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David Skolnick

Ramaswamy proposes Ohio university consolidation

Asked about his goal to eliminate the state’s income tax, Vivek Ramaswamy, the Republican front-runner for governor, proposed consolidating Ohio’s universities. It was a curious response. Ramaswamy said: “The reason (eliminating the income tax is) possible is that you look at certain areas of excess spending where we can not just cut costs, but improve effectiveness. Look at the number of universities in our state. I love the universities in Ohio. I want us to have the best universities. But we have too many of them. They need to be consolidated. And when you consolidate them, ...

DeWine missed opportunities to address key issues for Ohio

During his final State of the State address this week, Gov. Mike DeWine declined to discuss in detail — and not at all in some cases — the main issues that are important to Ohioans today: property taxes, the electric grid, rising utility costs and the economy. But that came as little surprise as DeWine, who is serving his eighth and final year as governor, has a different agenda than his fellow Republicans, who control the state House and Senate. DeWine took an active role in property tax reform after vetoing four items in the state budget dealing with it last year. After some ...

Many Mahoning Valley candidates quit races

It’s not that difficult to get on the ballot — though plenty of candidates over the years struggle to qualify. It’s even easier to get off it. All a person who qualifies for the ballot needs to do is submit a letter of withdrawal and they’re no longer a candidate. There’s already been four people who turned in valid nominating petitions to run for seats in the Mahoning Valley and who qualified for the May 5 primary election who then changed their mind and withdrew. This is a relatively small election, if you don’t include the central committee races for both political ...

Changing political parties has become commonplace

With the changing political climate in the Mahoning Valley, it didn’t come as a major shock that Trumbull County Common Pleas Court Judge Cynthia Westcott Rice, a longtime Democrat, switched political parties and filed as a Republican. But after pledging her allegiance to being a Republican, Rice withdrew from the race Tuesday, about three weeks after she filed. Having an incumbent change political parties when seeking reelection was uncommon in Trumbull and Mahoning counties. It isn’t so much anymore as Mahoning County Sheriff Jerry Greene did it in 2024, going from a Democrat to ...

Sizing up Mahoning Valley’s court of appeals elections

Tired of losing courts of appeals and Ohio Supreme Court races, Republicans changed the rules starting with the 2022 election — and have largely benefited. The Republican-controlled state Legislature passed a law in 2021, which took effect with the 2022 election, requiring party affiliation on the ballot for those running for seats on courts of appeals and the Supreme Court. Before that, candidates ran in party primaries and then didn’t have party affiliation in the general election. During the 2018 and 2020 elections, Democrats won three of four Supreme Court races and continued ...

Congress candidates face struggle to beat Rulli, Joyce

Those challenging the two incumbents who represent the Mahoning Valley — U.S. Reps. Dave Joyce, R-Bainbridge, and Michael Rulli, R-Salem — face tremendous odds to beat them. Defeating a sitting member of the U.S. House is very difficult. With the power of incumbency comes name recognition and a considerable amount of money, largely provided by political action committees who know the reliable votes of those already serving in Congress, particularly for a long time. OpenSecrets, a website that provides data and analysis of money in politics, also tracks the reelection rate of U.S. ...