Health care is among the affordability issues on Ohioans' minds.
Last week came news that the state saw the largest decline in Affordable Care Act enrollment in the country.
Campaign donations and endorsements are rolling in for Ohio’s two candidates for governor: GOP hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy got a $5 million check from trillionaire Elon Musk.
Challenger Amy Acton notches her own historic haul as a Democrat.
While in Washington, one Ohio senator seeks to punish Canada for the wildfire smoke that blew our way.
And there's a move to make daylight savings time permanent.
We're talking about all of these topic during a special Tuesday edition of the Weekly Reporter Roundtable.
Guests:
- Jessie Balmert, state government and politics reporter, Columbus Dispatch
- Andrew Tobias, state government and politics reporter, Signal Ohio
- Sabrina Eaton, Washington bureau, Cleveland.com
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 me for a special Tuesday Reporter Roundtable, we have Jesse Balmert, State Government and Politics Reporter for the Columbus Dispatch. Welcome back, Jesse.
Jesse Balmert: Thanks for having me.
Amy Juravich: Andrew Tobias, State Government and Politics reporter for Signal Ohio. Welcome back Andrew.
Andrew Tobias: Happy to be here.
Amy Juravich: And joining us from the Washington Bureau of Cleveland.com is Sabrina Eaton, making her roundtable debut. Welcome to All Sides, Sabrina.
Sabrina Eaton: Oh, it's so great to be here, thanks.
Juravich: All right, so there's plenty going on in Washington with quite a few Ohioans making some news from Vice President JD Vance and Usha Vance welcoming a fourth child, plus our two senators, Bernie Moreno and John Husted, are making some new. There's even an Ohio-related connection with the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. We'll get to all of that a little bit later, but first I wanna start with talking about affordability and how it's one of the defining issues of the midterm elections.
It was a bit surprising to read that Ohio was the largest, saw the largest percentage drop in the country of enrollees in the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. Here is Charlotte Rudolph. With the group Universal Healthcare Action Network, which helps Ohioans navigate affordable healthcare. This is what she told the Ohio Public Radio Statehouse News Bureau.
"It was sticker shock for our clients. They absolutely could not afford a plan." So, Andrew, the federal subsidies expired in January and to Charlotte's point, costs went up, but to hear that Ohio had the largest drop in enrollees. That surprised me. What's going on here?
Tobias: It's hard to really say because there's just so many factors that weigh into something like this, but what I've heard when I've spoken with people about this issue generally is that states that, so when they expand, when Obamacare was passed in the 2010, states had the choice of either setting up their own exchange plan or just piggybacking off the federal governments. And what we've seen is that, generally speaking, states that did it their own way had pretty stable enrollments, and then states like Ohio that piggybacked off the federal government website. Saw pretty significant drops. So that's probably one of the factors.
Another thing that I think stands out about Ohio is that when Congress under Joe Biden passed these expanded subsidies for Obamacare enrollees, we saw enrollment in Ohio climb a lot. So maybe some of this is just a function of how much things went up here and just speculating maybe enrollment went up because other healthcare plans became less affordable. Maybe people were making financial choices because of challenges they're facing. Ohio tends to be a little poorer than the rest of the country. So.
I think the big one is probably the mechanics of how Ohio set up its plan, but I was surprised too to see how large of a percentage drop it was compared to other states for sure.
Juravich: And Sabrina, can you remind us about those subsidies, why they were stopped in the first place, and the different explanations as to what happened there?
Eaton: Well, during the pandemic, there was a fair amount of people getting work disruptions. So they decided that they were going to put in some temporary subsidies to help people buy these health insurance plans under the Obamacare program. So, the subsidies. Were continuing in congress under the republicans said it was time to stop it so that is uh that is why they were canceled.
Juravich: And Andrew, did those who dropped out, are they just uninsured now? Or do we know that? Or like, yeah, do you know?
Tobias: That's a really good question. So this data that we're talking about was released in February. And so it's pretty out of date, but the reason why it's significant, one is just that it's new. So it gives us something new to look at, but the snapshot includes the period after open enrollment for Obamacare this year closed.
And also significantly, if you just didn't do anything, if you were enrolled in one of these plans, it would just be re-upped until you got your first bill and then somebody might say, I don't wanna pay this, I can't afford this. And so. The information we have is about five months out of date. We haven't seen like a spike in Medicaid enrollment.
For example, you might imagine that people who are in these plans might have not a lot of other options. And so they might go there. You know, I've talked with hospitals. They haven't a spike in people showing up with an uninsured or something like that. Or at least maybe it's too early to really have made the connection between these two things.
But when you hear from the health plans, they... So for instance, CareSource, which is a major Medicaid managed care provider in Ohio, has announced they're going to pull out of the Obamacare market next year. So I think there's some evidence that people are probably just uninsured, but it's really hard to say for sure. I think it's just there's so much data and we're still waiting for these things to kind of like work through the system a little bit more.
Juravich: And Jesse, are you aware of anything, you know, state lawmakers can do or want to do to help make health care more affordable? Or if there's anything that they should be doing, there's always something they should be doing.
Balmert: Well, I mean, I think some states have been pitching in money to kind of like offset some of this, some of this loss. There hasn't been a lot of discussion about doing that in Ohio. I think generally the Republican controlled legislature, which is on a break right now, so they're not passing anything in general, is not a giant fan of the Obamacare and Affordable care act program to begin with, so I don't think they're probably inclined to like prop it up.
Juravich: And from between now and November, affordability issues, including health care, are gonna come to play in the governor's race and the U.S. Senate race. Sabrina, how do you see specifically health care playing out in the race between John Husted and Sherrod Brown?
Eaton: Well, I think Sherrod Brown was a big advocate of Obamacare, and, you know, Houston kind of toes the Republican line. So I could see that becoming an issue in that Brown would say that people, you know, are losing their health care because of Republicans, and you know pointing the finger at John Houston as being part of the problem.
And Husted will probably be, you know, saying... The thing that all the Republicans are saying is that this was supposed to be temporary, you know, kind of like the same thing they said about, you know temporary, the temporary protected status of the Haitians and you know they're they're canceling these things that are supposed to temporary. So you know I definitely think it'll be an issue and people will just have to decide.
Juravich: Who they agree with. Yeah, Jesse or Andrew, how do you see it shaping in the governor's race? I mean, if we find out once we have more updated numbers that a whole bunch of Ohioans just don't have health insurance right now, that'll be a thing.
Tobias: Yeah, I think with this, the way that I view it is, you know, absent us learning of just a huge drop in or huge increase in uninsured people that it kind of just rolls into the affordability label. And so I think the flagship issue on that is gas prices. I think politically for Democrats, it's really easy for them to say gas prices were lower than Donald Trump decided to invade Iran. And then they spiked and they've been higher ever since then.
And so I think that people, in addition to that, just layers include food prices and especially. Health insurance premiums and medical costs. And so, Democrats have tried to make health care an issue in the past, you kind of hear, I've heard Republicans say like, yeah, they always try this and it never works. So, it's one of those things that maybe it's kind of complicated to really point the finger other than just say like has your life gotten better or worse under this current administration?
So I think it's probably gonna be more of a background issue, but the governor's, I mean, the governor candidates do have plans on this. I mean we could elaborate on that, but yeah, that's how I see it just generally.
Juravich: This is All Sides in the Reporter Roundtable on 89.7 NPR News. It's a special Tuesday edition of our Roundtable with Andrew Tobias from Signal Ohio, Jesse Balmert from the Columbus Dispatch, and Sabrina Eaton from the Washington Bureau of Cleveland.com.
I wanted to pivot to another issue that is really getting a lot of attention. And its data centers is. Getting considerable attention from around Ohio, around the country. It seems like everyone's talking about data centers and it's showing up in election campaigns. Sherrod Brown, the US Senate candidate recently ran a TV ad and tried to paint his opponent, Senator John Husted, as the face of data data centers.
And then Husted has introduced legislation to target electricity costs. Sabrina, you wrote about this recently. What does John Husted want want to require data centers to do that they're not doing right now?
Eaton: Well his Act, which has a counterpart in the House of Representatives that was introduced a while ago and has actually been marked up by a committee. So that may end up on the House floor and voted on, but it's the same bill. And it would direct state utility regulators to consider standards ensuring that large load customers, like data centers who use a lot of electricity. Pay the full incremental cost of any generation, transmission, or distribution upgrade needed to serve them, with the idea being that those costs would not be passed along to regular ratepayers so they wouldn't have to be subsidizing the data centers, which is, I think, what people are concerned about.
It would also require data centers to provide utilities with financial insurances before they make upgrades to serve them so the costs don't fall on other ratepayers if the data center. Facts out.
Juravich: So what's the deal here, Andrew, with data centers and whether they need to be regulated federally or because I'm here, I heard a lot where I thought the federal government wanted each state to figure it out. And some states are like, I think New York was maybe put a ban on them for a year while they figure some things out. So this bill that is further along in the House, as Sabrina just said, and then Houston put it in the Senate, I mean, do we need that or are the states supposed to be doing it.
Tobias: Yeah, I'm really not an energy policy expert, but not only is this a state level issue, but there's also regional electricity marketplaces that regulate these things. There are a lot of states involved with these. Ohio is part of the PJM. I know Pennsylvania is part, I forget the like 15 state group that's part of the whole thing.
But you know, if nothing else, I am sure that in Congress that lawmakers are worried about being blamed for not doing anything on this. And so they're. If for nothing else, there's like a demand for them to do something and so they have to do something. But as far as who specifically this falls on, how the powers are delineated, it's like not something that I'm, you know, an expert on.
Juravich: Sabrina, do you know if you're hearing, does the federal government, should they be regulating the data centers or do they want the states to do it?
Eaton: Well, I think Republicans tend to be a lot more wanting states to do things. So I think that they want the states to, but I think they have to, as I believe Andrew said, make a show that they're like, yes, we are trying to do something about it. And so I think the point of this is to kind of prod the state utility regulator.
Juravich: To consider doing this. Jesse, are you a energy policy expert at all? You want to weigh in on data centers or you want to pivot? Ha ha.
Balmert: I will just say the politics of data centers have been really interesting from the beginning because you have on one side some Republicans who are listening to their rural voters who are saying, we do not want these in our backyard, we're concerned about non-disclosure agreements with local leaders, we are concerned about, you know, the impact of this being right next to our farm versus you have other Republicans listening to the businesses saying like this is going to bring business and industry to the state.
And then on the Democratic side. You have environmental concerns, you know, just folks who are opposed to these things, and then you have the unions who get jobs from building them. And so it has been an awkward position for politicians on both sides of the aisle to really come down on this, but there was a decent amount of pressure while there was an effort to ban data centers entirely that was trying to make the 2026 ballot.
That's no longer going to happen. They're now shooting for 2027. So it's just been a really interesting thing to watch politicians navigate this particular issue.
Juravich: I'm going to pivot before we have to take the break. I'm gonna pivot to the governor's race for a few minutes. Republican nominee for governor, Vivek Ramaswamy, is zeroing in on tax cuts as a key part of his platform. And Ramaswamy has said that he wants to eliminate the state income tax and the capital gains tax his first year in office. Here he is talking about it sparking economic activity to help recover the loss in revenue.
Vivek Ramaswamy: "The economic growth that we bring to our state, that I've spoken about here, will bring in added sources of revenue that give us financial cushion, including from a state level to fill any gaps to ensure that important local services aren't left in the lurch during that transition as well."
Juravich: So, Jesse, anyone can weigh in. Help me out here with the logic and the math here. We have taxes for a reason. He wants to cut all these taxes. What's his plan here? Has he said how he's gonna pay for all this?
Balmert: Yeah, so basically he wants to phase out income tax over either an eight to 10 year period of time, which is not too different from what Republicans are doing already. They have been reducing both the rate and the number of brackets over the past decade or so. But this does bring about $10 billion into the state coffers to pay for everything from K-12 education to Medicaid to prisons to everything the state does. So this is not a small amount of money. And how much is that offset with economic growth that's something certainly Democrats would criticize him for.
Juravich: As the Democratic challenger, Amy Acton, talked a lot about Ramaswamy's tax plan. She did issue a statement after he talked about it recently. But where does she actually come down on tax cuts?
Balmert: Um, I don't think she has, she has not called for like widespread income tax cuts. She has been more targeted saying that there needs to be like a child tax credit, uh, which is something that governor DeWine proposed paying for with, uh tobacco taxes, but that got rejected by the Ohio Republicans in the state legislature. So her tax proposals are more like, let's help out this particular group of people. Versus like a widespread, let's eliminate billions of dollars in state income.
Tobias: Democrats have criticized this plan, though, more generally. So one element that Rama Swami wants to do is eliminate the capital gains tax more, you know, more immediately, basically in his first year, as opposed to the eight to 10 phase out of the overall income tax. And so capital gains taxes is basically taxes you pay if you sell an investment and make a profit.
And Rama Swami argues that eliminating that will attract more investment, that it will quote unquote only cost the state about $600 million in revenue or. Thereabouts much smaller than a ten billion dollars, but still not, you know, I it it's not that big in the grand scheme of things So that's what he argues anyways, but Democrats when they come at this basically say You're cutting taxes for the wealthy if you're talking about eliminating taxes on investments like hey Vivek Ramaswamy You're an investor.
You have a lot of investments and it's generally speaking the wealthier you are the more likely you are to benefit from this so It's not like Amy Acton has her own plan on the income tax, but they've been definitely more likely to characterize any move to cut the income taxes benefiting the wealthy disproportionately.
Juravich: Well, speaking of money, while we're talking about money, Ramaswamy has a lot of it in his campaign. Ramaswamy got $5 million as a campaign contribution from Elon Musk. Elon Musk recently became the first trillionaire in June. He lost that status when SpaceX stock dropped, but once a trillionaire, I guess always a trillionare. The two men headed up Doge together for a quick minute until Vivek exited. Sabrina, what do you make of Elon Musk giving his former Doge partner $5 million?
Eaton: Five million is peanuts to a trillionaire.
Juravich: It's like no money. Yes, Jesse. What? Yeah, Jesse, what do you what do you think though? I mean, it sounds I mean it sounds big though. It's to be like, you know, Vivek Ramaswamy now has five million more dollars because of Elon Musk. It says it's a good headline.
Balmert: Yeah, I mean it's a show of support from Musk, especially when there were certainly rumors and reports about how their relationship leading Doge was a bit fraught towards the end there. Brahmaswamy was at Doge for about 69 days before he left to initially potentially seek the U.S. Senate bid, but then eventually run for Ohio governor. So There was much made about the relationship there, and so this is, I guess, money between friends.
Juravich: Oh, a peace offering, I guess, too, yeah.
Balmert: And I will just, as a side note, it was a donation to a super pack that is supporting Rama Swami's bid.
Juravich: Not directly him. Okay, what's it called? The Super PAC?
Balmert: Victor's Not Victims, uh, V-
Juravich: All right. So got to love the names. All right, we got to be we got to be technical about where it comes from. But Andrew, is this the only big check? I mean, Ramaswamy, is he getting other big checks from other places in the campaign?
Tobias: So his largest single donor is Jeffrey Yass, who's a billionaire from the Philadelphia area. He's a strong supporter of school choice. That's a pretty major plank of Ramaswamy's campaign platform. Yass didn't give this more recent time, though, so that a few billionaires did, though, include in addition to Musk, he's now billionaire, right? He's not a trillionaire anymore.
Juravich: He was a trillionaire for just a hot minute, yes.
Tobias: So but then Ratmir Timashev who's an Ohio State graduate He's a Russian-born software engineer also gave five million to Vivek's pack as did Bill Ackman He gave one million Ross Stevens another billionaire gave one billion. So that quite a few billionaires giving to Ramaswamy's campaign
Juravich: Is Amy Acton getting any billionaires?
Tobias: She doesn't have a pack, at least that we know of, that's able to accept these large contributions that make it easier for us to zero in on them in the way that we're doing right now. So I'm not gonna say she hasn't received any, but she has not received, as far as we know, any of these million dollar plus contributions, like the ones we're talking about here.
Juravich: All right, coming up, we're going to talk more about the Amy Acton campaign. We're going talk about the Democratic messaging, because not everyone is happy with Amy Acton and Marcy Kaptur for that matter. Plus, an Ohio senator wants to punish Canada for last week's wildfire smoke that wafted into our state. That is when the Reporter Roundtable from All Sides continues on 89.7 NPR News.
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, and with us we have Andrew Tobias, state government and politics reporter for Signal Ohio, Sabrina Eaton, Washington Bureau reporter for Cleveland.com, and Jesse Balmert, state Government and politics reporter at the Columbus Dispatch. Andrew, you wrote about how both Amy Acton and U.S. Representative Marcy Kaptur are getting flack on their positions on trans issues. Why has this been such a tricky issue for Democrats when it comes to messaging on the issue?
Tobias: Well, just taking that part of it specifically, in 2024, we saw Republicans hammer Democrats relentlessly for their progressive views on this issue. Polling generally shows that the Republican position is supported by more Americans and the Democrat position is supportive by fewer. And so there was soul searching about why did we lose this election so badly, even though we think Donald Trump is terrible.
And so this is one of the things that They've zeroed in on in particular, and it's difficult for them because transgender issues they view as a civil rights issue. I mean, I'm just kind of speaking really generally here, but not unlike kind of gay rights that was a long-term fight that they had a lot of success with. And so I think there's this fundamental tension between generally believing that this is something that is a politically difficult issue for them, but also thinking that it's very important, including among the activists and base supporters Who? Might be more inclined to give money or volunteer, knock on doors and things like that. So it's a very fraught issue for them for sure.
Juravich: Well, so specifically, the Ohio Democrats Progressive Caucus posted a statement about this saying that Amy Acton's position will cost her votes and volunteers to your point of people who are active. But then the post was taken down. So what have you learned about this Progressive caucus? Like, first of all, I guess, you know, why did they why did they make the post and then take it down?
Tobias: So to start with, after the U.S. Supreme Court in late June issued a ruling upholding states' rights to ban transgender athletes from sports, basically, Amy Acton's campaign was asked by the Toledo Blade for a statement on the ruling. And the campaign, I think, surprised Democrats by issuing a statement saying they agreed with the law that Ohio is among the states that bans transgender athletes for participating in girls and women's sports. And she made a statement, she said. Something along the lines of I don't believe in boys playing in girls sports.
And so that led the both the Progressive Caucus and the Pride Caucus, which are both affiliate groups of the state Democratic Party. They advise them on their respective issues to issue statements really sharply criticizing Acton. And so the Progressive Caucus in particular said that, like you said, this is going to cause her support. They were very disappointed with the language that she used and They quickly took it down, but then they didn't say anything for a while. And a few days ago, they issued a new post explaining that the Ohio Democratic Party had asked them to remove it.
Juravich: Okay, so the Ohio Democratic Party contacted them and said, take this post down, please. Yes. And they agreed. Why? Why would they agree, I guess? So they're- In fighting. They want to- Yeah.
Tobias: Yeah, I mean this is kind of more the mechanics of the state party, but they were they're pretty recent creation and It's kind of like people who I don't know they care a lot But they don't necessarily have a lot of influence and how the party functions But I think this is a way to for them to have a conduit to give input as a constituent group to the state Party, but ultimately the state Party approves messaging and so Amy Acton is the Democratic nominee she is one of the most important Democrats in the state. So basically, if they're gonna say something like this, they have to get approval from the state party to do it. And if they wanna do it in their own individual capacity, they can, but they can't do it as an official state party affiliate.
Juravich: Oh, interesting. Okay. But in Amy Acton's statement, she was trying to thread the needle here. Like, basically, is she trying to appeal to more conservative Democrats? Or, yeah, who was that statement for? Because it wasn't for this Progressive Caucus, yeah. Yeah.
Tobias: Yeah, we can only kind of surmise what she's trying to do here The Buckeye Flame, which is an LGBTQ plus publication in Cleveland wrote a lot about this a couple of weeks ago running op-eds criticizing Acton as well as Marcy Kaptur for a different but related issue and I think people generally see this as act in trying to stake out a position that's more politically palatable, that there's probably polling that says this is the right move and stuff like that, and that's debatable whether that's true or not, but I think to some extent her statement, and so I'm gonna read it, I have it in front of me, it says, I do not support boys playing in girls' sports. This has already settled law in Ohio, and as governor, I will enforce and uphold the law.
So that phrase, boys playing and girls' sport, on the one hand, I've spoken with transgender people who feel that that, basically accepts the Republican framing about what transgender girls are. Transgender girls are girls, they say, and by saying that these are boys playing in girls' sports, that's nullifying the existence of transgender girls. But on the other hand, maybe the way that Acton put this, there's like an inferred next statement. Oh, well, of course transgender girls aren't, are girls so they're not boys playing girls' sport. So it's kind of a Rorschach test.
You can kind of look at it the way you want, I guess. I think it's probably written in a way to be a little bit vague and. Leave room for interpretation. But that's to answer your question. It's kind of hard to say. But it's been pretty specifically hurtful to like some of the transgender activists that I've spoken with about this.
Juravich: Well, and just because I briefly mentioned Marcy Kaptur, is it is she related to this in a different way? I didn't. How did she come into play here?
Tobias: So Acton set this off for her by issuing the statement that we've been talking about. Kaptur in May, and Sabrina would probably know more about the mechanics of this, but she was one of eight House Democrats to vote for a Republican bill. This bill required school officials to inform parents and get their permission before changing the name or the pronouns that a student would be referred to as.
It also would punish schools by stripping federal funding if they're found to, and I forget the exact phrase, but... Teaching progressive gender ideology or something like that. So the criticism, Kaptur got criticism when that vote happened. I think just kind of coincidentally, it came up again more recently, but you kind of look at it together with Acton's statement, Sherrod Brown also issued a statement calling this issue a settled law. It's pretty clear to see that Democrats generally are kind of recalibrating on how they interact with us.
Juravich: Yeah, Sabrina, do you have any insight into Marcy Kaptur and how she is trying to thread the needle of these issues for the Democrats in Ohio?
Eaton: Well, look, I think that Marcy Kaptur has been drawn into a district that is predominantly Republican and, you know, she is trying to appeal to swing voters. And I believe the state of Ohio has voted Republican a lot over the past, in recent decades and so Amy Acton is trying win over those voters. Now on the transgender athlete issue About every poll I've seen has indicated a huge majority thinking that male to female transgender people should not be able to participate in sports with females.
I think that the rationale behind that is that they may have had a big boost of testosterone, which tends to increase the muscle level. And, you know, I used to compete in, in athletics and. There has been controversies with female track athletes who just happen to have high levels of testosterone. And you're not supposed to be having testosterone. I mean, that is like a drugging kind of an issue.
So, I mean I think that what Kaptur and Acton are trying to do is appeal to these voters who regard that as an issue and I think the thing that, You know the specific thing that that Andrew mentioned, you know, I think that there are a lot of people who want to make sure that schools don't do anything behind their backs with their kids. And that Kaptur is a very savvy operator. I mean, she has been able to maintain that seat even as Republicans have tried to stamp her out. So I think when she votes, she has good reason.
Juravich: For doing that politically. Andrew, just to end on with this topic, do you feel the Ohio Democratic Party wants to focus in on affordability? So it's not that they want to ignore this other issue, but yes, they want to not talk about the other issue.
Tobias: Yeah. And I think that Republicans have enjoyed amplifying this controversy over the last couple of weeks because of that. I think they view it as kind of reminding voters like, hey, like, this is really who Democrats are and that kind of thing. So you kind of see, though, Democrats try to just pivot to other things and say, like this is an issue that Republicans are using to divide us. We're talking about a very small number of people. These are complicated issues. But really, we can all agree that prices have gone higher and that's really what affects you from day to day.
Juravich: This is the Reporter Roundtable on 89.7 NPR News, and we are talking with Andrew Tobias from Signal Ohio, Sabrina Eaton from the Washington Bureau of Cleveland.com, and Jesse Balmert from Columbus Dispatch. I'm going to pivot to Canada's wildfire smoke problem, because U.S. Senator Bernie Moreno wasted no time in drafting legislation to punish Canada for sending smoke from wildfires blowing into the United States and Ohio. So late last week, Central Ohio residents had their worst ever air quality record day.
There were hazy conditions, producing breathing issues, itchy eyes, burning eyes for some. Sabrina, you wrote about this. Bernie Moreno's bill is named the Canada Fire Act, but all those letters, C-A-N-A, D-A all stand for something. Can you tell us what Bernie Morena's legislation would do and how he can stop wildfire smoke from going over the border?
Eaton: Well, first, I want to give you the full title of it so everybody can hear just how artfully he managed to come up with this acronym. So the formal title of his bill is the Countering Atmospheric Nuisances Arriving from, oh, I'm sorry, Arising from Drifting Airborne Foreign Incendiary Residual Emissions Act, or the Canada Fire Act.
Juravich: Woo boy, what an acronym! You think ChatGPT did that for him?
Eaton: I don't know. He has he has a lot of little elves working in his office. You know, maybe they were all all on ChatGPT. I donno. But all right. Do you want to know what the bill would do? It would require the president to determine within 30 days of enactment whether wildfire smoke from Canada harmed U.S. Air quality over the preceding year and then whether Canadian officials failed to respond adequately if the president determines that that is the case.
There would be mandatory sanctions, including a ban on U.S. Government contracts with Canada and export import bank assistance. The president could also impose import restrictions and limits on new investments in Canadian state-owned entities. Also, there would sanctions on individual Canadians, like they would have their U. S. Visas revoked and be barred from entering the country. So... Whether this has any chance of passage, I don't know, but I'm just wondering after the smoke clears, if this will be on people's minds.
Juravich: Yeah, well, I was just gonna say, is this a serious bill or is he just trying to get some headlines with that nice acronym of his?
Eaton: Well, I mean, I certainly wouldn't wouldn't dream to just, you know, go into Bernie Moreno's head. But I mean he certainly did get a lot of headlines out of it. And I certainly got a lot emails from from readers saying that they were not impressed with that. So.
Juravich: Who knows? Yeah. Andrew, Jesse, if you do want to weigh in here, I mean, the U.S. Has sent smoke up to Canada as well, I'm sure, you know, borders work both ways.
Balmert: Yeah, I just keep thinking of that South Park song, Blame Canada, but anyway, I think, yeah, it got a lot of headlines. It was certainly a topic that everyone was talking about. Certainly Cleveland was in a pretty rough spot with the wildfire smoke, but obviously people live in in Columbus too. So everyone was focused on it, and so we introduced a bill.
Tobias: I was thinking of the balloon fest where Cleveland leaders launch millions of balloons into the sky in the 80s and some of them blew into Canada and caused pollution and stuff like that. So I was just thinking maybe this is Canada just getting us back for that.
Juravich: Oh, OK. Yes. All right. Well, we will we will keep tabs on that Canada Fire Act just so we can say what all those letters stand for again. Before we take the break, I wanted to pivot to one more topic. We don't typically talk about politician divorces or former girlfriends on the roundtable, but Cleveland area U.S. Representative Max Miller's past personal relationships are making some news as he campaigns for reelection.
His ex-wife is Emily Moreno, who is the daughter of U.S. Senator Bernie Moreno. He also formerly dated Stephanie Grisham. Is it Grishum? Grishom, I think I'm missing a letter. Yes, Grisham who served as White House press secretary during President Trump's first term. And she sued him earlier this month. So Sabrina fill us in on these very personal developments. They're coming out publicly. Like, what does this mean for Max Miller politically that he has some issues going on?
Eaton: All right, well, Max Miller is being accused of domestic abuse by his former wife, Emily Moreno. And Stephanie Grisham also accused him of domestic abuse and he has said that it is BS pretty much. And obviously he dated Stephanie before he married Emily. So when Stephanie aired these grievances initially, It was when he was running for Congress for the first time and she had a book out and so she had mentioned it in her book and kind of unveiled terms and then on a TV show later on I believe she said yeah it was Max Miller and then Max Miller sued her for defamation and then the defamation suit was settled with a confidential settlement after Miller was elected. It was it dropped.
So what Stephanie Grisham is alleging in this new suit is that in defending himself from the Emily Moreno domestic abuse allegations, there were conversations between him and Emily, which he has been promoting to the media, where Emily supposedly said, oh, I know that Stephanie was lying about you. And so when this is coming out, apparently, that is somehow violating this confidential settlement that he reached with Stephanie Grisham. So she sued him saying you violated the confidential settlement. So that is where that is coming from.
And a lot of this seems to be stemming from a, there's a custody dispute between Max Miller and Emily over their two-year-old daughter and some claims that. Some I mean there have been police reports filed apparently the the the little girl had had a broken bone And then you know, there were questions like where how did she get this and and you know? Max Miller hasn't been found guilty of abuse There was an investigation and a child care worker was found guilty Of doing some sort of abuse stuff. So um Anyway, that's kind
Juravich: know where where it stands. Andrew you wrote about this too. He's facing Democratic nominee Brian Poindexter and Ironworks union official and city councilman from Brook Park. Tell me more about Brian's chances versus Max Miller here considering all of this.
Tobias: Yeah, I think I fully expect that Democrats will try to somehow call attention to this. We haven't seen that yet, but as far as Brian Poindexter, he's the latest recruit for this district. Democrats have been trying to win version of this district for a long time. They used to hold a predecessor of it a long ago. And so it's just kind of gotten more Trump supporting and it was redrawn a little bit last year to become even a little bit more Republican leaning.
Poindexter, though, is, like you said, a union official. He's from Brook Park, he's from the district. He's part, he is from a part of the district in Cuyahoga County that not only has a lot of voters, but it has a of these kind of like former Trump Democrats turned Republicans who really have become a base of the president's support now. I personally view these voters as being kind of more independent than Republicans.
And so Democrats are hoping that between Poindext, you're kind of, like, you know, he's a former construction worker, he's blue collar guy, that he's more biographically in line of, you know his life experiences are more similar to the people in this county than Max Miller's who's from a rich family. I think they're also hoping that some of these broader political issues like rising gas prices might make some of these voters less likely to support, either less likely support Trump or less likely vote in general.
And so this is still a district that Donald Trump won by 11 points. This is... Not an easy lift for Democrats, but that you hear more and more that as Democrats look at basically three plus 10 ish districts, Trump districts in Ohio, that this is the one they feel the best about because of the combination of Max Miller, some of his personal issues and the makeup of Brian Poindexter who's running this race.
Juravich: Alright, we are going to leave that there and we're going to take a break. Coming up, daylight savings time in the push to make it permanent, but not everyone agrees. That is when the reporter roundtable from All Sides continues on 89 7 NPR news.
You're listening to All Sides Weekly Reporter Boundtable. I'm your host, Amy Juravich. And still with us, we have Jesse Vollmert, State Government and Politics reporter at the Columbus Dispatch, Andrew Tobias, State Government and Politics Reporter for Signal Ohio, and Sabrina Eaton, Washington Bureau Reporter for Cleveland.com.
There is a push to make daylight savings time permanent. Now this has come up several times before, but it never seems to really go anywhere. Sabrina, you've been following this issue. The U.S. House voted to make daylight savings time permanent and most of the Ohio delegation voted in favor. What did they have to say about it?
Eaton: Well, the ones who voted in favor of it said that people regarded it as a big inconvenience to change the clocks twice a year. Warren Davidson, who was one of the people who made a social media post about it, said that, pointed out, the daylight savings time was first adopted during World War I to conserve energy, and that more than a century later, changing the clocks no longer delivers meaningful energy savings.
So, and the people who opposed the change said that it would make it difficult for little kids in the mornings going to the bus stops if it was really dark out and, you know.
Juravich: Is it Dayton Republican Mike Turner, Akron Democrat, Amelia Sykes both voted against it? Is that they were saying that they're worried about kids walking to school in the dark?
Eaton: Yeah, well, Sykes said that, and Mike Turner isn't big on returning my phone call, so I didn't get anything out of him. But I think that that's, my guess is that's probably where he was coming from. When I watched the debate on the floor, a lot of the people who were really for this were people in Florida. And I think Florida probably doesn't have, because you know how the further south you go, The last.
Variation there is in the daylight length times, you know, between winter and summer. So I think that, you now a Northern state like Ohio has more significant darkness in the mornings, you know under that than a place like Florida. So, you now that might be why the people in Florida were all for it. And the president, of course, President Trump, who is now a Florida man, he also posted stuff on social media that he supported. Eliminating daylight savings time. So that probably swayed some of the Republicans because you know how a lot of the Republicans like to do what Trump wants them to do.
Juravich: That is all right. So and there's been a years long effort to end this practice of changing our clocks.
Eaton: And I think it passed the Senate once before, but it hasn't passed this time around. And to become law, something has to pass in the same two-year span, both houses of Congress.
Juravich: So now it heads to the Senate and have Bernie Moreno or John Husted made any statements about it?
Eaton: Uhhh ffffff
Juravich: Mm. Not.
Eaton: You know, I think that they tend to do what the president wants, so that's my guess.
Juravich: All right, but from your perspective, do you think that the Senate will take it up? You know, because this has gone back and forth many times before. It is hard to know what the Senate is going to do.
Eaton: To do. The Senate just seems like it is a completely log jammed body. And a lot of that is, I think, because of the way they do their votes. I mean, it takes forever to vote on anything over there. So there's really just not a whole lot of floor time that they have. And they really are stuck. They have to do nominations. And so they are still way backed up with nominations. I think that just getting anything through the Senate is always kind of a long shot.
Juravich: Andrew, you're smiling. Do you want to weigh in at all in Daylight Savings Time? I didn't know if that smile was just, you know.
Tobias: I'm just thinking of all the stories I've written about Ohio bills that are sort of meaningless urging Congress to take action on this issue. And so now I guess they finally have meaning because Congress is maybe taking action on it. But you know, I also am familiar with this.
You know, one of the things I'll point out is that Congress eliminated daylight savings time in the 70s. So we've done this before and there were immediately some morning bus accidents involving school children. That's one of the main issues you hear about is that if it's really dark in the morning, then kids are getting on the bus early in the in the dark. And so whether or not that's because of the time change, Congress ended up changing it back.
So we'll see whether that's on their minds that was 50, 60 years ago, maybe things have come a long way since then. But I think if nothing else too though, I mean, as a parent. There is the safety issue, but there's also the issue of even though the times change, your kids still think it's the time it was before and it causes a lot of lost sleep for people, which itself is a safety issue.
Juravich: This is All Sides on 89.7 NPR News and this is a special Tuesday edition of the Reporter Roundtable. We are talking with Sabrina Eaton from the Washington Bureau of Cleveland.com and Andrew Tobias from Signal Ohio and Jesse Balmert from the Columbus Dispatch.
Jesse, I'm going to pivot to the issue of child marriage. There's no good pivot here. The issue of child marriage is back in the spotlight because of the Vinton County case. This is the case where the parents of 16 surviving children, Elizabeth Siders, Gary Siders Jr., along with the grandparents, Gary Sr. And wife Christina, are all charged with multiple counts of child endangerment. They've all pleaded not guilty.
Your colleague Laura Bischoff is reporting that three members of the Siders family married as young teenagers, including Elizabeth, who was 15 and pregnant when she got married. Earlier this year, there was a protest outside the state house. Women were wearing wedding dresses. They're seeking to end child and forced marriages. There was a bill, did it? I can't remember if anything happened with it. So what does Ohio law say when it comes to underage marriage right now?
Balmert: Yeah, so the bill that you are referencing would prevent those who are 17 from getting married right now younger children are not allowed to get married, but you are allowed to get married in Ohio before age 18 with like parental consent. And there's a bill from from senators Bill Blessing, who's a Republican, and Bill Demora, who is a Democrat to end that practice it's effectively saying. You're not 18, if you can'enter into any other kind of contract, why are you allowed to get married in the state of Ohio?
That passed out of committee before lawmakers took their break but didn't end up on the Senate floor, in part because there was some concern or opposition to passing it in the Senate. So there was a lot of pressure from individuals who were concerned about practices like this, obviously this horrible situation in Vinhenton County came out after. The Senate broke and the state lawmakers broke for until after November elections. So we'll see if this case is kind of compelling for them when they come back.
Juravich: Okay, so basically we assume that Elizabeth, who was 15 and pregnant when she got married, her parents gave permission for that to happen.
Balmert: They also got married in West Virginia, which might have had slightly different rules at the time But for a while Ohio allowed 15 and 16 year olds to get married, but that was eliminated a few years ago. Okay
Juravich: We are running short on time and then Sabrina something I mentioned at the beginning of the show that I wanted to talk about just before we ran out of time is that it's been a very long time historically speaking, since a second lady has given birth while her husband was held office as the vice president and so since JD Vance is Ohio's own Vice President JD Vans now has a second Lady Usha Vance now have a fourth child. You wrote about this, the Vance is posted on social media. What do you think about, what does this represent for the personal and political mission of J.D. Vance and the fact that we have a baby in the vice president's house?
Eaton: Well, Vice President Vance has been urging people to have more children and as he quipped during the Right to Life speech that he addresses, he addressed the Right To Life March earlier this year. He says he's practicing what he preaches. Now, I don't think that he would probably encourage, you know, what was going on in Vinton County as far as that sort of thing happening, but you know-
Juravich: You know, it was a bad segue from one to another. I should have again said a very bad segue. Yeah. No, no, no. I should've, I should of added that. A lot of children. No, yeah. Speaking of children, no bad segue, I just wanted to talk about it cause I mentioned it at the beginning of the show.
Eaton: Right. Well, anyway, yeah, so they're having another kid. And he apparently had said, I follow his commentary on a daily basis. And during one of his appearances in Michigan, he had said something about how when he was a running for vice president you know he and his wife were talking about maybe having a fourth kid and she said well you can either be vice president or have a fourth kit and then he said something to her to the effect of after she got after they decided to have the fourth kid he was like see i'm very persuasive i got both so um so anyway yeah so he's they've they've got a fourth kid i mean you know vance vance believes kids are a blessing and obviously he's got enough money that he can support for our kids.
I think a lot of other people who hear his go forth and multiply message are kind of like, okay, but how am I going to pay to feed all those kids and clothe them? So I think many people have more financial constraints than he does when deciding family size.
Juravich: All right. We're going to end it there. And apologies for the bad segue. I did not mean to go from Vinton County to JD Vance. That was not my intention. It was just the order of things. Whoops. This has been the Reporter Roundtable on 89.7 NPR News. I want to say thank you to Sabrina Eaton, Washington Bureau reporter for Cleveland.com. Thanks for joining us, Sabrina.
Eaton: Thank you for having me.
Juravich: And Jesse Balmert, State Government and Politics reporter at the Columbus Dispatch. Thanks, Jesse.
Tobias: Thank you.
Juravich: And Andrew Tobias, State Government and Politics reporter at Signal Ohio. Thanks, Andrew.
Tobias: Always happy to do it.
Juravich: And this has been the Reporter Roundtable from All Sides on 89.7 NPR News.