More bills become law with the stroke of Gov. DeWine's pen, including a conservative-backed idea called the "Success Sequence." It will now be taught to children starting in the 6th grade.
Just what is it and why is there opposition?
Listen up, drivers: If police pull you over for any reason, you must provide your name, address and date of birth, because under a new law you can't withhold personal information.
Due to new digital safeguards, SNAP recipients will get new cards with electronic chips, and Medicaid home health workers must check in electronically.
Survivors of sexual violence looking to move in order to stay safe can’t break their leases under Ohio law. A bipartisan bill would change that.
One million dollars in emergency state funds may be headed to Vinton County to help 16 siblings living in what authorities called deplorable conditions.
It's the last call to claim unclaimed funds earmarked for the Cleveland Browns' new stadium complex.
We're talking about all these major political topics on this week's Reporter Roundtable.
Guests:
- Karen Kasler, bureau chief, Ohio Public Radio Statehouse News Bureau
- HaleyBeMiller, Columbus Dispatch
- Noah Blundo, executive editor, Hannah News Service
Transcript
This transcript is generated with AI. To ensure its accuracy, review the audio file.
Amy Juravich: Welcome to the All Sides Reporter Roundtable. An hour where we catch up on the political news of last week and preview the week ahead. I'm your host, Amy Juravich. Joining us on the Roundtable this week, we have Karen Kasler, Bureau Chief for the Ohio Public Radio State House News Bureau. Welcome back, Karen. Great to be here. Haley BeMiller, State Government and Politics Reporter for the Columbus Dispatch. Welcome back Haley. Good morning. And Noah Blundo, Executive Editor for Hannah News Service. Welcome back Noah. Good morning Governor DeWine was busy last week signing a number of bills into law, and I wanted to go over some of them. Karen, one that was a little controversial adds a requirement, which is for schools to teach what is called the Success Sequence. Can you tell us what the Success Sequence is and why it was included in the bill that the governor signed.
Karen Kasler: Well, the Success Sequence is a formula that's been talked about by a lot of conservative commentators and groups, groups with the word family in the title, for instance. They've talked about the idea of, if you graduate high school, get a full-time job, get married, and then have kids, you are statistically more likely to have economic success, statistically less likely to end up in poverty. And so a lot Republicans say, this is a way to give kids better tools to make better decisions. But Democrats have pointed out that not everybody who goes through that sequence has success. And there are a lot of factors that contribute to people ending up in poverty. You know, you've got to wage stagnation and inflation. And there's the whole statistic of if you're born into poverty, you're very likely to spend your life in poverty, so that was the real opposition here. I mean, this was added to a bill that had no opposition, pretty much. It was about... Licensing school psychologists who are coming into Ohio. So this was, and we see this fairly often in lame duck and also in these kinds of sessions where an idea that the legislature wants the Republican leadership wants to push forward is added to something that's already on its way through and quite often is going through very quickly or going through it very easily.
Juravich: Did it get added kind of late? Like did the teachers unions or any teachers that all have a chance to weigh in about it?
Kasler: Added pretty late. I mean this was a bill that was already out there, the idea of teaching the success sequence, so that was something that was already had been proposed as legislation, but this was just kind of added to that bill on the child or on the school psychologists later.
Juravich: Do you know if so schools because it takes like after the governor signs a bill it takes 90 days to go into effect to do schools in this upcoming school year have to add the success sequence to curriculum.
Kasler: I don't know. I know that the Department of Workforce and Education, I'm sorry, the Department of Education and Workforce do. They have to, part of the law is to approve and review specific curriculum related to the success sequence, which actually starts, the law says it'll start being taught in sixth grade all the way through the end of high school. So I'm not sure how the implementation will go, as we've seen with cell phones and the You know, it sometimes takes a little while to get moving.
Noah Blundo: There are provisions in this law about integrating it with other, there's a long list of life skill, general welfare topics that lawmakers want teachers to address, avoiding STIs, you know, learning about substance abuse, dating violence, things like that. So there are. It has to be in a course that's required for high school graduation, and it can be in the curriculum that integrates the success of these students with these other topics that are already required to be addressed.
Kasler: And that was another thing Democrats had said they had concerns about was that this is another burden on teachers. And so they were concerned about that as well.
Juravich: Did Governor DeWine weigh in at all, make any comments, or he just signed the bill?
Kasler: On his, he had two statements last week, I believe, outlining the bills. He signed like 13 bills at once and then a bill like the day or next day later or whatever. And he didn't make any statements about any of these that he signed.
Juravich: Haley, any comments on the Success Sequence? I didn't want to leave you out.
Haley BeMiller: No, I think Karen and Noah covered it.
Juravich: All right. Well, another bill that was signed included a provision related to two programs that will get some digital upgrades, and they're meant as safeguards against fraud. So one is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as SNAP, and those are also known food stamps. And this involves EBT, electronic benefit transfer cards. So... Every card will now have a chip in it instead of being a swipe. Noah, what do we know about why we need chips instead of swipes?
Blundo: Yeah, this just makes it much less susceptible to fraud. There's a lot of benefit theft from people putting these skimming devices or getting people's EBT card information. It has been, I don't remember the last time I had a debit or credit card that didn't have a chip. It has become industry. It has industry standard for several years and other payment cards, but Ohio was behind.
Juravich: And so it'll address fraud because the swipes are more apt to be like, you can skim the numbers with a swipe rather than a chip.
Blundo: These cards are less just less prone to theft and it won't this will be a gradual process there was initially an idea to just kind of swap out all the cards at once but that was deemed to be cost-prohibitive so there's a regular schedule for replacing these cards and just as people's cards need to be replaced they will be swapped in with a chip card and also if you lose your card you the one that is reissued to you we'll come with the chip.
Kasler: I talked to Matt Damschroeder from the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services about the implementation of this, because like you mentioned, it takes a while for state laws to take effect, so this would go into effect in October. But obviously, this is something that lawmakers and even advocates for low-income Ohioans have wanted to see happen because of the level of theft that happens. And it's really, if your benefits are stolen on these cards, you can't get them back. There's nothing you can do. But only one other state has used... Electronic chip cards and already implemented then. So this will make Ohio the second state to do that. Oh.
Juravich: So we're so we're behind in the chip cards, but everyone is exactly
Kasler: Exactly. I asked him why that is, and he said that the way that the federal government has set up SNAP is that it doesn't run on the normal commercial payment system. It runs on an entirely separate system. So that has made it difficult for states to go ahead and implement these chip cards. And so he says that the process is already underway to get a vendor and that we could see those chip cards coming out by the end the year.
Juravich: Do you, does it need, are you saying that like the card doesn't work at all, all little like kiosk terminals, is that why they, there's a delay or something like that?
Kasler: It's just, it's a totally different system to access the benefits that are on these EBT cards versus the system that if you are using a regular debit card, they access your bank account. All right.
Juravich: The internet of monies, yes. Okay.
Blundo: I'm not sure how much the state is going to benefit from making this decision now versus a year ago in terms of there was a push to get this done because the federal government is going start pushing more of the administrative costs of SNAP onto the states. So that was part of the argument for doing this a while ago. Now we're not necessarily putting it into effect until around the time that that policy change takes effect but
Kasler: And this is going to be fairly expensive, I think. I mean, OK, maybe not when you start talking about the billions of dollars in the state budget. But there was an estimate from a couple of years ago this would cost about 12 million dollars and the federal government would have a match in that. Well, apparently, the federal governments match has changed. So nobody seems to know exactly how much this is going to cost, but it could be. I mean you're talking about replacing a significant number of cards as well as I don't know if you're going to have to replace the. Units, you know, that people use at retailers if there's going to be new units installed. So we'll have to see how that goes
Juravich: Well, in addition to the chips in snap cards, lawmakers also added several Medicaid-related changes involving home health care services that raised some concerns. So this involves what is known as EVV, Electronic Visit Verification. Who can talk about what will change and how this will address fraud concerns? What's electronic visit verification?
Kasler: Well, it's basically another thing that has been talked about as an anti-fraud measure. And it would require people who are home health care workers to electronically check in and check out, check in when they are arriving at their client's house, and then check out when they leave. And the question is, of course, the implementation. How do you make that happen? And advocates for home health-care workers have said part of the problem has been, There's parts of the state that don't have good GPS coverage or they don't good internet coverage or cell phone coverage. And so that's an issue that has to be dealt with. And also sometimes these home healthcare workers, they're supposed to clock out at a certain time, but their client fell or there's something going on where they can't just, they don't want to just clock out and leave. You know, they want to stay and help. So this is. All of in a reaction to the story that came out earlier this year from the conservative outlet, The Daily Wire, that claimed that Ohio's, Ohio Medicaid had paid home health care workers hundreds of millions of dollars in fraudulent benefits. And at one point, this bill even had a provision that would have banned family members from caring for other family members as home health-care workers, which there are about 7,000 people in Ohio that are getting paid to do this from Ohio Medicaid and.
Juravich: After much testimony that got taken out.
Kasler: The advocates, including people who are disabled, were very vocal in their opposition saying this will lead to more institutionalization of people and there will be, as one person put it, human damage. But that was immediately removed when the outrage started. And so this now does require that electronic visit verification though. So home healthcare workers will have to, as the state rolls this out, use GPS devices and electronically check in and check out on their patients and clients.
Juravich: Audio from your story, Karen. This is Tara Britton, Director of Public Policy and Advocacy with the Center for Community Solutions.
Tara Britton: There have been issues raised during implementation that said hey you know we live in a rural area we don't have cell service or coverage and that makes it really hard to be specific on the times you know you check in.
Juravich: Check out. So Karen, this is what you're saying is basically this law is supposed to go into effect in October, but it's not like the internet's going to be any better in some of these places. So are they going to help some of the workers with like hot spots or something?
Kasler: I think that's what the implementation is going to be the challenge because Tara Britten said in that interview that that's been the problem for years because there was a period where it was part of legislation and then was taken out and so trying to make that work is really the challenge here.
Blundo: Clunkiness of the system was one of the complaints that came up a lot. It was just, it takes a lot of time. And if you're in the middle of providing care to somebody, and then people were concerned that I'm getting flagged because I build for this period of time, but the EVV shows that I build for the slightly overlapping period of the time, and now I'm under scrutiny. But really, it's just that the system wasn't working very well, made it hard to sign in.
Juravich: Clunky. That's a technical term, right? Yes. That is that's the official scientific.
Kasler: And once again, the balance is, you know, you don't want to have fraud, but you also want to make sure people are getting the services they need. And so that's, I think clunky is a really great way to put it, but the upshot of that is what happens if there are people who are caught in that clunkiness and then they lose, they're either the provider and they lose their ability to be paid or they're the client who loses the ability to have somebody come help.
Juravich: Right. Right. And it could be something could supposed to take an hour and takes an hour and a half. Something supposed to an hour could take 20 minutes. You never. Yeah, it's just all right.
Juravich: You're listening to All Sides in the Weekly Reporter Roundtable. We're talking with Noah Blundo, executive editor with Hannah News Service, Haley B. Miller, state government and politics reporter for the Columbus Dispatch and Karen Kastler, bureau chief with the Ohio Public Radio State House News Bureau. Haley, something that you wrote about is providing information to the police. So if the police pull you over for any reason. Under a new law that was just signed, you must provide your name, address, and date of birth. And under this new law, you cannot withhold personal information. I learned that I didn't know you were allowed to withhold personal I guess. So tell me about this law, what's happening? What are we doing now that we quit before? Yeah.
BeMiller: Yeah. So as you said, it's now a requirement for both drivers and passengers. If you're pulled over for suspected traffic violation, if an officer asks for your name, address or date of birth, you have to provide that information. Proponents of this law said that there are increasing number of cases of people withholding that information, and sometimes making a big splash out of it on social media. Recording, things like that. And lawmakers who supported the bill said that this is creating a safety concern for police. So this would ramp up the penalties if you don't provide this information and. You know, I think critics of this have said, you know, this is really expansive because it would apply to any suspected traffic violation, even like if your taillights are broken or something like that. And there was a, it was brought up to that, you know, This could open police departments up to even more lawsuits than they typically see now. So it'll be interesting to see how this. Plays out once it takes effect in 90 days, you know, to your point, I think some people just kind of automatically provide this information, but there have been people who withhold that because they say, you, know, I don't believe I've done anything wrong.
Juravich: So they don't even want to engage in the conversation with the police officer, yeah.
Kasler: I think it was a reference to people who are social media lawyers, they're learning things on social media, or sovereign citizens who are people who claim that they don't have to give up this information, they don't have to pay taxes, this kind of stuff, and they said that the sponsors of the bill said these are problems that we're seeing that police are reporting to.
Juravich: What about motorists of color who tend to be pulled over more than white motorists? I mean, they are leery sometimes of providing information to the police. I think that's probably why some of these videos have started. And we've all seen videos of traffic stops gone bad and even deadly. So was there opposition to the bill? Did people speak up and say, we should be allowed to not tell our name?
BeMiller: Yeah, I think there was definitely concern from, you know, this bill didn't really get any democratic support. You know, that was brought up that, you know, there are times when there are, there have been instances of police bias and traffic stops and things like that. And people are concerned that this is just going to exacerbate situations like that, the Office of the Public Defender was opposed to this, again, saying that this is just too expansive and. That the penalties are really disproportionate to, you know, again, someone getting pulled over for.
Juravich: A minor traffic infraction. I see. So you get pulled over just because you have a taillight out and then if you don't give your name and birth date, then you end up with another charge against you. Is that right? Okay, instead of just the taillights. Do you know the penalty? I'm not sure if you read the law in detail to know if it, is it a $500 fine or is it, yeah.
BeMiller: I believe, I think it's a fourth degree misdemeanor, so it'd be up to 30 days in jail or they get a $250 fine, so.
Juravich: Yeah. Not nothing. Not nothing? Do you know if this is, I'm not sure how new laws are communicated, like will police officers say in traffic stops, you know, it's the law, you have to give me your name.
BeMiller: Yeah, I mean, I think that remains to be seen, you know, not everyone in the state of Ohio is paying attention, of course, to new laws that take effect all the time. So, you now, whether it's police departments or maybe even the BNB, things like that, I guess we'll see if there's an effort to educate people or if this is just going become, you know, what police do and maybe. I'm sure there's going to be some sort of learning curve for people who don't realize that they have to do this now.
Juravich: In this day and age, I could also see immigrants being fearful of giving their name. Like if they got pulled over for rolling through a stop sign instead of fully stopping, and I could see them not wanting to say their name, like in this immigration era. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Well, okay, I guess we'll see how it's communicated to people, but that is the new law. You have to give your name and your birthdate and your address in October, right? 90 days from now. This is the Weekly Reporter Roundtable. Coming up, the State Controlling Board meets today to consider $1 million in emergency aid for 16 siblings in Vinton County whose parents and grandparents are being charged with child endangerment. We'll talk about that and more when the roundtable continues on 89.7 NPR News.
Juravich: You're listening to All Sides in the Weekly Reporter Roundtable, an hour where we talk about all things Ohio politics, I'm your host Amy Juravich. Still with us, we have Haley B. Miller, state government and politics reporter for the Columbus Dispatch, Noah Blundo, executive editor of Hanna News Service, and Karen Cassler, Bureau Chief for the Ohio Public Radio Statehouse News Bureau. There is a case out of Vinton County. It's an Ohio case, but it's dominated the news locally, and it's made national news too. The Vinton county case of 16 children found living in what authorities are calling deplorable conditions. The children range in age from one to 18 years, and the parents, Elizabeth Siders and Gary Siders Jr. And the grandparents, Gary Sider Sr. And Christina Siders have been charged with multiple counts of child endangerment. Haley, the Ohio Controlling Board is scheduled to meet today, because there's a request for $1 million in emergency state aid. Can you talk to me about like the process and what, well, first of all, I guess why the controlling board is the one who has to approve this? Yeah, so.
BeMiller: Money that goes out basically between the budget cycle that wasn't part of that kind of process goes to the controlling board for approval. This $1 million is designed to go to the agency that provides foster care and child welfare services for Vinton County. This is a really significant case in a very small county and one of, if not the poorest counties in Ohio. So this just aims to give them a little extra support, especially because I think I read at one point that Vinton County's foster care system has about 45 children in it per year. So a sudden influx of 16 children at once is just a huge strain and the state wants to help local services navigate that.
Juravich: And Senator Jerry Serino is a member of the Controlling Board. He told 10TV that the state should act, and he called this, quote, the worst case that he had ever heard of. So is it just thought that the Controll Board will approve this today?
BeMiller: I would imagine so. I would be surprised if they didn't. I think there's a lot of concern about this case across the state and, you know, state officials want to be able to help as much as possible. It's also possible that this won't be the last payment to Vinton County. Representative Brian Stewart has said this could be the first of a few ways that the state tries to support them. It just kind of depends what happens from Bye.
Blundo: This reminds me of the Pike County, the Roden-Wagner family dispute murders in that it was a relatively sparsely populated county, small government. It's just the kind of workload that that kind of a case creates for the local sheriff deputies or social workers or just the court system. And so the state stepped in with money there. Part of that was because there was a capital case being prosecuted there. And those are always way more expensive than any of their criminal case. Minutes. I think this follows that precedent.
Kasler: And also, there was reporting about Gary Sider Sr. Being released on a recognizance bond. And one of the reasons that's been cited for that is because that would, he needed medical attention. And the concern was that the county would have to absorb those medical costs if indeed he was still in jail. So he was released to, I guess, get medical attention on his own, on his. Right and with like a
Juravich: A monitor thing or something.
Kasler: Yeah, we're a cognizant's bond, I mean, obviously, but that kind of, I think, really demonstrates a lot of rural counties in Ohio just don't have a whole lot of money that they can put toward medical costs for people they're holding in jail, for child custody cases, all this stuff, because this stuff gets very expensive very quickly.
Juravich: Yeah. And the state's attorney general, Andy Wilson, earlier described the scene that he and law enforcement officials witnessed as pure evil. I'm not sure if he's made any more comments than that, but is this something that the state attorney general would be involved in at all or does it stay as an event in county case?
Blundo: My understanding is that local prosecutors can invite the state attorney general's office to help prosecute. That happened in Pike County again. And probably likely the Bureau of Criminal Investigation, which sits within the AG's could be involved in the law enforcement investigation.
BeMiller: And it's worth noting too that BCI was actually initially in Vinton County at this home on an unrelated warrant as part of an unrelated investigation. We still don't know the details about that. BCI is what? The Bureau of Criminal Investigation? Yeah, within the AG's office. Oh, that's the AG'S office bureau.
Juravich: Okay, got it.
BeMiller: Um, so we still don't know a lot about that investigation, but, you know, it was a surprise to them. And it sounds like everyone else that these kids were in the home, so it'll be interesting to see if and when we get more information about why the AG's office was looking at this family in the first place.
Juravich: Interesting. Well, and I do want to say that the court-appointed attorney for the children's mother, Elizabeth Siders, did an interview. The attorney did an interview with 10TV, and the attorney is pushing back on how some things have been characterized by authorities. He said that language like feral kids is inaccurate and unhelpful, and he said the older children had access to phones and social media, and he said that there was no signs of restraints, so. I encourage listeners if they wanna know more to listen to this interview. It was between the court-appointed defense attorney and it was on 10 TV. But just overall, I mean, this is mostly a law enforcement and court story at this point. Is there anything else to add from a state or political level, just the controlling board and what happens with the AG?
Blundo: Well, you asked about... Go ahead, Nana. So, um...
BeMiller: So the State Department of Children and Youth is conducting a review to determine if any child welfare reports were made about this family. In the past, this is kind of standard practice, but that's another thing I think we'll learn more about as to whether this family was on anyone's radar at the local or state level, and if so, if there were any gaps or anything that was missed. Yeah, Noah. I'll just...
Blundo: You mentioned the attorney general's comments about the sort of heinous nature of the allegations here. I think, you know, this is a crime in court story which means eventually it has to go to a courtroom and there will be things about, you now, like can they get a fair trial down there? You know, will they need to change a venue? So, you, know, public statements from elected officials on that might not, you know could play into those considerations.
Juravich: And I think I read this morning that a lawmaker proposed a bill related to more serious checks on homeschooling. I'm not sure if these children were in school ever, but there's no real followup. If a parent says you're being homeschooled, then you're just being homescooled and there's not checks and balances there.
Kasler: Well, that's my colleague, Joe Engels, my State House News Bureau colleague, Joe Engles, wrote about that. She talked to Representative Bill, Senator Bill Blessing about that, he's proposed putting some more guardrails on people who are homeschooling their kids, basically for this reason, that homeschool is something that there's there's got to be curriculum and follow through and that sort of thing. And he just says that it's time to have a little bit more accountability and making sure that this kind of thing would not happen anywhere else.
Juravich: Right, because if the kids were going to school periodically, there might have been another adult checking in or something like that. Well, you are listening to the Weekly Reporter Roundtable on 89.7 NPR News. This is All Sides. We are talking with Karen Kassler from the Ohio Public Radio Statehouse News Bureau, Haley B. Miller from the Columbus Dispatch, and Noah Blundo with Hanna News Service. Karen, you wrote about the Um. The five academic civic centers. So in 2023, Republicans approved these five centers to be housed at five different universities and they are also called intellectual diversity centers. They were created to counter what lawmakers viewed as liberal bias on college campuses. There's one on Ohio State University's campus. It's the home of the Salmon P. Chase Center. Some schools are reporting low enrollment, but they also say the centers are just getting off the ground and need time to develop. So... Amid worries that universities are not promoting the centers, Republican Senator Jerry Cirino wants to mandate that students take classes there. Here is some of what he said last week.
Sen. Jerry Cirino: We wanna make sure that they are financially viable and that they are not taken advantage of by those that would like to frustrate the implementation of the laws that we passed.
Juravich: So Karen, is he suggesting that some of the colleges are not promoting the centers or undermining the centers?
Kasler: This is that three credit hour course in American civics literacy was required under Senate Bill 1, which was the big bill that banned most mandatory diversity, equity, inclusion training, required intellectual diversity, so-called intellectual diversity in certain topics being taught in classrooms, banned faculty strikes, did all these things. And it's been in effect for about a year. And that three-credit hour course in American civic literacy is part of that. Serino says he's seen what coursework looks like in other states that have had a similar requirement, and he called that coursework a joke. And he said that he really wants students in the public university system to basically get the American civics literacy course that really was part of the reason behind Senate Bill 1. And so he said, for kids who are attending these five universities with these civic centers, well, it's just natural that they would take that required course at these civic center. So that's the whole genesis of his idea of, let's move this civics course to the civic centers. But there's another part of the bill that also says that tuition and other assorted fees that are associated with this course and any other course have to stay at those civic centers and can't be taken to other parts of the university. So he really wants these civic centers to. To be sustainable and to stay after he's no longer in office.
Blundo: And there's provision of the bill about sort of establishing a funding floor for these universities so that if the state is not able to contribute the amount that they have in the past universities would be required to make up the difference so that it couldn't they couldn't become defunded through in action, basically.
Juravich: So the enrollment numbers, I've seen a range of figures from different media outlets. WOSU's George Shilcock reached out to Lee Strang, the executive director of the Chase Center at Ohio State. And Strang wrote back in an email that enrollment is growing. And he said that as of July 9th, nearly 350 students are enrolled for the fall. So it seems like a growing thing. I can't remember the exact numbers. They had a few dozen in the first semester and then more than 100 and now they're up to 350. Karen, what about the centers at other places? So there's one in the University of Toledo, Miami University, Wright State University, Cleveland State University. Are they all struggling?
Kasler: Enrollment? I think the centers at Wright State, Cleveland State, and Miami University are really kind of just getting started because, as you mentioned, this was something in the budget that was signed in 2023, so some of these centers are still getting off the ground. University of Toledo said, I got an email from them, I asked for an email, from Ohio State, still waiting on that one, but I got a email from the University of Tallito saying, its Institute of American Constitutional Thought and Leadership offered five course sections with a total enrollment of 12 during spring 2026. They're registering right now for fall still. Approximately 60 students are registered for seven course sections as of early July. Okay. So.
Juravich: Cirino seems very concerned about the financial viability of these centers, so they budgeted, the state budgeted money for the creation of them, right? But maybe not forever, is that what he means?
Blundo: Well, no. No appropriation can last longer than two years. Oh, OK. So, you know, I would expect that the Republicans, state lawmakers would continue to support these centers. But I think they sort of want to put a guarantee in law that they'll that they will continue to be sustained.
Juravich: Okay, but this is a bill that is working its way, it hasn't passed anything yet.
Blundo: It's just been only been introduced. It was introduced around the tail end of the spring legislative session So hasn't even gotten any committee action yet. So could move in the fall could be Preview to some budget debates of next spring under governor Acton or Ramaswamy.
Juravich: All right, and before we take a break, I'm gonna pivot to one more topic. Haley, you wrote about this. There's a bipartisan bill that seeks to provide protections to survivors of sexual violence when it has to do with rental housing. So you wrote this bill, it's co-sponsored by Democratic representative Michelle Grimm and Republican representative Melanie Miller. And basically it's to try to help people be able to move if they feel unsafe, is that right?
BeMiller: Right. So this would put some protections in place for if you're a survivor of sexual violence, and you do need some paperwork for this, like a protection order or proof that you reported allegations to police or a victim advocate, but this would allow people to break their lease without any sort of financial penalty. I think as anyone who is rented knows, you can't just break your lease without consequences more often than not. So this would ensure that if someone is in this situation, they don't have to worry about paying for anything or that their credit's gonna get hurt. And Ohio is in a minority of states that does not do this. Most other states have something in place to help these folks, so. It is bipartisan, but it's been introduced in the past without much success, so I'm not sure what the prognosis for it is at this point.
Juravich: Do you know if landlords are on board with this at all?
BeMiller: I think Representative Grim and I talked about this and I think having that protection order, having some sort of paperwork as opposed to people just claiming that they need to break their lease because of XYZ reason, I think that is intended to appease the landlords a little bit, help find some middle ground. So they have some assurances that, you know, this this isn't just being done willy-nilly. So there's also an option in the bill for a tenant to request new locks and if in that case the landlord can only charge up to $250 for that.
Juravich: And do you, this has just been proposed though. I mean, has it had hearings or anything like that? Okay.
BeMiller: No, it was introduced a little while ago, but yeah, it's still no hearings. And, you know, we're we're nearing the end of this session. So.
Juravich: Well, the the sessions on a break right now until after the election basically, right? So we'll see where some of these bills go. This is the reporter roundtable from all sides. And coming up, we're going to see how things are going with the governor's race and the U.S. Senate race. It's about four months from Election Day. That's when the reporter Roundtable from All Sides continues on 89 7 NPR News.
Juravich: You're listening to All Sides. It's the Weekly Reporter Roundtable. I'm your host, Amy Juravich. And still with us, Haley B. Miller, state government and politics reporter for the Columbus Dispatch, Noah Blundo, executive editor of Hanna News Service, and Karen Kastler, bureau chief at the Ohio Public Radio Statehouse News Bureau. Haley, you wrote about the governor's race between Republican Vivek Ramaswami and Democrat Amy Acton, and it's officially being called a toss-up according to the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. And this marks a shift from political forecasts that used to give a slight advantage to Ramaswami. I mean, how significant is this that we're calling this governor's race a toss-up?
BeMiller: Yeah, I think it's definitely noteworthy. Cook is a very reputable political prognosticator. And Jessica Taylor, the Senate and governor's editor for Cook, argued in her analysis that Ramaswami has a likability problem, and that despite the financial advantage that he has and the race, it's an open question about whether he's going to be able to overcome that decisively enough to. Defeat act in. Now, this is just one take on the race. There are other forecasters who have said the race still likely leans Republican just because Ohio in recent elections has pretty decisively favored Republicans. But I think this is an open race. Governor DeWine obviously not running for reelection. It's two candidates that aren't complete strangers but are certainly newer to the Ohio political sphere. And, you know, I think, you know, Taylor argued in her analysis that some Republicans in Ohio think, they may have bet on the wrong horse, especially in an election year that nationally is expected to favor Democrats because of what's happening in D.C.
Juravich: All right, Noah is is Ramaswami the wrong horse in the race. Let's let's extend the metaphor. Who knows, but.
Blundo: Who knows, but I think, as I was reviewing some of the forecasts, like Cook and Sabato's crystal ball, you know, one of the things they point out is, well, first we've got the national environment, which is just generally shifting towards Democrats when there's one party in the White House, the other party generally does well. And then we have the president's falling popularity levels. But Vivek Ramaswamy is a little more akin to JD Vance and Bernie Moreno in that he is not a household name in Ohio politics. I mean, obviously, he's been endorsed by the party. He's been advertising heavily. But Mike DeWine is capping off a 40, 50-year career. People knew John Kasich from time in the state legislature, time in Congress. So we have people like Donald Trump and Mike De Wine Winning. Their statewide contests by several points or double digits in, I think, the case of DeWine's re-election. And then we have people like J.D. Vance, when he was a senator, Bernie Moreno, our recently-elected senator, winning by smaller margins. And so when you have the collision of a national environment that's shifting toward Democrats and then these candidates that are less familiar, it just brings it into a more competitive sphere. That's not to say... That Ohio suddenly became a purple state or blue state, but it's the confluence of factors. It's hard to isolate one from the other.
Juravich: Well, let's turn to two more recognizable names in the U.S. Senate race, Senator John Husted versus former Senator Sherrod Brown. A new ad from Brown is labeling Houston as, quote, the face of data centers and talking about how he aggressively recruited them in what he what he's calling his team is calling sweetheart deals at either Karen or Haley. Talk about the Senate race. I mean, are Houston and Brown's names well-known all around the state, both of them?
BeMiller: No. Okay, so more than Romus Wellman Acton, maybe? Yes, definitely more so. I mean, Sherrod Brown is very well known in Ohio. He's spent decades in politics at this point. He stood kind of in an interesting position because he's been around for a while and I certainly think he has some name recognition. But, you know, think about the positions he's held Secretary of State, Lieutenant Governor, those are not necessarily the elected officials that draw the most attention or that are, you know, the first people to come to mind. And we've seen in polls that there are, there is a segment of the voter population that is still trying to figure out Husted, they don't really have an opinion on him right now.
Juravich: Mm-hmm.
BeMiller: So it's a pretty interesting dynamic because Houston is the incumbent, but Brown is probably better known.
Juravich: Yes. Karen, talk to me about this ad where Brown's campaign is making Houston the face of data centers because there's conflicts there with the data centers. Sherrod Brown needs rural Ohio, but it could turn off some building trades people. I mean, labor unions, like all the jobs that come from building a data center and labor has been Sherrod bread and butter politically, so What do you think his methods are here by saying John Husted is the data center guy?
Kasler: Well, I think the opinion of data centers has really changed dramatically from people embracing them as clean industry to now people blaming them for high energy costs and environmental and noise pollution and all these things. You've seen a real swing toward people being very concerned about data centers and a lack of transparency around them in general. And so I think Sherrod Brown's kind of seizing on that, even though. There are Democrats who are very interested in data centers for the jobs that they provide in terms of the construction jobs they provide. So this is kind of an interesting place to land, but it's certainly something that's a big talking point, I think, for a lot of people. People typically either like data centers or you really, really don't like them, and yet they're still considered. Very needed. I mean, we need them to power our phones and all that kind of stuff, but AI has really ramped up the need for them.
Juravich: Noah, is our data center is going to become like a crux of this campaign over the next three to four months?
Blundo: I would not be surprised to see it. I mean, the legislature was paying a lot of attention to data centers, tried to get a bill done and kind of collapsed at the last minute for lack of agreement. But it's just kind of a snowball of a lot different issues that make people angry. There's general purpose NIMBYism. I don't want that in my backyard. There's the concern about the electricity costs and the water use. There's this stuff about how they're having local officials sign NDAs, non-disclosure agreements so that... People don't necessarily know a whole lot about these projects until the skids are greased and they're all, you know, the shovels are in the ground. So I wouldn't end, it's a very salient political topic and I would not be surprised to see a lot of people, you know jump to the front of the mob and say that they're leading a parade.
Juravich: Well, and another thing, another issue that came up this week, putting data centers aside for a second, is Democratic candidate for governor Amy Acton is getting some flack for her position on the trans athlete issue. The Buckeye Flame, which is an LGBTQ publication, ran a headline that says "Dr. Amy Actin betrays Ohio's trans community and yet again forces us into the lesser of two evils debate." Do we know much about where she comes down on this issue or if it's going to be. I mean, Amy Acton's campaign, Karen, is really trying to focus in on affordability. So is she trying to just avoid the trans-athlete issue?
Kasler: I think she, I was watching another show this weekend that specifically takes on Ohio politics other than our show, The State of Ohio. And I think, she was at one point asked at a campaign stop about this, but yes, she's definitely pivoting a lot of discussion toward affordability. And, you know, because this is an issue that's been a concern for a lot of Democratic voters. And so I can imagine that Republicans could seize that now that we've got some court decisions on trans athletes and girls sports. And of course we have the state law that bans that.
Juravich: Well, I mean, related to figuring out the positions a little bit better, you know, it's less than four months out. Do we know anything about either Brown Houston or Act in Ramaswami having a debate? Has anyone heard anything about that? I have.
BeMiller: Have not heard anything specific. I think history will be a useful barometer for this, you know, in the past few elections we've seen fewer and fewer debates. You know, often there's arguing about it in the public, one candidate will publicly challenge their opponent to debate, but often a lot of this occurs behind the scenes and trying to negotiate.
Juravich: Have you heard of any challenges or has anyone challenged anyone?
Kasler: I haven't heard a challenge. I know that, for instance, the Ohio Debate Commission is very interested in really ramping up debates in general. That's why they exist. Exactly. And I mean, I think a lot of it will depend on how close the race is. And I means Sherrod Brown and John Huston are both experienced debaters since they've been in office in politics for a long time. Whether Acton and Ramoswami will debate is really interesting because neither one of them has run for public office before. So that could be a real But I always go back to it's an excellent opportunity for candidates to really take on each other without ads and talking points and that sort of thing, and to get real questions and to have, it allows voters to see their candidates face to face and judge them on their answers and the way that they present themselves. I think it's a real great opportunity.
Juravich: Noah, do you have anything to add? You're pondering debates.
Blundo: So we haven't seen one of the things that I think is often a sign of candidate weakness, which is somebody comes out and says, I'm challenging my opponent to like 15 debates or something. That's just like an earned media play. And that's usually a sign of desperation.
Juravich: Did Brown and Moreno debate? No, no, no. I did DeWine and.
Blundo: Waley Waley
Juravich: Really debate? Nope.
BeMiller: No, I think the last really robust debate we saw was during the 2022 Senate GOP primary which Karen is very familiar with
Kasler: very familiar with. That was a memory. But there were debates actually with Tim Ryan and JD Vance following that. But yeah, that seven-way debate in the Republican competition for the nomination for US Senate was quite a thing. Did you moderate that? I did. Okay, that's what I thought. 90 minutes. It was quite, quite a, thing.
Juravich: You're laughing and I'm like, I think that was you, right? It was me, yes. So that's the last time we had a robust multi-candidate debate.
Kasler: Yeah, and like I said, there were debates between Ryan and Vance, and we really hope to see those again because it's really disappointing when journalists want to see these candidates' debates, a great opportunity for us to see them go face to face with their opponents.
Juravich: No, we have a minute left. Does the general public want to debate, or does the general just not pay attention to politics?
Blundo: Ah, yes. Okay. I think, you know, the general public is hard to generalize about. It's a collection of overlapping groups. Certainly some people want to see, they want to learn, I mean, people, you know, to some of the other comments earlier about people not really knowing a lot about these people. Well, if you get them speaking off the cuff at length. You can start to get an idea of their personalities and they are forced to explain their positions and you might get some more information beyond what's served up to you by the social media algorithm.
Kasler: And I heard on NPR this morning that Jubilee's production of "Surrounded," which is a debate-style podcast, is one of the most popular, especially among younger voters. So there's an opportunity there. Fascinating.
Juravich: All right. Well, we're going to leave it there. Karen Kasler, Bureau Chief of the Ohio Public Radio Statehouse News Bureau. Thanks, Karen. Always great to be here. And Haley BeMiller, state government and politics reporter for the Columbus Dispatch. Thanks, Haley. Thank you. And Noah Blundo, executive editor of Hannah News Service. Thank you.
Blundo: Thank you.
Juravich: This has been the Reporter Roundtable from all sides on 89.7 NPR News. I'm Amy Juravich.