also seen a significant increase in depression, anxiety and post-trauma symptoms among their pediatric patients. 

Delayed healthcare has critical consequences for young kids. For example, hearing loss, such as that experienced by Jayawardena’s patients, can hinder crucial development including speech, language and social skills. Along with missing health milestones and getting needed healthcare, kids are grappling with the long-term trauma of losing a parent.

“Community-wide trauma that is being inflicted is having a really important impact on families and children in particular. There are children that are losing their guardians. There are families that are losing their breadwinners,” said Amy Liebman, chief program officer of the Migrant Clinicians Network, a nationwide organization of healthcare workers serving migrant families.

“That certainly is going to ultimately impact their health and then their ability to access care,” she said.

The Trump administration also has introduced rules that allow federal agencies to take into account a family’s use of public benefits when reviewing applications for lawful immigration status. Dr. Gabriela Maradiaga Panayotti, a pediatrician in Durham, North Carolina, pointed to studies showing that such policies lead to a decrease in healthcare use, including among U.S. citizen children.

One of her patients, a U.S. citizen on Medicaid, had stopped a medication for ADHD that had helped him achieve better grades at school. His parents feared being targeted through Medicaid paperwork, so they didn’t refill his prescription. The child’s grades began to drop again.

“They didn’t want to be labeled as utilizing resources,” Maradiaga Panayotti said. “I hurt for him, especially because he’s at this tender preteen age where self-confidence and performance at school can really either build on and set a good foundation for success in high school, or can drop.”

Millions of children

Researchers at the Brookings Institution, a public policy research nonprofit, estimate that since Jan. 20 of last year, the day President Donald Trump was sworn in, and through early April of this year, over 146,000 U.S. citizen children have had a parent detained.

But many more are living with that fear. 

The Pew Research Center estimates 4.6 million U.S.-born children lived with an unauthorized immigrant parent in 2023, and roughly 2.5 million children could face the detention of both household parents, according to a Brookings analysis. 

But the trend cuts across immigration status — including those born to refugees, DACA recipients, asylees and people with temporary protected status. Across the nation, about a fourth of children are born to immigrant families, according to the Migrant Policy Institute.  

Increased ICE activity has included arrests at hospitals, and the agency has also made unprecedented efforts to obtain private health data, including Medicaid patient records, to extract addresses and immigration statuses — another major source of fear for families.

Jayawardena and his colleagues published a study in the American Academy of Pediatrics medical journal in August measuring whether pediatric outpatient care visits were disrupted during and after the large-scale immigration raids of Operation Metro Surge in Minneapolis, when the Trump administration deployed 3,000 agents, heavily targeting Somali and South Asian communities. 

The research team found that the rate of missed appointments among Hispanic or Latino children increased by over 50% during Metro Surge compared to the same time period — the first week of December to second week of February — in the prior two years.

Missed appointments increased by 80% among Spanish-speaking families and 53% among families needing language interpretation services. 

“The barrier is not necessarily lack of access, but more the fear and the isolation, and so the enforcement is having this chilling effect on immigrant families who, even though they may need these critical services, may be avoiding the hospital, the counseling, the victim services, and other essential care,” said Jasiel Fernandez, vice president of psychosocial supports at the global pro bono nonprofit KIND, or Kids in Need of Defense. “We see that happening over and over.”

It’s just very disheartening knowing that there’s something I can do, but I am prohibited from doing it because families don’t feel safe.

– pediatric otolaryngologist Dr. Asitha Jayawardena, a head and neck surgeon at Children’s Minnesota

The Migrant Clinicians Network, along with Physicians For Human Rights, surveyed nearly 700 healthcare workers across 30 states between March and August of last year, amid spikes in immigration activity. Most of the surveyed professionals — 84% — reported significant or moderate drops in pediatric patient visits since Trump’s January 2025 executive orders on immigration.

Kids also were spending less time outdoors, which affects overall health, and saw delayed diagnoses of their conditions. About 27% of clinicians said patients feared enrolling in benefits for their children, and couldn’t afford doctor visits. Preventive care, such as vaccinations, as well as chronic disease management and mental health care were the most affected, healthcare workers reported. 

And in both the survey and through interviews with Stateline, clinicians have reported seeing kids show up to emergency departments alone.

In Missouri, one pediatric emergency medicine physician, who spoke with Stateline on the condition of anonymity because he feared retaliation against his hospital, recalled an 11-year-old child who had been attacked by a dog, his legs riddled in bites. He came to the hospital with only his teenage sister.  

“He told us that (his parents) were scared to come in because ICE might be at the hospital,” the physician recalled. 

Others aren’t showing up to care at all. “Kids like these are so vulnerable that they kind of could fall through the cracks,” he added. “We see the downstream effects of policy changes, and we try to address all these needs. But when kids are coming in, they’re super sick.” 

Missed care, advanced illness

Some clinicians told Stateline that by the time some children reach their clinics, their health conditions have advanced to a more difficult stage. 

One North Carolina pediatrician has seen kids with asthma miss inhaler prescriptions, leading to more asthma attacks. In another case, a large family of refugee children came in covered in splotchy, itchy rashes — scabies. The family had been sharing two bedrooms. Afraid, they had postponed care for four weeks. 

“All of these children, totally ridden throughout their bodies, and it’s so uncomfortable. You can’t sleep because it’s horribly itchy,” said the pediatrician, who spoke to Stateline on the condition of anonymity, fearing retaliation since her clinic receives federal funding. 

“We’re creating tremendous problems for our community that will probably come back to bite us, because now these kids are going around with untreated medical conditions that are only going to get worse,” she said. “It’s a time when they need even more support than before, and our administration just isn’t really allowing that.”

She and others said they’re also noticing worsening depression among their patients.

“They’re spiraling out, and they’re not getting any support because they can’t come in and get care,” said the North Carolina pediatrician. She recalled one teenager telling her that they couldn’t sleep at night. “ ‘I’m sobbing and crying, terrified that my parents will be taken away,’ ” she recalled the teen telling her.

Elsewhere, one of KIND’s clients in California, a preteen sexual assault victim, has gone weeks without mental health care.

“The child’s sponsor, who is undocumented, is very afraid to take the young person to mental health appointments or any other kind of follow-up service,” Fernandez said. “Choosing basically to forgo that for the time being.”

In Texas, which has the most immigrant detainees of any state, a 14-year-old’s primary caregiver was detained. The teen has been suffering suicidal ideation.

“That young person is unable to access services,” Fernandez said. “Even if we think that a teenager has a certain level of agency to do certain things, when the caregiver is removed abruptly … the sponsor is not able to support, is not able to meet significant needs and monitoring for that young person.”

Fernandez said KIND has been offering Uber and Lyft rides to field offices because clients are afraid to drive to appointments to receive healthcare.

In southeast Florida’s Indian River County, Heather Miranda is CEO of Treasure Coast Community Health, which runs multiple clinics serving nearby communities of agricultural workers. Clinic staff in the northern area of the county, where Miranda said most immigration enforcement activity has been concentrated, told her they’ve seen a significant decrease of kids coming in — nearly 500 pediatric no-shows since February, 16% of all appointments. 

“They’ve seen kids not coming in for sick visits,” Miranda said. “Not coming in for their well-child or their vaccines. … It’s just been, overall, a decrease in preventative care, which is really, really important.”

Back in Minneapolis, Jayawardena said that even months after Operation Metro Surge, fear among his patient families remains “a persistent problem.”

“I want to help take care of these children, and the families want to get taken care of, as does my entire hospital system — and we cannot get them just physically into the hospital for things that are necessary,” he said.

“It’s just very disheartening knowing that there’s something I can do, but I am prohibited from doing it because families don’t feel safe.”

Stateline reporter Nada Hassanein can be reached at nhassanein@stateline.org.

This story was originally produced by Stateline, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Ohio Capital Journal, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

A promising, young Haitian immigrant in Ohio, fitted with an ICE ankle bracelet in July, threw himself in front of a semi on I-70 on Monday. Pierre Damas Bel, a Springfield immigrant and new student at Wright State University, was pronounced dead at the scene. The 20-year-old, with big dreams of going to medical school, had been mocked by fellow students about the bulky ankle monitor he was forced to wear. On a July 30 Instagram post, Bel shared his pain.

“I came to this country to pursue my education. I didn’t come here to commit a crime or hurt anyone. Yet now I’m walking through the streets of the United States with a GPS monitor on my leg, carrying a feeling of shame and humiliation that I never imagined I would experience,” Bel wrote. “I came here to study, build my future and to live a better life, not to be treated like a criminal.”

Like Bel, dozens of Springfield’s Haitians have been fitted with ankle monitors or detained by ICE after their Temporary Protected Status was officially ended by the Trump administration on July 27. The extreme toll on the community— that had come to Springfield legally under TPS to work and raise families until it was safe to return to Haiti— was ironically the emphasis of the “Unshackle Springfield” rally held the day before Bel took his own life.

The protest at city hall drew hundreds of faith leaders from across Ohio and the country, immigration advocates, asylum-seeking Haitians, and supporters but notably no political leadership (local, state, federal) with an elevated platform to decry the dehumanization of terrified Ohio residents.

“They’re nowhere. They’re hiding. They’re afraid of the federal government. They’re afraid of masked federal agents coming into Springfield with guns, ramming their cars against people driving down Springfield roads,” said an exasperated Lynn Tramonte, executive director of the Ohio Immigration Alliance. “I mean, who’s protecting us? I can’t believe we’re in this situation where the only people standing up are the faith community and regular, ordinary people who are on the lookout for ICE and doing these patrols.”

“The city of Springfield went from embracing the Haitian population that helped it grow to abandoning them in their hour of need.” 

Tramonte also said “agents of the U.S. government are using our tax dollars to terrorize good people who deserve to live in a safe place” and city officials are accommodating and actively assisting ICE out of fear.

She argued that the people in power who could bring peace to Springfield would rather offer “thoughts and prayers” for better days ahead than lead through conviction. The inhumanity is happening in Ohio, and Springfield is offering city property to make it more efficient.

Mayor Rob Rue once urged Congress to find a permanent legal solution for hard-working, tax-paying Haitian TPS holders in Springfield, strongly rejected the dehumanizing lies spewed by JD Vance and Donald Trump about pet-eating Haitians, and blamed consecutive bomb threats in his town on that hateful rhetoric, demonstrating that he had a functioning moral compass before.

But now, Tramonte said he is not talking publicly, and his rote political statements about enforcing the law and deporting criminals who break it “is not what we’re talking about in Springfield.”

ICE is “enforcing paperwork violations” as if they were heinous crimes, with raids, detentions, deportations, and boxy electronic shackles, she said. City officials are missing in action on purpose.

So is Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, added the immigrant advocate. After being an ardent proponent “for Haitian-Ohioans settling into their new home,” Gov. DeWine seems to have turned the page, Tramonte said. He published an op-ed in the New York Times that tries to pass the buck to President Trump, naively calling on him to “lead an effort to reform our immigration system—to make changes that prioritize our workforce needs while respecting our history of welcoming people fleeing from oppression and humanitarian crises.”

Tramonte noted wryly that “no one has ever used the words ‘Trump’ and ‘welcoming people fleeing oppression’ in the same sentence for a reason.”

The lame-duck governor, concluded Tramonte, feels like he’s done all he can. Time to move on. The ball is in Trump’s court.

“But when it’s your family, you don’t give up, and I just want him to think about it as these (Haitian immigrants), this is your family. These are Ohioans. These are your people. Don’t give up.”

DeWine can pick up the phone today, she added, and tell U.S. Sens. Bernie Moreno and Jon Husted that Ohio needs them. He can tell Ohio law enforcement to focus on criminal activity not civil immigration enforcement.

“They should not help the Trump administration send Ohioans to a country where they will be killed,” Tramonte said. “That is not who we are and now is the time to lead.”

Maybe DeWine will surprise us, and maybe Ohio’s U.S. senators will grow a spine to save an Ohio city and the immigrant population that revitalized it. I wish somebody of either party would seize the moment with the moral courage it demands. Because, as Martin Luther King Jr. taught “there comes a time when silence is betrayal.”

A Haitian son who came to Springfield with his family legally and lost that status through no fault of his own, was bullied about the large, black tracking unit ICE slapped on the leg of the honor student who played soccer and wanted to be a doctor.

When Pierre Damas Bel died by apparent suicide this week, DeWine called it “a horrible, horrible tragedy.” It is also a grievous stain on the state that conceded defeat on his future without a fight.

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The statewide average price for regular gasoline was $3.988 per gallon in August, according to newly released data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. That was the highest August average in the EIA’s Ohio gasoline price series, which dates to 2003.

The previous record was set in August 2012, when regular gasoline averaged $3.776 per gallon statewide. This year’s average topped that mark by more than 21 cents per gallon.

The year-over-year increase was far larger. Regular gasoline averaged $3.147 per gallon in Ohio in August 2025, according to the same federal price data. That means the August 2026 average was about 84 cents per gallon higher than one year earlier, an increase of nearly 27%.

The record comes less than two years after President Donald Trump repeatedly made dramatically cheaper energy a centerpiece of his campaign to return to the White House.

At an October 2024 campaign rally in Atlanta, Trump promised: “I will cut your energy prices in half within 12 months.” He made the same 50% pledge repeatedly at campaign stops around the country.

Trump continued predicting sharply cheaper gasoline after taking office. During an Aug. 6, 2025 White House appearance, Trump said gasoline would “soon” be “less than $2 a gallon.”

Instead, one year later, Ohio drivers spent August paying nearly twice that amount on average.

Prices climbed above $4 per gallon during portions of the month. The EIA’s weekly Ohio data show regular gasoline averaging $4.085 per gallon on Aug. 3 before falling to $3.899 on Aug. 10. One week later, the statewide average surged to $4.180 per gallon on Aug. 17, an increase of more than 28 cents in seven days.

The average fell to $3.981 on Aug. 24 and $3.797 on Aug. 31, but the month’s overall average still established a new August record.

The surge has unfolded during the prolonged U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, which began Feb. 28 and has repeatedly disrupted one of the world’s most important energy corridors.

The Strait of Hormuz carried roughly one-fifth of the world’s oil before the conflict. Reuters reported in late August that disruptions to energy supplies through the strait had helped push U.S. gasoline prices above $4 per gallon, roughly $1 higher nationally than a year earlier.

Ohio’s monthly numbers show how sharply the conflict coincided with higher prices at the pump. Regular gasoline averaged $2.758 per gallon in February, when the war began at the end of the month. The statewide monthly average climbed to $3.439 in March, $3.778 in April and an extraordinary $4.627 per gallon in May, according to EIA data.

Trump has acknowledged that the conflict is costing Americans at the pump. In May, while discussing gasoline prices and his decision to attack Iran, Trump said Americans would have to put up with higher prices “for a little while” and dismissed the additional cost as “peanuts.”

By August, the president was again defending higher fuel prices as a tradeoff for continuing the conflict. Reuters reported that Trump argued Americans should accept paying more for gasoline because he believed military action was necessary to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

Husted voted against 13 efforts to withdraw U.S. forces

Ohio’s U.S. Senate race has put the economic consequences of the Iran war directly on the November ballot.

Republican U.S. Sen. Jon Husted has voted 13 times against Senate efforts to withdraw U.S. forces from hostilities with Iran or advance measures requiring their withdrawal, according to a TiffinOhio.net review of federal roll-call records. Husted opposed every such Senate roll-call effort through July 30.

The votes included measures explicitly directing the removal of U.S. Armed Forces from hostilities “within or against the Islamic Republic of Iran that have not been authorized by Congress.” Husted’s own Senate voting record documents his opposition to the withdrawal measures.

Husted has defended his position by arguing that abandoning the military campaign could allow Iran to resume efforts to develop a nuclear weapon. But his response to Ohioans worried about the cost of gasoline drew attention earlier this year.

During a May appearance on Northeast Ohio’s “Strictly Speaking Unfiltered,” Husted discussed conversations with constituents concerned about gas prices and asked rhetorically: “What do you want me to do?”

As TiffinOhio.net reported at the time, Husted followed the question by arguing that the alternative would be walking away from Iran and allowing what he called the world’s leading sponsor of state terrorism to return to developing a nuclear weapon.

Husted faces former Democratic U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown in November’s special Senate election. Libertarian William Redpath is also on the ballot.

Brown has made the cost of the Iran conflict a major line of attack against Husted, repeatedly pointing to Husted’s votes and the higher prices Ohioans have faced for gasoline, diesel and other goods affected by energy and transportation costs.

The political pressure comes as fuel prices remain elevated heading into the fall. AAA reported an Ohio average of $3.9003 per gallon for regular gasoline on Sept. 3, up from $3.1313 one year earlier.

Diesel has risen even more dramatically. AAA put Ohio’s Sept. 3 diesel average at $5.7895 per gallon, compared with $3.6388 one year earlier. Reuters reported Thursday that U.S. diesel prices had reached a record high amid renewed fighting with Iran, disruptions to global fuel supplies and historically low inventories.

Oil markets also remain exposed to further escalation. Reuters reported this week that renewed U.S.-Iran fighting sent crude oil prices sharply higher again as traders reacted to the threat of additional disruptions around the Strait of Hormuz.

Trump and his administration have sought to push prices back down by pressing refiners to increase output, pursuing additional sources of crude oil and accusing some oil companies of profiting excessively from the crisis. But the conflict that began in February has continued into its seventh month, and Vice President JD Vance said Thursday that the administration could not provide a timeline for when hostilities would end.

The August record reflects nominal pump prices and is not adjusted for inflation. But measured by the prices motorists actually saw at the pump, the EIA data show that no August since the agency began tracking Ohio gasoline prices in 2003 was more expensive than August 2026.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Start with the ad. Ramaswamy’s campaign put Cincinnati Republican activist Linda Caudill on television, looking into the camera, blaming Dr. Amy Acton for her own mother’s death. “A few weeks after that is when Amy Acton shut down the state,” Caudill says in the spot. “My mother didn’t understand it. It traumatized her. She didn’t know why her family couldn’t come visit her. Two months later, she died. Amy Acton is to blame for this.”

It is a gutting thing to say about anyone. It is also, according to public records TiffinOhio.net and the Columbus Dispatch both confirmed, false. Caudill’s mother lived and died in Kentucky — not Ohio. She died six weeks after Acton had already resigned as health director, and roughly two months after Gov. Mike DeWine lifted the stay-at-home order Ramaswamy’s ad blames on Acton in the first place. DeWine himself, the man who actually signed those orders, has said repeatedly that the pandemic decisions were his alone. Read the full breakdown here: Fact check: Ramaswamy ad blames Acton for death of woman who lived and died in Kentucky, not Ohio.

Columbus City Attorney Zach Klein didn’t mince words about it. “It’s a lie; it’s a complete fabrication,” he said. “I think it speaks volumes to the type of person that Vivek Ramaswamy is and the type of governor he will be, that he’s going to lie, cheat, and steal his way to the governor’s office.”

I don’t say this lightly: he’s right. Dorothy Farrell’s obituary is a public record. Her Kentucky address, her Kentucky funeral, her Kentucky grave — all of it was one search away from anyone building this ad. Ramaswamy’s campaign ran it anyway. More on who Caudill actually is — a decade-long GOP operative, not a random grieving Ohioan — is here: Who is Linda Caudill? The Republican insider Ramaswamy chose to blame Amy Acton for her mother’s death.

Then there is what he said about Amy Acton herself. In April, Ramaswamy posted a video to X claiming Acton has no real vision for Ohio “other than to complain about what someone else did to her.” Acton has spoken publicly, as a doctor and as a mother, about surviving sexual abuse as a child. Ramaswamy turned that into a punchline about a political opponent who won’t stop whining.

Acton campaign manager Phil Stein called it what it was: “We were shocked and disgusted to see Ramaswamy’s allies shame Amy for being sexually abused as a child.” Months later, when Ramaswamy’s own super PAC, V-PAC: Victors, Not Victims, ran a second round of the same material, Stein said Ramaswamy was “once again spreading lies about Dr. Acton and shaming her for being a survivor of childhood sexual assault, all to distract from” his own record. Full story: Ramaswamy keeps accused allies, super PAC attacks abuse survivor.

A woman disclosed that she was sexually abused as a child and got help. Ramaswamy mocked her for it. That is what “other than to complain about what someone else did to her” means, coming from a man running against a survivor of childhood sexual abuse for governor of Ohio. There is no version of Ohio politics where that is an acceptable line to cross.

None of this happens in a vacuum. Before Ramaswamy was running attack ads about dead women and mocking abuse survivors, he was running Axovant Sciences, the biotech company he built around an Alzheimer’s drug GlaxoSmithKline had already given up on. He rode that company to a $1.4 billion IPO, sold roughly $40 million of his own stock while he was still publicly hyping the drug’s prospects, and walked away with what Democratic-aligned researchers estimate was $260 million by the time it was over. The drug failed. The stock cratered more than 70% in a single day and never recovered; the company was eventually wound down. Ordinary investors who bought into the hype were left holding shares worth next to nothing. Ramaswamy was not one of them — he’d structured his own stake through the parent company, Roivant, to insulate himself from exactly that outcome.

Yale management professor Jeffrey Sonnenfeld reviewed the whole arc and told Fortune the fortune was built on “basically a version of pump and dump.” A 2023 Newsweek opinion column went further and called it fraud outright. To be exact: no regulator has ever charged Ramaswamy with a crime over Axovant, and he has never been convicted of one. But you don’t need a courtroom to recognize a scam artist when you’ve watched him work twice: once on Wall Street, and now on Ohio. Background here: Ramaswamy’s biotech failures and pandemic profiteering record.

Put it together and you don’t get three unrelated controversies. You get a pattern. A man who made hundreds of millions telling investors a failed drug still had promise is now telling Ohio voters a woman who left office in July 2020 is responsible for a death that happened in Kentucky two months after the order he blames her for was already lifted. A man who built a fortune on other people’s losses is now mocking a childhood abuse survivor for talking about what happened to her. I have covered a lot of shameless candidates. I have never covered one this shameless.

And it is getting worse, not better, as November gets closer. The Cook Political Report moved Ohio’s governor’s race from Lean Republican to Toss Up on July 10. The dead-woman ad and the second round of abuse-survivor material both ran after that shift, not before it. That timing reeks of desperation. This is a campaign that has decided the only path left runs through a grieving daughter’s grief and a survivor’s trauma.

More and more Ohioans appear to be seeing through it. Keep watching — and keep asking Ramaswamy’s campaign, on the record, why it runs ads that aren’t true.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

A federal judge just handed Democrats a very different closing argument.

On Aug. 25, U.S. District Judge Julien Xavier Neals refused to dismiss the central whistleblower claims brought by former Strive Asset Management executive Joyce Rosely, who alleges Ramaswamy demanded that employees violate securities laws, received their repeated objections and participated in firing her afterward.

Ramaswamy and Strive deny the allegations.

But politically, the timing could hardly be worse.

The Republican nominee is heading into the final stretch of a race that has settled into a statistical dead heat, while Democratic groups are already spending heavily to portray his business career not as the qualification he says it is, but as evidence that he cannot be trusted.

Now a federal court has ensured that one of the most serious disputes from that business career will remain alive while Ohioans are deciding who should run the state.

A tied race leaves little room for a new liability

Ramaswamy is not entering the fall with a commanding Republican advantage.

The latest public polling has repeatedly shown the race within a few points. A mid-August Wedgewood Polls survey had Democrat Amy Acton ahead 47% to 46%, while a Fox News survey conducted around the same period had Ramaswamy ahead 50% to 48%. A July Siena College survey found the race tied at 47%.

RealClearPolling’s current average puts the race essentially even, with Acton holding only a fractional advantage. 270toWin’s polling table shows the same pattern: neither candidate has established a durable lead.

The Statehouse News Bureau reported Aug. 29 that the contest has entered an increasingly negative phase as both campaigns race to define the other candidate before the election.

That is precisely the environment in which an adverse court ruling can matter most.

There is no post-ruling public poll yet showing that the Strive case has changed voters’ minds. But in a race separated by roughly a point in polling averages, Ramaswamy does not need a scandal to move 10 points to create a serious political problem.

He needs it to reinforce doubts among a small number of persuadable voters.

Democrats were already building a ‘conman’ case

The Strive ruling did not create the political attack on Ramaswamy’s business career.

It landed directly on top of one that was already being built.

On Aug. 19, Ohioans for Lower Costs, a group backed by the Democratic Governors Association, launched an advertisement literally titled “Conman.”

The spot attacks Ramaswamy over his pharmaceutical business record, including the Alzheimer’s drug at the center of separate scrutiny of his former company Axovant.

The Democratic Governors Association had already been calling Ramaswamy a “pathological scammer” in an Aug. 12 attack centered on his biotech record.

The Ohio Democratic Party has adopted similar language.

Its recent releases have repeatedly described Ramaswamy as a “scammer,” including an Aug. 28 campaign roundup accusing him of a series of “lies and scams,” and a Sept. 1 release attacking the accuracy of one of his campaign ads.

That matters because the Strive lawsuit fits the same narrative without requiring Democrats to invent a new line of attack.

A former senior executive says Ramaswamy personally demanded conduct she believed violated securities laws.

She says she and another executive repeatedly objected.

Both were fired.

Ramaswamy tried to get the individual whistleblower claim against him dismissed.

The judge refused.

The political frame Democrats have spent August constructing — Ramaswamy as a businessman whose record deserves scrutiny rather than admiration — just acquired a fresh federal-court news peg.

The ruling strikes directly at Ramaswamy’s central qualification

For another candidate, an employment lawsuit involving a former company might be easier to compartmentalize.

For Ramaswamy, business is the résumé.

His own campaign biography describes him as “one of the most successful business leaders of his generation” and says he is running on a “business-grounded agenda.”

The campaign’s homepage calls him an “accomplished business leader” who spent his career “turning bold ideas into real results.”

Ramaswamy has repeatedly made the same argument himself: he is an entrepreneur rather than a conventional politician, and the skills he used building companies are the skills he would bring to state government.

That makes scrutiny of how those companies were run unusually relevant to his campaign.

The Strive case does not attack an incidental chapter of Ramaswamy’s biography.

It attacks the chapter he is presenting as evidence that he should be governor.

The allegations are no longer just a 2023 headline

Rosely’s lawsuit was first reported nationally three years ago.

At the time, Forbes reported that Rosely accused Ramaswamy and Strive co-founder Anson Frericks of pressuring employees to violate securities laws.

Another former Strive employee, John Phillips, filed a separate lawsuit containing overlapping accusations about pressure to violate securities rules and alleged misrepresentations about the company’s finances.

Those stories largely disappeared from the political conversation as Ramaswamy moved through his presidential campaign and then into the race for Ohio governor.

The Aug. 25 decision changed that.

Neals did not find that Ramaswamy actually violated securities laws. At the motion-to-dismiss stage, the court accepts well-pleaded allegations as true and determines whether they state a claim that can proceed.

But Ramaswamy specifically asked the court to conclude that Rosely had not alleged enough to keep him personally in the whistleblower case.

The judge rejected him.

When Ramaswamy’s lawyers argued there were no allegations showing he had been directly involved in Rosely’s firing, Neals wrote:

“The Court disagrees.”

The judge pointed to Rosely’s allegations that Ramaswamy supervised her, demanded that she and colleague Jeff Nye violate securities laws, heard their objections and participated in the decision to fire her.

“Taking her allegations as true, Plaintiff sufficiently states a CEPA claim against Ramaswamy,” Neals wrote.

That ruling turns what Ramaswamy could previously dismiss politically as an old employee lawsuit into an active federal case moving forward during his gubernatorial campaign.

The details are more damaging than the old headlines

The renewed scrutiny is also arriving with details that received relatively little attention when the case was first filed.

As TiffinOhio.net reported after reviewing more than 150 pages of court filings, Rosely identified five categories of conduct she says Ramaswamy and Frericks demanded.

She alleges employees were pressured to use noncompliant sales materials promising future investment returns, engage in sales activity before securities licenses had transferred to Strive, distribute materials before compliance approval, put unregistered workers on calls with prospective clients and solicit business for products before those products were registered and trading.

Rosely also alleges Ramaswamy personally engaged in what she considered unlawful securities-sales activity on Twitter.

Ramaswamy and Strive deny those allegations and argue Rosely failed to identify sufficient dates, statutes and specific conversations.

But another piece of the case could prove politically potent: Rosely says she and Nye were the two workers who repeatedly objected to the alleged conduct.

Strive fired both of them on the same day.

That fact played a central role in the federal court’s decision to allow the retaliation claim to proceed.

“Firing both objecting employees is enough to support the inference that Defendants fired Plaintiff because she objected,” Neals wrote.

Ramaswamy now has to fight two campaigns at once

The practical political problem is not merely that Ramaswamy has another negative headline.

It is that the case competes directly with the message his campaign wants voters hearing.

Ramaswamy’s campaign has spent millions trying to define the election around lower costs, property taxes, crime and education. In March, the campaign announced a $10 million statewide advertising campaign built around affordability and public safety.

Now every day spent answering questions about whether he pressured employees to violate securities laws is a day spent talking about something else.

And because Democrats had already begun airing “Conman,” they do not need to persuade voters that the new lawsuit belongs in a separate category.

They can simply add it to the pile.

Pharmaceutical profits.

“Pump-and-dump” accusations.

A former executive alleging pressure to break securities laws.

A second former employee making overlapping allegations.

A federal judge refusing to dismiss the whistleblower case against Ramaswamy personally.

Individually, Ramaswamy has defenses to each accusation.

Collectively, they threaten the brand he has spent his political career selling.

The calendar makes the problem harder to outrun

The lawsuit also reentered the campaign at a point when time is becoming scarce.

Early voting is only weeks away.

That leaves Ramaswamy far less time to allow an unfavorable story to fade before voters begin making decisions.

And the case itself is not disappearing.

Neals’ Aug. 25 order allowed Rosely to amend the three claims that were dismissed without prejudice. Her attorneys have already requested and received additional time to file that amended pleading.

The two central whistleblower claims against Strive and against Ramaswamy and Frericks personally remain alive regardless.

In other words, this is not a one-day controversy created by an old complaint being rediscovered.

The docket is active.

The plaintiff is preparing another filing.

And the surviving case is moving toward its next phase at the same time the governor’s race moves toward its final one.

No evidence yet of voter movement — but the vulnerability is obvious

There is an important distinction between a damaging political development and proof that voters have already punished a candidate for it.

No public poll released since the Aug. 25 ruling has yet measured whether the case has changed support for Ramaswamy.

His campaign also retains enormous financial resources, a Republican-leaning statewide electorate and the endorsement of President Donald Trump.

But this is no longer the kind of Ohio governor’s race in which a Republican can assume a comfortable margin.

Axios reported in August that Ohio’s marquee races had become unexpectedly difficult for Republicans, while Axios Cleveland described the governor’s race as one of several toss-up contests emerging amid broad voter dissatisfaction.

In a race like that, the political significance of the Strive decision is not that it proves Ramaswamy will lose.

It is that the ruling lands directly on an existing weakness, reinforces an attack already being broadcast to voters and keeps the conversation centered on the part of Ramaswamy’s biography his campaign most needs to protect.

The business record is now part of the closing argument

Ramaswamy has spent his campaign telling Ohioans that his success in business is evidence he can successfully run state government.

Democrats have increasingly argued that voters should look more closely at how that success was built.

The Aug. 25 ruling ensures that debate will not remain confined to old clips, opposition research or attack advertisements.

There is now an active federal whistleblower case in which a former senior executive alleges Ramaswamy personally pushed employees toward securities-law violations and helped fire her after she objected.

Ramaswamy tried to get himself out of that case.

The judge said no.

With the governor’s race effectively tied and voting approaching, a three-year-old lawsuit has suddenly become a 2026 campaign problem.

And the part of Vivek Ramaswamy’s résumé he has spent years presenting as his greatest political asset is becoming one of the central liabilities he will have to defend before Ohioans make their choice.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

After the bill passed the Ohio House, Click went a step further: He added his name as a cosponsor.

Months later, the Vickery Republican began highlighting many of the same concerns associated with energy-intensive data centers in his own district, calling potential electric-rate increases, strain on the power grid and noise pollution “legitimate” issues deserving serious consideration.

But the legislation Click backed would make it harder for cities, townships and counties to impose rules specifically tailored to cryptocurrency-mining operations.

Click voted yes, then put his name on the bill

House Bill 116, dubbed the “Ohio Blockchain Basics Act,” passed the Ohio House on June 18, 2025.

The sequence surrounding Click’s support is notable.

When the bill was brought to the House floor for its final vote, Click was not listed among its cosponsors.

The official House Journal listed only Reps. Tex Fischer, Brian Lorenz, Ty Mathews, Riordan McClain, Josh Williams and Thaddeus Claggett as cosponsors when the legislation was called for a vote.

Click nevertheless voted yes.

HB 116 passed 70-26, according to the official House roll call.

Immediately after the bill passed, sponsor Steve Demetriou moved to amend its title to add another group of lawmakers as cosponsors.

The first name on the list was Gary Click.

“Add the names: ‘Click, Daniels, Deeter, Dovilla, Gross, Hall, T., King, Lear, Mathews, A., Miller, M., Plummer, Roemer, Swearingen, Willis, Workman,’” the House Journal records.

That means Click did not attach his name to an earlier or substantially different version of the legislation and later find himself voting on unexpected provisions.

He voted for the completed House version and then agreed to have his name formally added to it after its passage.

What Click voted for

HB 116 defines a “digital asset mining business” as multiple cryptocurrency-mining devices operating at a single site and consuming more than one megawatt of electricity on an average annual basis.

One megawatt represents 1,000 kilowatts of continuous electrical capacity. And the threshold is only the point at which HB 116 begins defining an operation as a commercial digital-asset mining business, not a cap on how much electricity such a facility may consume.

Under the House-passed legislation, a cryptocurrency-mining business could operate in any area zoned for industrial use as long as it satisfies the requirements applicable to industrial uses.

More significantly, the bill says a political subdivision “shall not adopt or enforce” an ordinance, resolution, regulation or order specific to digital-asset mining businesses unless that rule also applies to “other similarly situated businesses.”

The legislation does not define what qualifies as a “similarly situated” business.

It also gives a cryptocurrency-mining company the right to appeal to a county common pleas court if it believes a local government rezoned or redistricted property in a manner that discriminates against the business.

The bill would not wipe out local zoning codes or exempt crypto mines from generally applicable industrial regulations.

But it would expressly restrict the ability of local governments to single out cryptocurrency mines for regulations aimed specifically at that industry.

That could become important when communities confront issues unique to or especially pronounced at large mining operations, including around-the-clock computer equipment, cooling systems, fans and extraordinary electricity demand.

Even the crypto lobby acknowledged the noise

The potential effects of those operations were acknowledged by the very groups lobbying Ohio lawmakers to pass HB 116.

Eric Peterson, policy director for the Satoshi Action Fund, testified in favor of the bill before the House Technology and Innovation Committee in March 2025.

In his written testimony, Peterson repeatedly described cryptocurrency mines as “Bitcoin datacenters.”

He also acknowledged a problem that would later become central to Click’s own discussion of conventional data centers.

“There are often concerns about the noise from Bitcoin miners.”

Peterson nevertheless urged lawmakers to enact protections for the industry, arguing that HB 116 would create a more predictable environment for crypto-mining companies.

He specifically praised provisions allowing Bitcoin miners to operate in industrial zones and preventing local governments from targeting mining businesses through zoning actions.

The Satoshi Action Fund describes itself as an organization working with state lawmakers on Bitcoin policy and publishes model legislation intended to protect cryptocurrency ownership, transactions and mining.

Crypto industry told lawmakers rural Ohio was prime territory

The Ohio Blockchain Council also testified in support of HB 116.

Executive Director Andrew Burchwell told lawmakers that cryptocurrency mining companies were already developing large operations in Ohio and specifically identified Standard Power, Bitdeer and MARA.

His testimony described Bitcoin mines as data centers and argued that rural communities were particularly attractive places for the industry to expand.

Bitcoin data centers, Burchwell said, “are often built in rural communities where traditional data centers are not typically looking to build.”

He argued that the projects could create jobs and tax revenue and said Bitcoin miners can reduce their electricity use when the power grid is under stress.

But his testimony also made the purpose of HB 116’s regulatory provisions clear.

Burchwell said changes to Ohio’s zoning laws were necessary to signal that the state was open for business and that cryptocurrency developers faced “no risk of undue or unjust rulemaking against the developments this industry seeks to provide within the State of Ohio.”

The official committee record shows proponents at the March 25 hearing included the Satoshi Action Fund, Ohio Blockchain Council and Americans for Prosperity-Ohio.

Then Click started talking about data-center noise and electricity costs

By February 2026, Click was using a substantially different tone when discussing the rapid growth of data centers in his own district.

Click introduced House Bill 646 with Rep. Kellie Deeter to create a state commission studying data-center development.

In sponsor testimony on Feb. 17, Click said the proposal stemmed from concerns in the 88th House District, particularly Sandusky County.

Click said he attended a meeting of concerned residents and found “many of their concerns were compelling.”

He specifically listed:

• the loss of agricultural land;

• impacts on local water supplies;

• wastewater disposal;

• strain on the energy grid, including potential increases in electricity costs for ratepayers;

• noise pollution;

• light pollution;

• tax abatements; and

• unfulfilled promises of economic development.

“Many of these concerns are legitimate and deserve serious consideration,” Click told lawmakers.

The contrast is difficult to miss.

When the Ohio House was considering protections for cryptocurrency mines, Click voted for legislation restricting local governments from enacting rules specifically aimed at those facilities.

When data-center development became controversial in his own district, Click himself identified noise, electricity demand and potential increases in residents’ electric bills as legitimate concerns.

Cryptocurrency mines and AI or cloud-computing data centers are not identical facilities. But HB 116’s own proponents repeatedly described Bitcoin mining operations as “data centers,” and both types of facilities can involve large concentrations of computing equipment and substantial electricity demand.

Arkansas already tried it

There is also evidence from another Republican-led state showing why specialized cryptocurrency-mining regulations can matter.

Arkansas enacted the Data Centers Act in 2023, limiting local governments’ ability to treat cryptocurrency mines differently from other data centers.

The law quickly generated backlash as communities complained about noise and said local governments had been left without sufficient power to address mining operations.

By 2024, Arkansas lawmakers reversed course on key parts of the policy.

The Republican-controlled legislature approved new cryptocurrency-mining restrictions requiring noise-reduction measures and state permits while repealing a portion of the earlier law that prevented local governments from imposing different noise requirements on mining businesses.

The new law allows measures including liquid or submerged cooling, fully enclosing equipment that directly produces noise, or locating operations farther from nearby homes and businesses.

Arkansas lawmakers were explicit about why they believed additional regulation was necessary.

In Act 174, the General Assembly found that cryptocurrency-mining businesses presented “significant challenges” that included “significant noise emissions” and “massive consumption of power,” as well as large water use and potential cybersecurity concerns.

The Associated Press reported at the time that the changes followed backlash from residents and local officials over the 2023 law and the noise produced by mining operations.

Arkansas effectively had to restore specialized safeguards after first restricting communities’ ability to impose them.

An Ohio township is confronting the same question right now

The issue is no longer theoretical in Ohio.

In August, trustees in Shalersville Township authorized a $9,000 independent acoustical study as Bitdeer Technologies Group, a Bitcoin-mining company, pursues a proposed data-center campus there.

According to The Portager, the township commissioned the study to establish existing noise levels near the proposed development and help officials determine what local noise regulations may be appropriate.

Bitdeer has said sound from its proposed project should remain below 50 decibels at its property line.

The situation illustrates exactly why the details of HB 116 matter.

A township confronted with a cryptocurrency-mining development may conclude that it needs regulations specifically designed around the noise or operational characteristics of that industry.

The legislation Click backed would require mining-specific rules to also apply to other “similarly situated businesses,” a term the bill leaves undefined.

The bill offers more than zoning protections

HB 116 contains several other provisions favorable to the digital-asset industry.

It would establish a state income-tax deduction for capital gains arising when cryptocurrency is used to purchase goods or services in transactions of $200 or less, with that threshold subsequently adjusted for inflation.

The provision does not exempt the underlying purchase from ordinary sales tax. It instead eliminates Ohio income tax on qualifying capital gains generated when appreciated cryptocurrency is spent in those smaller transactions.

The Legislative Service Commission’s fiscal analysis says the provision would reduce state personal-income-tax revenue by an amount that could not be determined.

The bill would also prohibit counties, municipalities and certain townships from imposing taxes or charges specifically based on using digital assets as a form of payment when those charges would not apply to a transaction conducted with U.S. currency.

And it says a person would not need an Ohio money-transmitter license solely to engage in digital-asset mining, staking, exchanging one digital asset for another, developing certain exchange software or operating blockchain nodes.

Click’s record speaks for itself

Click’s later data-center legislation does not prohibit data centers, nor has he positioned himself as an opponent of the industry.

But he has made the concerns surrounding their growth part of his public message.

After the Ohio House passed his study-commission bill in March, Click said it had originated “in the heart of the 88th district” because his constituents had unanswered questions about data centers.

“They have questions that deserve answers,” Click said.

Those questions include noise, power-grid strain and whether massive computing operations could contribute to higher electricity costs.

Click had already voted on legislation involving those issues.

His vote was to give large cryptocurrency-mining operations additional protection against local rules written specifically for them.

Then he added his name to the bill.

HB 116 remains pending before the Ohio Senate Financial Institutions, Insurance and Technology Committee.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

An Ohio data analyst has identified one cause that could be a warning sign for the overall economy.

About 720,000 Americans seemingly stopped looking for work between May and June alone, CNBC reported. And Policy Matters Ohio reports that 74,000 fewer people are seeking jobs in the Buckeye State than were this time last year.

One reason for the losses: millions of foreign-born men are no longer in the country, according to an analysis that was published on Sunday. Happening amid President Donald Trump’s mass deportations, many were probably forced to leave.

Eric Pachman used government data to determine that 2.1 million foreign-born, working-age men have left the country since the start of Trump’s second term. Eighty-eight percent of them were working when they left the country, according to the analysis.

“Over the past two years foreign-born men’s labor force shrank by 1.4 million,” the report on Pachman’s website, Data 4 the People, says. “But in a normal pair of summers it would have grown by about 360,000 — so measured against trend, the swing is 1.8 million.”

The losses of foreign-born men last year and this year were by far the biggest in the datasets with which Pachman worked.

In 2025, the United States lost 1.2 million foreign-born men, followed by 919,000 so far this year. The next closest year — at the height of the pandemic in 2020 — saw only 336,000 foreign-born men left the country.

Analysts who study the government’s data regarding Trump’s mass deportations say there are reasons to question their reliability. But with the government reporting as many as 10,000 deportations in a month, it’s reasonable to assume that many of the male, foreign-born workers who have left the country did so via deportation.

Pachman’s analysis didn’t find similar steep declines in the number of foreign-born women. That raises the possibility that many more men than women are being deported, thereby breaking up families, the researcher said.

Other analyses indicate that historically, the great majority of deportations involved men.

Pachman said the fact that native-born workers haven’t rushed to fill jobs vacated by foreign-born men undermines a basic tenant of Trump’s deportation project: the claim that foreign workers took jobs that the native-born want.

“There’s a narrative that a lot of people believe despite their political party. Call it the labor-displacement effect,” Pachman said in an interview. “It says that if an immigrant takes a job, that is a job that’s being taken from another individual, say a native-born, white American. 

“If that is true, what we should be finding when we look at the public data is that as jobs go away that immigrants were holding, those jobs should be getting filled by native-born men. But we’re not finding that. We’re finding that the participation rate of native-born men is continuing to decline.”

Pachman looked at the kinds of jobs in which foreign-born men were most prevalent. 

First was farming, fishing and forestry, where they made up 42% of the workforce. That was followed by construction and extraction at 34%, 30% in building and grounds maintenance, healthcare support at 27%, 25% for food preparation and serving, and another 25% in transportation and material moving.

Those are fields that the native-born apparently find less attractive than their foreign-born counterparts.

In addition to Trump’s tariffs, healthcare cuts and his war with Iran, his mass deportations may be yet another drag on the economy.

“If this displacement theory does not hold, then we’re playing with fire with the economy,” Pachman said. “All that is going to do is lead to certain vacancies in the economy for certain types of jobs that were more likely to be done by the foreign-born. If they go unfilled, then all this does is lead to more inflation.”

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Since then, courts have generally followed a rule of thumb that states can specify what college instructors can teach, but not what they conclude about it. In other words, as long as professors stick to talking about things relevant to the course topic and their own area of expertise, the First Amendment strongly protects their liberty to present whatever viewpoints they feel are relevant to discuss. 

This distinction – that the state gets to choose the topic and faculty decide how to pursue it – has largely held for the past seventy-five years or so. In Ohio, the state legislature broke with this precedent when it passed its claimed omnibus higher education reform bill, Senate Bill 1. A small, unremarkable provision of that law tip-toed past the larger controversies raging over the bill and quietly stepped over that line. 

Buried deep in the 42 page law is the requirement that newly state-mandated civics courses include reading at least “five essays in their entirety from the Federalist Papers.” Fine. This would pass the test affirmed this summer in Pernell v. Florida, by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, that held that the government can dictate programs but not viewpoints. But the next short sentence opened the door to blowing up this distinction.

“The essays shall be selected by the department chair.”

By itself, having a department chair determine which of the 85 Federalist Papers are most worthy of teaching is probably not a clear violation of academic freedom principles (though given the range of the Federalist essays, which ones a professor chooses to highlight can be very ideological).

But for the first time, it specifically establishes in Ohio law the power of a state bureaucrat (yes, Virginia, chairs and deans are government functionaries, ultimately beholden to their bosses rather than their own principles) to pick and choose how a particular subject is to be taught. 

S.B. 1 was passed in the spring of 2025, and in the year since, its sponsor has been unsettled by how one aspect of it has been rolled out. State Sen. Jerry Cirino, R-Kirtland, discovered that some professors were not going to teach a celebratory and patriotic version of American history and he introduced a follow-on bill, S.B. 461, to, as he put it, “close the loophole.” 

Senator Cirino has been remarkably candid about his determination to legislate the viewpoints that he wishes to see taught. He recently spoke on Ohio Senate Majority Communications Director John Fortney’s podcast:

Fortney: There’s even a new textbook called Unpatriotic Civics, explicitly designed to fulfill the requirements of Senate Bill 1, but “without endorsing the patriotic narrative.” That’s how far some of these leftists will go to try and get around the law. 

Cirino: Well, we’re not going to have any of that in the state of Ohio … So what we’ve done in Senate Bill 461 is we set it up that the directors of the five centers as a group need to be the ones in the future who will be approving the courses that qualify … That way we are not going to have any of this funny business which the academicians will definitely attempt to do, putting courses in there that don’t meet the intent of the legislation that we passed.

For full disclosure, I am the author of Unpatriotic Civics and its companion book, The Civics of Pluralism, that will be made available at no cost to all Ohio students through the Ohio Open Ed Collaborative, a project of the Ohio Department of Higher Education. 

Cirino didn’t fully explain his own bill, because S.B. 461 does much more than merely approve courses. The law gives his Ohio Civics Board “sole and exclusive authority over all aspects of American civic literacy courses…including course modality, syllabi, class size, faculty teachers, and course content.”

This is a level of control reminiscent of the way the Soviet Union would station political overseers at desks next to government officials to ensure they toed the line and to report on their loyalty. 

I suspect that such a Civics Board will look unfavorably upon a textbook that highlights facts including that slavery was a major issue in the American Revolution, the idea that many patriotic Americans viewed the Constitution of 1787 as an aristocratic coup, that Dr. Martin Luther King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail was in violation of the prohibited concepts in S.B. 1, and that Adam Smith was not a consistent believer in the free market but wanted state controls over major portions of the economy. 

Cirino has also explained that he established the structure of the Ohio Civics Board to insulate it from any popular attempts to check its power. As envisioned in S.B. 461, the board is composed of five GOP loyalists who are not elected and cannot be removed or appointed by the governor. They will enjoy a budget that would be the envy of every college dean in the state.

Not only will they directly receive the tuition dollars of students taking their classes, but were the Ohio legislature to decide to cut its share of funding to these civics centers, the university must make up all the shortfall in their budgets from its own general funds. 

All of these barriers to democratic controls were explained by Cirino this way: 

“The current chancellor is doing a really good job of ferreting out, you know, some of the courses that have been proposed to qualify, but what (S.B.) 461 is attempting to do is to solidify this a little bit more and protect it because there will be future governors, future chancellors, future legislators, who may want to, you know, water things down.”

Ohioans who care about the quality and independence of their universities and colleges might want to pay attention to S.B. 461 this fall. 

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

More than 1 million American children have lost access to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, following a recent federal law. Now, as schools gear up for a new term, a portion of those children could be at risk of losing free meals — viewed as crucial supports for both childhood hunger and classroom learning.  

But the changes in cafeterias could affect even families who have never participated in the federal food stamp program.

Many students who receive free school meals automatically qualify because of their household participation in SNAP or Medicaid. So a reduction in those social service programs can directly threaten their eligibility for free school meals.

And many schools offer free meals to all students. Those schools qualify for federal funding that is tied to rates of SNAP participation. The complicated federal funding formula means even a slight change in SNAP enrollment could jeopardize free meal funding for entire schools and districts. 

“Cuts to SNAP are not going to stop at the grocery store,” said Clarissa Hayes, deputy director of child nutrition programs and policy at the Food Research & Action Center, a nonprofit working to combat hunger. “They really are going to threaten children’s access to school meals, which is obviously going to increase hunger at home and in the classroom, and is going to have that negative ripple effect across children’s health and academic performance.”

The threat to school meals comes during a period of upheaval for federal safety net programs and growing hunger across the country amid rising grocery prices. Last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act implemented new eligibility and work requirements for SNAP as well as pushed new costs onto states. Already, millions have lost food stamps, but the threats to schools are just coming into focus.

“We are really only starting to see the beginning,” Hayes said.

The free school meal program allows previously qualified students to remain enrolled over a 30-day grace period. And some students who lost SNAP coverage may still qualify for free meals at school if their families submit certain paperwork. 

Many low-income families are struggling to keep their kids fed, according to a recent survey from the nonprofit No Kid Hungry. In that survey, parents said back-to-school season creates impossible choices: More than two-thirds worried they would have to choose between paying bills or buying healthy food for their kids. Already, more than half reported cutting back on groceries given the high prices. 

More than a quarter of the nation’s public schools currently offer universal free meals. Aside from the obvious financial benefit to families, those schools have reduced the stigma of free lunch and improved efficiency in the lunch line and the office since no one is paying up front for meals or working to track down unpaid meal debt, said Carolyn Vega, senior program manager at No Kid Hungry.

But federal changes could halt the important progress made in expanding universal access.

“Then all kids at all incomes would suffer,” Vega said.

Importance of school meals

For Tennessee parent Anthony Bonner, this year’s first day of school delivered instant relief. It meant that his 14-year-old son was ensured a free breakfast and lunch every weekday, leaving worry only about dinner each night.

“School starting has definitely alleviated some of that stress, that worry and that concern,” said Bonner, a 38-year-old campaign organizer and barber in Memphis.

School meals are more important than ever since the pair lost their $250 monthly SNAP benefit in March. Bonner said he lost his eligibility because of federal changes that ended the work requirement exemption for parents of children 14 and over. He is currently working a contract job that doesn’t satisfy federal work requirements.

It’s caused him to cut back on fresh proteins and produce, opting instead for cheaper frozen veggies and packaged foods like ramen packets.

“It’s one thing to cut me off, but I should have been able to get benefits for him,” he said. “I still have yet to really have enough food that I feel comfortable with that me and my son can eat for the month.”

For now, his son’s breakfast and lunch will continue as his entire school receives free meals. 

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Community Eligibility Provision reimburses schools for a portion of breakfasts and lunches using a formula based on the percentage of students that qualify for SNAP and other means-tested programs. 

Kids attending schools in the highest poverty areas will likely maintain eligibility for free meals for now, said Diane Pratt-Heavner, spokesperson for the School Nutrition Association, which represents 50,000 school meal providers across the country.

But schools with more mixed economic levels could lose free meal eligibility as participation in SNAP declines.

This summer, Miami-Dade County Public Schools in Florida announced it would no longer offer free meals at all of its 500-plus schools because of changes to its federal reimbursement eligibility. Florida’s largest school system still has universal free meals in 121 schools, but children at the remaining schools must now individually apply for free meals.

This fall, Central Kentucky’s Marion County Public Schools remain in a holding pattern, said Jennifer Wheeler, school nutrition director. The school system currently offers free meals for all, but future funding may be at risk as student participation in SNAP declines.

Under its current four-year certification, the school system receives the maximum federal reimbursement for about 93% of its students. But Wheeler said current SNAP enrollment means the school system would receive the full reimbursement for about 75% of its students.

“Which then is a huge financial impact on our program,” she said.

Like many school meal programs, Marion County’s is self-funded, meaning it doesn’t receive local tax revenue to feed its 3,000 students across seven schools. Rather, federal meal reimbursements must cover the costs of food, labor and kitchen equipment.

Wheeler said rising grocery prices have already stretched many families in her community. As evidence, she pointed to the school summer feeding program, which last year handed out about 134,000 prepackaged meals. This summer, the same program with the same offerings and logistics gave out more than 201,000 meals.

“When people would come through the lines, they would talk about grocery costs,” she said. “They would talk about gas costs. So inflation, I think, is the number one driver.”

Changing federal landscape

When Congress passed last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, Republicans who supported food stamp cuts downplayed their impact. Many, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, said the changes would help cut waste and fraud from the safety net program.

Between May 2025 and May 2026, more than 5.6 million people lost SNAP coverage, according to the latest federal data. 

That 13.5% one-year decline was a much faster drop in coverage than was originally anticipated by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office that analyzed last year’s legislation.

The latest federal data showed about 36.6 million people received SNAP in May with an average monthly benefit of about $187 per person.

SNAP benefits are expected to shrink more as the law is fully implemented — raising fears that some states could even drop out of the program entirely as the federal government requires states to spend billions on administrative costs and benefits. 

The White House did not respond to Stateline’s questions about how the SNAP changes will impact school meals. Neither did a spokesperson for the U.S. Senate agriculture committee that oversees SNAP and school meal programs.

Currently, nine states provide free meals for all school students: California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, New York and Vermont. Experts say students in those states, which rely on a mix of state and federal funding, should be shielded from the SNAP fallout for now. 

But even states where lawmakers have specifically funded school meals could see major financial upheaval. 

In Maine, for example, the state spends $64 million per year to supplement federal meal reimbursements. But federal funds are based on how many low-income families schools serve. And those calculations will likely change as more children lose food stamps.

Already, more than 15,000 Mainers have lost SNAP coverage since last July, according to the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. 

The changing landscape could force the state to spend much more to supplement school meals, Maine Morning Star reported.

“Free meals for all was already a big ask when it first went into law, and that was when the federal government was giving more money,” Allison Leavitt, nutrition director of the Lisbon School Department and president of the Maine School Nutrition Association, told the Morning Star. “Now the feds are giving less money and it’s like, how do we do this?”

Stateline reporter Kevin Hardy can be reached at khardy@stateline.org. 

This story was originally produced by Stateline, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Ohio Capital Journal, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.

This story is republished from the Ohio Capital Journal under a Creative Commons license. View the original article.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

His lawyers argued there were “no allegations in the Complaint” showing the Republican nominee for Ohio governor was directly involved in firing Joyce Rosely, a former senior executive at Strive Asset Management.

U.S. District Judge Julien Xavier Neals answered in three words:

“The Court disagrees.”

In a 24-page opinion issued Aug. 25, Neals laid out the allegations that kept Ramaswamy personally in the case: Rosely says he supervised her, demanded that she and another employee violate securities laws, received their repeated objections and participated in the decision to fire her after she refused.

“Taking her allegations as true, Plaintiff sufficiently states a CEPA claim against Ramaswamy,” Neals wrote.

That sentence revived a lawsuit that spent years largely outside the political spotlight while Ramaswamy moved from Strive into presidential politics and then became the Republican nominee for governor of Ohio.

The court record goes far beyond the shorthand description of a “securities-law whistleblower case.” TiffinOhio.net reviewed the original complaint, both sides’ briefs, a federal magistrate judge’s recommendation, Ramaswamy’s objections, Neals’ Aug. 25 ruling and the filings that followed.

Taken together, they describe a senior Strive executive who says she was ordered to cross securities-law lines almost as soon as she arrived, repeatedly objected directly to Ramaswamy, received a positive performance review, and was then fired alongside the only other employee she says joined her securities-law objections.

Ramaswamy, Strive and co-founder Anson Frericks deny Rosely’s allegations. Their own court filings describe her as an underperforming employee terminated during a legitimate reorganization and attack the complaint as vague, conclusory and unsupported.

A federal magistrate judge recommended allowing the central whistleblower claims to proceed. After Ramaswamy and the other defendants objected, the district judge reached the same result.

What the judge actually decided

Neals was not deciding whether Ramaswamy violated securities laws or retaliated against Rosely. He was deciding whether Rosely’s complaint alleged enough facts for those claims to proceed.

At the motion-to-dismiss stage, a court accepts well-pleaded factual allegations as true and asks whether they state a plausible legal claim.

On the core whistleblower theory, Neals said they did.

He allowed two central claims to continue: Count I, Rosely’s whistleblower-retaliation claim against Strive under New Jersey’s Conscientious Employee Protection Act, and Count IV, which seeks to hold Ramaswamy and Frericks individually liable for that alleged retaliation.

The court’s Aug. 25 order dismissed three other claims involving age discrimination and retaliation tied to a separate internal complaint without prejudice, meaning Rosely can amend them.

The ruling therefore did not validate every accusation in the lawsuit. It rejected Ramaswamy’s argument that the whistleblower case against him was too thin to proceed.

Rosely says the pressure began “almost immediately”

Strive hired Rosely in August 2022 as executive vice president and co-head of institutional sales and distribution. She worked remotely from New Jersey for the Dublin, Ohio-based investment firm Ramaswamy co-founded with Frericks.

Rosely’s complaint says both men exercised supervisory authority over her.

Then came the demands.

“Almost immediately” after starting work, Rosely alleges, Ramaswamy and Frericks directed her to violate securities laws.

Her complaint identifies five categories of conduct, which are also detailed in Rosely’s federal court brief:

• using noncompliant sales material that improperly promised future investment returns;

• having new employees engage in sales activity before their securities licenses had been transferred to Strive;

• sending sales materials before they had been approved by Strive’s outside compliance vendor, Foreside;

• having unregistered employees discuss Strive securities products with prospective clients by telephone; and

• creating deal books and soliciting business for investment products before those products were registered and actively trading.

Rosely also alleges that Ramaswamy and Frericks personally engaged in securities-sales activity without licenses. She says Frericks called and emailed individual investors while Ramaswamy engaged in what she considered unlawful securities-sales activity on Twitter.

Rosely says she and Jeff Nye, Strive’s executive vice president and head of wealth management distribution, repeatedly objected to the conduct in conversations with both Ramaswamy and Frericks.

Those five allegations appear in the original complaint and are repeated nearly verbatim in the defendants’ own objections filed in federal court.

Ramaswamy’s lawyers attacked them as too vague. They argued Rosely failed to identify dates, exact conversations, specific securities statutes or which alleged instructions came personally from which co-founder.

The core whistleblower claim survived.

The two employees who objected were both fired

The retaliation theory does not rest only on a complaint followed months later by a firing.

Rosely says she and Nye were the two employees who repeatedly objected to the alleged securities-law conduct.

On March 21, 2023, Strive fired both of them.

That same day, Strive also fired senior vice presidents John Phillips and J.P. Towey.

The company told Rosely it was “reorganizing” and there was “no longer a position” for her.

Ramaswamy and Strive made the passage of time a centerpiece of their effort to dismiss the whistleblower claim. Rosely says the securities-law pressure began soon after she joined Strive in August 2022. She was fired roughly seven months later.

The defendants argued that seven months was too long to support an inference of retaliation.

Magistrate Judge Cathy Waldor rejected that argument in her July 2024 report and recommendation. She focused on another allegation: Strive fired the other employee who allegedly engaged in the same protected activity at the same time.

Neals reached the same conclusion.

“According to Plaintiff, Defendants asked her and Nye to break the law; Plaintiff and Nye repeatedly refused to do so and complained to management; and Defendants fired Plaintiff and Nye seven months later,” Neals wrote.

Then came the key finding:

“Firing both objecting employees is enough to support the inference that Defendants fired Plaintiff because she objected.”

A positive review, then “we had to do this”

Rosely’s complaint says her sales numbers were strong and that she received a positive written performance evaluation in February 2023, about one month before Strive fired her. Her attorneys highlighted the evaluation in their brief opposing dismissal.

Strive later described the termination differently. In federal court, Ramaswamy and the company said Rosely was fired “for underperformance” as part of a broader reorganization.

The defense argued in its February 2024 reply brief that the positive review weakened Rosely’s retaliation case: an employer preparing to fire someone for complaining, they said, would not logically give that employee a favorable evaluation first.

Rosely’s account puts the same facts in a different sequence. She says she repeatedly objected to alleged securities-law violations, received a positive review, and then was abruptly fired alongside the only other employee she says joined those objections.

The next day, according to Rosely, Ramaswamy appeared at Strive’s Dublin office to reassure the remaining employees about their jobs.

She says he referred to the four dismissals and told employees:

“we had to do this”

Ramaswamy’s lawyers argued that the statement did not show he personally participated in Rosely’s firing.

In their objections to the magistrate judge’s recommendation, they argued that the statement fell “far short” of plausibly showing Ramaswamy played a role in Rosely’s specific termination or acted with a retaliatory motive.

Judge Neals rejected that argument.

The judge pointed to the full set of allegations against Ramaswamy: that he supervised Rosely, demanded that she and Nye violate securities laws, received their repeated objections and participated in the decision to terminate her.

Ramaswamy told the court the complaint did not plausibly connect him to Rosely’s firing.

“The Court disagrees,” Neals wrote.

The other allegations — and what did not survive

Rosely’s lawsuit contains two other major storylines, but neither survived the Aug. 25 ruling in its current form.

One involves an internal complaint about alleged sexual misconduct by Strive Chief Operating Officer Ben Pham.

Rosely says that in January 2023, Nye told her a newly hired employee had reported that Pham was pursuing her romantically in an “aggressive manner.” Rosely says she had traveled with the two and found their interactions “very uncomfortable to observe.”

She brought the issue to Strive’s head of people strategy, Laura Brady, and says Brady told her to:

“keep an eye on them and report back”

Rosely says she later raised the issue with Frericks, who told her it was none of his business, and confronted Pham directly, who told her to mind her own business.

Two months later, Rosely was fired.

Those allegations are detailed in Rosely’s court filing.

They formed the basis of a separate retaliation claim under New Jersey’s Law Against Discrimination. Neals dismissed that claim without prejudice, finding the complaint did not plead enough to establish the required causal link.

Rosely also alleged age discrimination. She was 52 when Strive fired her. Nye was 54 and Phillips was 53. Her complaint says the three were the only Strive employees age 50 or older at the time. Towey, the fourth employee fired that day, was 40.

Waldor initially recommended allowing the age claim to proceed, but Neals disagreed. He ruled that Rosely had not pleaded enough information about the age and circumstances of the younger employee she said was retained in her place.

That count and the related individual claim against Ramaswamy and Frericks were dismissed without prejudice.

Those claims can be amended.

The whistleblower claims do not need to be. They survived.

Ramaswamy spent years trying to move or kill the case

The Aug. 25 ruling came after a long procedural fight.

Ramaswamy and Strive first tried to move the case from New Jersey to the Southern District of Ohio.

Rosely’s employment agreement said actions brought to “enforce” the agreement had to be filed in Ohio. The defendants argued that Rosely was effectively enforcing it because she sought lost compensation tied to the contract.

Waldor rejected that argument, finding the forum clause covered lawsuits to enforce the employment agreement itself, not statutory whistleblower and discrimination claims.

Ramaswamy and Strive objected to that recommendation.

Neals rejected them again.

“The Court cannot transform the word ‘enforce’ into ‘arise out of or relate to,’” he wrote.

The effort to move the case to Ohio was denied.

Then came the delay.

Waldor issued her report and recommendation on July 24, 2024. Ramaswamy and the other defendants objected on Aug. 7, 2024.

For the next 19 months, the district court did not rule on those objections.

On March 6, 2026, Rosely’s attorney Christopher Lenzo wrote directly to Neals, noting that the defendants’ objections had been pending for 19 months and asking the judge to issue a decision “so that the litigation can proceed.”

It took another five months.

Neals finally ruled Aug. 25, 2026, more than two years after Waldor first recommended keeping the central whistleblower claims alive.

The timing transformed the political context of the case. A lawsuit filed while Ramaswamy was running for president is now moving forward while he is the Republican nominee for governor of Ohio.

Rosely was not the only former Strive employee making securities-law allegations

Rosely’s lawsuit did not emerge in isolation.

Former Strive regional sales chief John Phillips filed a separate lawsuit in 2023 accusing Strive and its founders of misrepresenting the company’s financial condition and pressuring employees to violate securities laws.

Forbes and the Columbus Dispatch reported on both lawsuits in 2023. Phillips had left JPMorgan to join Strive and alleged he relied on representations that the startup was well financed and that Ramaswamy intended to remain committed to it.

Phillips was one of the four employees Strive fired on March 21, 2023.

Later that year, Bloomberg Law reported that Strive changed its top legal and compliance leadership while the two lawsuits were pending. Strive said that personnel change was unrelated to the layoffs or litigation.

Strive said when the lawsuits first surfaced that it intended to “vigorously defend itself.”

The existence of the allegations was news in 2023. What is new now is what happened after years of litigation: Ramaswamy tried to get the central whistleblower claim against him dismissed, and a federal judge refused.

The case is moving again

The docket became active almost immediately after Neals ruled.

On Aug. 25, the judge’s order gave Rosely 30 days to amend the three claims he dismissed without prejudice.

Two days later, Rosely’s attorneys requested an additional 30 days because the lawyer primarily responsible for the case was dealing with a personal emergency.

Neals granted the extension Aug. 28.

An amended complaint is now expected while the surviving whistleblower claims against Strive, Ramaswamy and Frericks continue.

The case is no longer waiting for a judge to decide whether its central allegations can move forward.

They can.

Why this matters in the Ohio governor’s race

Ramaswamy has made his business career one of the central arguments for electing him governor.

He founded Strive as a direct challenge to the largest firms on Wall Street, accusing asset managers of allowing politics to override their duties to investors. The company’s public brand was built around fiduciary responsibility, merit and a promise to strip ideological agendas out of investment management.

The lawsuit describes a different Strive behind the scenes.

A senior executive says the firm’s founders pressured employees to use noncompliant materials, market securities before required approvals were complete, involve unregistered employees in sales conversations and solicit business before products were registered and trading.

She says she objected directly to Ramaswamy.

She says the only other employee who joined those objections was fired the same day she was.

She says Ramaswamy appeared at the office the next day and told the remaining workforce, “we had to do this.”

Ramaswamy says the allegations are false and that Rosely was an underperforming employee let go in a legitimate reorganization.

He asked the federal courts to move the case to Ohio or throw it out.

First a magistrate judge rejected the core of that effort. Ramaswamy objected. Nineteen months later, Rosely’s lawyer had to ask the court to finally rule.

Now the district judge has ruled.

Ramaswamy remains a defendant.

The whistleblower claims remain alive.

And the business record he is asking Ohio voters to trust is headed deeper into federal litigation.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The 20-year-old Springfield High School honors graduate had started classes at Wright State University on Aug. 24, studying physiology and neuroscience as he prepared for what he hoped would eventually become a career in medicine.

By Monday morning, he was dead.

Bel was struck and killed by a tractor-trailer on Interstate 70 in Clark County after exiting his vehicle and entering the westbound lanes, according to the Ohio State Highway Patrol’s initial investigation.

His family says he died by suicide after weeks of mounting distress over an electronic GPS monitor that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement had strapped to his ankle following the termination of Temporary Protected Status for Haitians.

The Highway Patrol said the circumstances surrounding Bel’s death remain under investigation.

What happened in the weeks before his death, however, is increasingly well documented through Bel’s own social media posts, statements from his father, school records and the federal government itself.

An honors student with plans for medical school

Bel graduated from Springfield High School in May as a member of the Class of 2026.

Springfield City Schools said he participated in the National Honor Society, Marine Corps Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps and varsity boys soccer program. He played forward and midfield for the Wildcats.

He was also an Award of Excellence scholarship recipient, one of several Springfield seniors recognized this spring for academic achievement, service, character and leadership.

Bel was the oldest of three children.

On Aug. 24 — the first day of Wright State’s fall semester — he began college. His social media posts described plans to study physiology and neuroscience before attending medical school.

Wright State President Sue Edwards described him Tuesday as an active honors student who was passionate about soccer and had already become engaged in his classes and campus community.

“We are heartbroken by this devastating loss,” Edwards said.

ICE put a GPS monitor on his ankle

Bel’s college experience began against a dramatically different immigration backdrop than the one under which he had finished high school.

The Trump administration terminated Haiti’s Temporary Protected Status designation, and after a June Supreme Court ruling cleared a legal obstacle to the termination, TPS protections for Haitians ended July 27.

TPS had allowed hundreds of thousands of Haitians already in the United States to remain and work legally because of dangerous conditions in Haiti.

Immigration authorities subsequently began summoning Haitians from Springfield for in-person check-ins at ICE offices in Blue Ash and Westerville. Many emerged wearing electronic ankle monitors.

TiffinOhio.net previously reported on the monitoring effort and the objections from Springfield-area pastors and immigrant advocates who said the devices stigmatized people who had been living and working legally under TPS.

Bel was among them.

In a statement released Tuesday, the Department of Homeland Security confirmed that ICE placed Bel into its Alternatives to Detention program with an ankle monitor on July 29 while his immigration proceedings continued.

The Washington Post reported that Bel also had a pending asylum claim.

The next day, July 30, Bel publicly described what the monitor was doing to him.

“I came to this country to pursue my education. I didn’t come here to commit a crime or hurt anyone,” Bel wrote on Instagram.

He described walking around with the device as a source of “shame and humiliation” and questioned how he would be able to continue playing college sports with it strapped to his leg.

His father says he begged to have it removed

Bel’s father, Pierre Ronal Bel, said his son made two trips to federal immigration offices in an attempt to persuade officials to remove the device.

They did not.

“After my son was outfitted with the ankle monitor, he felt like he was treated like an animal,” his father said in a statement read Tuesday by Springfield pastor Carl Ruby.

His father said the device interfered with soccer and embarrassed his son. Family members and advocates also say Bel was mocked by other students because of the monitor during his first week at Wright State.

Wright State said Tuesday that it has “no confirmed information regarding complaints or investigations into bullying related to the student.”

But according to his father, bullying was precisely what Bel raised during their final conversation.

At 8:03 a.m. Monday, Bel called his father and said he was not doing well mentally, his father said. He told his son to come home so they could talk.

Less than an hour later, the Highway Patrol was dispatched to Interstate 70.

DHS defends its handling of Bel

The Department of Homeland Security confirmed Tuesday night that it had been notified of Bel’s death and that ICE had placed him on electronic monitoring July 29.

The agency declined to comment on the cause of death while the Highway Patrol investigation remains pending.

DHS characterized Bel as a “non-detained illegal alien from Haiti” and said he had entered the United States in March 2024 through a CBP One appointment before being released while his immigration proceedings continued.

The agency defended the use of monitoring and said immigrants facing removal can instead voluntarily leave the United States through the government’s CBP Home self-deportation program.

“Remaining in the country illegally, while fighting removal, is a choice,” DHS said.

Bel’s family and immigrant advocates see the government’s actions very differently.

Guerline Jozef, executive director of the Haitian Bridge Alliance, said Bel had become depressed after losing TPS and that the prospect of deportation had become unbearable to him.

Ruby said the family wants the public to understand the role they believe federal immigration policy played in their son’s deterioration.

The same Springfield targeted by the ‘eating the pets’ lie

Bel’s death comes two years after Springfield’s Haitian community became one of the most recognizable targets of the national immigration debate.

During the 2024 presidential campaign, then-Sen. JD Vance amplified false allegations that Haitian immigrants in Springfield were abducting or eating residents’ pets. Donald Trump then repeated the claim before tens of millions of viewers during a presidential debate.

Springfield officials and police said there were no credible reports supporting the allegation. Republican Gov. Mike DeWine called the story “a piece of garbage that was simply not true.”

PolitiFact later named Trump and Vance’s Springfield claims its 2024 Lie of the Year.

There is no public evidence that those false claims themselves caused the federal government’s later decision to terminate Haitian TPS or its use of electronic monitoring.

But Springfield’s Haitian residents — the same community turned into a national political symbol during the 2024 campaign — are now experiencing a concentrated immigration enforcement effort involving detentions, deportation proceedings and ankle monitors.

On Tuesday, DeWine publicly questioned whether that approach is what Americans want carried out on their behalf.

“Do we want this being done, this mass deportation, in our name?” the Republican governor asked reporters. “Do we really support that?”

A life larger than an immigration case

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cautions that suicide is rarely caused by a single circumstance or event. Individual, interpersonal, community and societal factors can interact in complicated ways.

Bel’s family is nevertheless unequivocal about what they witnessed in the final weeks of his life: a young man who had graduated with honors, earned a scholarship, played varsity soccer and begun pursuing medicine became increasingly distressed after the loss of his immigration protections and the placement of a GPS monitor on his ankle.

His father said his son felt humiliated.

Bel himself had written about that humiliation publicly more than a month before his death.

He was 20 years old.

He had finished only his first week of college.

If you or someone you know is experiencing suicidal thoughts or emotional distress, call or text the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Free, confidential support is available 24 hours a day. You can also text HOME to 741741 to reach a volunteer crisis counselor through Crisis Text Line.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The message that prompted State Rep. Rodney Creech, R-West Alexandria, to respond was brief:

“Shame on you. We believe your daughter. You should resign.”

Creech answered the text with a laughing emoji and wrote, “If you need any topsoil let me know.”

Then he posted the exchange to Facebook.

Facebook’s edit history shows four different versions of Creech’s post appeared over the next 11 minutes. Creech initially told followers he was “requesting” that they contact the sender and said, “I would love to see you blow their phone up.”

Three minutes later, he separately edited the post to add the phone number in plain text.

Five minutes after that, Creech edited the post again while leaving both the number and his explicit request intact.

Only in the fourth version, 11 minutes after the original post, did Creech soften the most direct language.

Facebook shows four versions of Creech’s post in 11 minutes

At 10:31 a.m., Creech published the original version alongside a screenshot of the text exchange. The sender’s phone number was visible in the screenshot.

Creech wrote:

“Someone sent me this text earlier.

So to friends and family that want to have fun…I’m requesting that you just drop this person a line and say hello.

Please be nice but I would love to see you blow their phone up.

When you play stupid games you win stupid prizes!”

Three minutes later, at 10:34 a.m., Creech edited the post for the first time.

He left his request that supporters contact the person unchanged.

But Creech made the sender easier to contact: he added the phone number itself in plain text beneath the post.

At that point, Creech was still explicitly telling followers, “I’m requesting that you” contact the person and “I would love to see you blow their phone up.”

At 10:39 a.m., Creech edited the post again.

He changed “Someone sent me this text earlier” to “A random person sent me this text earlier,” changed “friends and family” to “my fb friends and family,” and added a smiling emoji.

But the substance of the request remained.

Five minutes after Creech had added the phone number in plain text, the third version still told his followers:

“I’m requesting that you just drop this person a line and say hello.”

“Please be nice but I would love to see you blow their phone up.”

The phone number remained directly beneath those words.

It was not until 10:42 a.m. — 11 minutes after the original post — that Creech softened the language.

“I’m requesting that you just drop this person a line and say hello” became:

“maybe just drop this person a line and say hello.”

And “I would love to see you blow their phone up” became:

“Please be nice but I would love to see their phone blow with friendly Creech supporters just saying hello.”

The phone number remained in the post.

The edit history shows Creech did not simply expose the number in his original screenshot and then immediately retreat from his request.

Three minutes after publishing the post, Creech affirmatively added the number in plain text while retaining the words “I’m requesting that you” and “I would love to see you blow their phone up.”

He then edited the post again at 10:39 a.m. without removing either the number or those statements.

Only in the fourth version did Creech change the most direct language — while continuing to publish the number and encourage “friendly Creech supporters” to contact it.

TiffinOhio.net is withholding the phone number and has redacted it from images accompanying this report.

Supporters said they acted on Creech’s request

The comments beneath Creech’s post show that some followers understood his invitation literally.

One commenter wrote simply: “Done!”

Another wrote, “Maybe we should all send text messages to this phone number lol.”

A third said he had already contacted the number, writing that he “asked him if he needs topsoil” and offered “better prices and free delivery.”

Others continued joking about contacting the number.

Several commenters also began trying to identify the person behind it. Screenshots of social media accounts purportedly associated with the number were posted publicly beneath Creech’s post.

One supporter suggested going further, writing: “Just go put a little top soil on their front porch for free, maybe add some manure on top.”

Commenters also posted screenshots purporting to show that the number had previously been advertised in connection with a small business. TiffinOhio.net has not independently confirmed that the person associated with those accounts sent the original message to Creech.

Another commenter raised the possibility that the number could belong to someone who had nothing to do with the message, warning that “there’s a good chance some innocent person is going to receive the messages.”

Despite that uncertainty, Creech kept the number in the post while continuing to encourage his followers to contact it.

‘We believe your daughter’

The criticism that triggered Creech’s post referred to allegations that have followed the lawmaker since an Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation probe became public in 2025.

The allegations were not simply that Creech had been in bed with his daughter.

According to BCI documents obtained by the Statehouse News Bureau, Creech’s minor daughter accused him of climbing into bed and under the covers with her while erect and wearing only his underwear.

Creech acknowledged to investigators that he had gotten into bed with the minor while wearing his underwear, but denied the sexual nature of the allegations, including allegations of inappropriate touching.

The daughter alleged that Creech’s erect penis pressed or poked her in the back while they were in bed, according to the investigative record.

Another Republican lawmaker, state Rep. Phil Plummer, a former Montgomery County sheriff, was interviewed by BCI about a private conversation he had with Creech concerning the allegations.

According to BCI interview records, Plummer told investigators that Creech said he did not remember whether he had poked the minor in the back during the encounter.

Plummer told investigators Creech’s comments were “disgusting and uncalled for” and “appalling.”

“As a father myself, I think it’s just appalling,” Plummer told investigators, according to records reported by the Dayton Daily News.

When BCI investigators questioned Creech about his conversation with Plummer, Creech initially responded, “Whatever Phil told you I probably said,” according to the investigative records.

After investigators described Plummer’s account, Creech denied making the remarks.

Creech was never charged and has repeatedly denied sexually abusing his daughter. He has called the allegations “demonstrably false” and politically motivated.

But the special prosecutor who reviewed the investigation did not describe Creech as having been exonerated.

Clark County Prosecutor Daniel Driscoll declined to pursue charges in October 2024, writing that Creech’s behavior was “concerning and suspicious” while concluding that the available evidence fell short of the threshold needed for prosecution.

“I find the statements of [the alleged victim] to be persuasive but find no independent evidence to support their claims,” Driscoll wrote.

Driscoll later told the Dayton Daily News that his description of Creech’s behavior referred both to his conduct during the investigation and his conduct during the period investigators were examining.

Five months later, Creech gave $4,100 to prosecutor’s judicial campaign

The case also raised questions about how the allegations were initially handled in Creech’s home county — and about a large campaign contribution Creech subsequently made to one of the local officials linked to that handling.

In July 2023, the minor’s stepfather, an Ohio police chief, contacted Preble County Sheriff Mike Simpson about the allegations.

According to a BCI investigative record, Simpson told a state agent that the stepfather believed he was required to report the alleged incident as a mandatory reporter and provided text messages describing Creech’s alleged conduct.

Simpson said he took the information to then-Preble County Prosecutor Martin Votel.

According to the investigator’s report, Simpson said Votel indicated “there was no criminal complaint at that time.”

“No report or other action took place from the sheriff’s office,” the investigator wrote.

Simpson later gave the Dayton Daily News a different description of the conversation, saying the stepfather had asked whether he was legally required to report the allegation and that Votel advised he was not a mandatory reporter in that circumstance.

Votel disputed both descriptions of his involvement.

“There was never a question presented to me about mandatory reporters,” Votel told the newspaper, adding that his office “did not and would not either encourage or discourage an investigation.”

What is undisputed is that no sheriff’s report was generated and no local investigation began when the allegations were first raised in July.

Both Simpson and Votel — described by the Dayton Daily News as personal friends of Creech — later recused themselves when the allegations resurfaced and an investigation eventually moved to BCI.

Then came the campaign contribution.

On Dec. 19, 2023, roughly five months after the allegations were first brought to Preble County authorities, Creech’s campaign transferred $4,100 to Votel’s campaign for Preble County Common Pleas Court judge.

Creech was Votel’s first and largest donor, according to a Dayton Daily News analysis of campaign-finance records.

The contribution accounted for roughly 75% of the financial support Votel had received for the judicial campaign at that point.

It was the only contribution Creech’s campaign had made to Votel dating back to at least mid-2019 and was the fourth-largest expenditure Creech had made to any individual candidate during that period, according to the newspaper’s analysis.

Votel went on to win the March 2024 Republican primary with about 70% of the vote and was unopposed in November. He now serves as a Preble County Common Pleas Court judge.

Votel later donated $100 to Creech’s reelection campaign in September 2024.

There is no evidence that Creech’s $4,100 contribution was a bribe or was exchanged for any official action.

But its timing and size drew scrutiny because Creech made it after Votel had been identified by Simpson as having a role in the initial handling of allegations against Creech — allegations that produced no sheriff’s report or local investigation — and while Votel was campaigning for a judgeship.

Creech denied any connection between the contribution and the allegations.

“Marty Votel is a tremendous public servant, and I am proud to know him,” Creech told the Dayton Daily News, saying their friendship went back nearly 15 years.

Creech dismissed scrutiny of the payment as controversy over “one conservative supporting another.”

Votel also denied that accepting the contribution was improper.

“I did not then, and do not now, feel that my campaign’s acceptance of these contributions was unethical or inappropriate,” Votel said.

The contribution does not establish wrongdoing. But it is part of an unusual sequence: allegations were brought to Creech’s home-county sheriff; no report or investigation followed; the sheriff said he had taken the matter to the county prosecutor; both officials, who were personally acquainted with Creech, later recused themselves; and Creech then became that prosecutor’s first and largest donor as he sought a judgeship.

Creech’s daughter later spoke publicly

The identity of Creech’s accuser was initially withheld by news organizations because she was a minor relative.

His daughter has since publicly identified herself and directly challenged Creech’s characterization of her allegations.

As TiffinOhio.net previously reported, Creech publicly described his daughter’s allegations as “textbook parental alienation” and said the controversy was “100% in the name of politics” during a February Facebook dispute.

His daughter responded directly.

“You continue to post trying to nail my mother and blame her, instead of taking blame for your own inappropriate actions,” she wrote.

She later added: “Heaven forbid a child speaks out about something like this, right?!”

The comments subsequently disappeared from Creech’s page. Creech denied removing them.

That history explains the otherwise cryptic message Creech received Tuesday: “We believe your daughter. You should resign.”

The screenshot Creech himself published contains no threat. It shows a person criticizing an elected official and urging him to resign over allegations made by his daughter.

Creech responded by directing his political supporters toward the phone number used to send it.

Ohio law addresses inciting others to harass someone

Creech’s post also raises questions under Ohio’s telecommunications-harassment statute, although there is no indication he has been charged with an offense.

Ohio Revised Code 2917.21(A)(10) provides that no person shall knowingly “incite another person through a telecommunication or other means to harass or participate in the harassment of a person.”

The statute separately prohibits knowingly posting text or an image online “for the purpose of abusing, threatening, or harassing another person.”

A first violation of either provision is generally a first-degree misdemeanor.

The existence of the law does not mean Creech’s post automatically constituted telecommunications harassment. Whether conduct violates the statute depends on whether prosecutors could establish each element of the offense, including the required intent.

But Facebook’s edit history provides a contemporaneous record of exactly what Creech told his followers.

“I’m requesting that you just drop this person a line and say hello,” he wrote in the first version.

Then: “I would love to see you blow their phone up.”

Three minutes later, Creech edited the post to add the phone number itself in plain text while leaving both statements unchanged.

At least one person warned Creech in the comments about the potential legal issue.

“Just a heads up telling people to text somebody like that can be considered telecommunications harassment,” the commenter wrote.

Creech did not remove the number from the version of the post reviewed by TiffinOhio.net.

GOP leaders once asked Creech to resign

The episode comes after Ohio Republican leaders first punished Creech over the allegations and then reversed course.

When the BCI investigation became public in May 2025, Ohio House Speaker Matt Huffman stripped Creech of all four committee assignments, including his chairmanship of the House Agriculture Committee, and asked him to consider resigning.

“This, on its face, was very serious,” Huffman said at the time.

Creech refused to resign.

Nine months later, Huffman restored Creech to four committees, citing the absence of criminal charges or other action by authorities.

Huffman then backed Creech’s reelection, and the Ohio Republican Party endorsed him for another term.

Creech went on to win the May Republican primary for House District 40 with about 58% of the vote.

He remains a sitting member of the Ohio House and the Republican nominee for another term.

Tuesday’s incident began with a person sending Creech seven words of political criticism: “We believe your daughter. You should resign.”

Creech’s original public response was equally clear about what he wanted his supporters to do.

“I’m requesting that you” contact the person, he wrote.

“I would love to see you blow their phone up.”

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

The Seneca County Sheriff’s Office was notified shortly after 6 p.m. Monday that the girl was missing from a residence on South Township Road 77. The caller said the child had been riding her bicycle and had last been confirmed seen roughly 45 minutes earlier.

Multiple sheriff’s deputies were dispatched to search the area. Republic police and the Ohio State Highway Patrol also responded to assist, while another deputy was called in to deploy a drone as the search expanded.

Investigators followed several possible leads about where the child may have traveled, including information suggesting she could have been heading toward New Washington. Crawford County authorities were also notified during the search.

The Sheriff’s Office reported at approximately 6:52 p.m. that the girl had been located.

According to the final entry in the sheriff’s media summary, the child had left home on her bicycle, became lost and eventually arrived at a former teacher’s home. The former teacher then brought her home.

No injuries were reported in the media summary.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

Polling suggests that cutting the program is deeply unpopular, which is why it is often referred to as “the third rail of electoral politics.” A recent AARP survey found that 82% of American adults view Social Security as “very important.” Half of those enrolled in the program say they would not survive financially if their benefits were cut.

The issue reemerged last year when Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the White House’s tax-deferred investment accounts for newborns, known as “Trump accounts,” were a “backdoor for privatizing Social Security.” The accounts were part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBB), which passed the House and Senate with only Republican votes.

Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan celebrated OBBB’s passage and falsely claimed that the law “doesn’t touch Social Security.” The law will cut $1 trillion from Medicaid over the next decade to fund tax breaks that primarily benefit wealthy people. Those tax breaks will create less revenue for the Social Security trust fund, speeding up the program’s insolvency.

In 2014, when he was first running for the Senate, Sullivan suggested raising the retirement age and delaying Social Security benefits for future generations. He said “a younger generation of Alaskans or Americans can accept” such a change.

Sullivan is seeking a third term this year. His Democratic opponent is former Rep. Mary Peltola.

Florida Sen. Ashley Moody called OBBB “historic” when it passed and promised “this is just the beginning, and with President Donald Trump, we will not stop pushing forward.”

Moody was also a big fan of DOGE, the White House initiative that fired 14% of workers at the agency responsible for administering Social Security. This led to several Social Security field offices shutting down and longer wait times for those filing claims. Moody voted against multiple budget amendments to restore this funding.

More than 5 million of Moody’s constituents are enrolled in Social Security. She was appointed to the Senate last year to fill the seat vacated by Secretary of State Marco Rubio. She is now running for a full term against Democratic state Rep. Angie Nixon.

Like Moody, Ohio Sen. Jon Husted also voted for OBBB and against reversing DOGE cuts. He then went a step further by proposing a constitutional amendment that would compel Congress to balance the federal budget.

Currently, Social Security is mostly funded through payroll taxes. Those funds are held by the U.S. Treasury and disbursed to beneficiaries. Any surplus funds are invested in special Treasury bonds that are drawn on when tax revenues fall short.

A balanced-budget amendment would essentially make it illegal for the federal government to spend more in a given year than it collects in revenue. If tax revenues are insufficient to fund Social Security, the government would be prohibited from drawing on the bonds to make up the shortfall. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities says this would inevitably lead to a cut in services.

The AARP says such a plan would be “devastating for millions.”

Husted will face former Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown in this year’s election. Brown co-sponsored the 2024 Social Security Fairness Act that increased benefits for public workers.

Maine Sen. Susan Collins did not vote for OBBB, but she did vote to allow the legislation to be debated, clearing a key procedural hurdle and setting the stage for its eventual passage. North Dakota Sen. John Hoeven said Collins was a “team player” for doing so.

Collins has cast multiple votes weakening Social Security in her 29-year career, including a 2003 vote against creating a Social Security reserve account and a 2011 vote against tabling a budget bill that proposed cutting the program.

Collins is running for reelection this year against Democratic state Sen. Troy Jackson.

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) plans to make Republican hostility toward Social Security a major issue in the midterms.

“In November, voters will reject Republicans’ attempts to put this critical program on the chopping block by electing a Democratic Senate majority that will stand up for seniors and protect Social Security,” says DSCC spokesperson Maeve Coyle.

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.

More than 15,000 Americans have contracted cyclosporiasis in recent months, a type of food poisoning that causes low-grade fevers and painful diarrhea. The outbreak has been traced to iceberg lettuce. In August, multiple store-bought guacamoles were recalled because of potential salmonella contamination.

This has been a growing trend in President Donald Trump’s second term. Last year, 25 people were hospitalized and six died after contracting listeria from ready-to-eat pasta products. In total, the federal government failed to identify the source for 13 of the 28 foodborne illness outbreaks reported last year.

“As families spent this summer wondering what was safe to put on the dinner table, everyone is wondering what happened to the safeguards designed to protect our food supply,” the report says.

Issues of food safety and public health are generally managed by three federal agencies: the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).

All of these agencies were dramatically downsized by DOGE, the White House initiative that slashed workforces across the federal government. The FDA lost 3,859 employees and the USDA lost 19,984, including 874 workers at its Food Safety and Inspection Service.

The White House insisted food safety inspectors were not included in the firings, but the gutting of support staff still contributed to a growing backlog of uninspected food producers. The farm linked to the cyclosporiasis outbreak, for example, had not been inspected for seven years.

As for the CDC under Trump, it narrowed the foodborne pathogens it monitors from six to two. Cyclosporiasis and listeria are among the pathogens no longer being tracked.

“FDA inspections are the first line of defense for mitigating contamination outbreaks,” the report continues, noting that this applies to both domestic and imported products.

Food borne illnesses are also affecting the economy. USDA data suggests that food borne illnesses cost Americans $75 billion a year in medical care, lost productivity, and premature deaths before Trump started eliminating safeguards. Now, that figure seems poised to grow.

According to a CBS poll, 40% of Americans are buying and eating less produce of all brands and varieties, not just those impacted by cyclosporiasis. A separate poll found that a majority of Americans have little or no confidence in government oversight of food safety.

“Even though Trump and his allies promised to ‘Make America Healthy Again,’” the report says, “his administration has made it harder to find out what is making Americans sick.”

Originally published on TiffinOhio.net.