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Ohio Dems seek new leader

The person who takes over as chairman of the Ohio Democratic Party has a monumental task.

Despite claims from some, Ohio is solid purple in many ways. Going back to 1990, Democrats have won statewide executive branch offices in only 2006 and Republicans have a stranglehold on the state Legislature, even picking up seats in the recent election.

David Pepper has been Democratic chairman since January 2015, taking over after the 2014 statewide election — an utter disaster for the party. He’s leaving Jan. 1.

Pepper was able to eliminate the party’s debt and field a strong slate of statewide candidates in 2018. But in the end, results matter. Those candidates lost two years ago, and Donald Trump won Ohio this year and four years ago.

The initial plan was for the party to choose a successor Dec. 29, but at a Tuesday meeting, it was agreed to delay it until Jan. 14 to give the six interested candidates more time to speak to party executive committee members. Also, others may jump into the race.

Vice Chairwoman Rhine McLin, a former Dayton mayor, will take control until an election is held to fill Pepper’s term, which expires in mid-2022.

Even with the delay, the committee heard from the six current candidates Tuesday with each getting three minutes to talk.

Three have no chance of winning and probably won’t even get nominated. They are Gary Josephson, who came in last in the Democratic primary for an Ohio House seat in Columbus; Will Klatt, a labor organizer who currently works for the Ohio Education Association; and Vanessa Enoch, who runs a consulting firm and has twice lost congressional races.

The three most compelling candidates are Lou Gentile, a former state legislator from Appalachia; Liz Walters, a Summit County councilwoman and former ODP executive and political director; and Antoinette Wilson, a Columbus political consultant.

Wilson has an impressive resume and ran Jennifer Brunner’s successful Ohio Supreme Court campaign. She’s been involved in other statewide Democratic wins as well as serving as political director for President Bill Clinton’s re-election campaign in 1996 and worked for the party, including as political and executive director, from 1991 to 1996.

But an overwhelming amount of her success has been restricted to Franklin County, which means the executive committee doesn’t know her as well as Gentile and Walters.

Of the six who spoke Tuesday, Walters delivered the best speech.

Walters has been an active member of the party since 2008 and spent about four years with the ODP as political director and then executive director before joining the Summit County Council in 2016.

“The work that lies ahead for us is not small; it is not easy,” she wrote in her letter to the executive committee. “It will not be achieved by a single person. It will take all of us, and it’s going to take more than one election cycle to build lasting strength back into this institution we all love.”

There is talk Walters wouldn’t get into this race if she didn’t have U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown’s support.

When I asked Brown who he supports, he said: “I’m not backing anyone yet.” He said he wants to hear from the candidates and recognizes the party has much work to do.

Gentile has run and won in Appalachia, an area once Democratic but now solid red.

As he wrote in his letter to the executive committee: “While we grow and expand our base in blue counties, we must bring Democrats home in rural areas, flip counties back to blue and reduce the margin of victories for Republicans in traditional red counties.”

Gentile served as deputy director for the state office of Appalachia, won an Ohio House seat in 2010, got appointed to the state Senate in 2011 (at the time the district included Columbiana County), won in 2012 and lost reelection by 4.8 percent in 2016 while outperforming Hillary Clinton, the party’s presidential nominee, by 17 percent.

While in the state Senate, he served in leadership, is currently a state central committeeman and a lobbyist, and along with his ties to ex-Gov. Ted Strickland, Gentile is well-connected throughout the state.

There can always be a late-arriving candidate, but the race now is between Gentile and Walters.

Skolnick covers politics for the Tribune Chronicle and The Vindicator.

dskolnick@tribtoday.com

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