Rotunda Rumblings

Boehner on the record: Former House Speaker John Boehner spills plenty of amusing tales in the political memoir he released Tuesday, titled “On the House,” but one gets the impression there are even better stories he won’t divulge, writes Sabrina Eaton, who focuses on some of the interesting Ohio material in the book. It details high-strung behavior by former Ohio Gov. John Kasich when Boehner invited him on a golf foursome with then-President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden.

Американская мечта (The American Dream): Mike Gibbons, a Cleveland businessman running in the Republican primary for Senate, used some not-so-American visuals while talking about the “American Dream” in his debut video, Seth Richardson reports. Gibbons’ campaign used stock video filmed in Russia and Ukraine in his nearly three-minute America-centric pitch.

Any way the wind blows: Former Ohio Republican Party Chairman and Senate candidate Jane Timken is trying to rewrite history a bit, saying on a conservative radio show that she never donated to Republican Gov. John Kasich’s 2016 presidential campaign, the Associated Press’ Julie Carr Smyth reports. The problem with that is records clearly show otherwise, though Timken‘s campaign insisted that even though her name was on the donation, it was solely from her husband.

<b>New homicide charge</b>: A new Ohio Senate bill would create a new crime, “abortion manslaughter,” if a doctor didn’t provide life-saving care to a fetus that survives an abortion but dies. <a href="https://www.cleveland.com/open/2021/04/ohio-senate-bill-would-require-doctors-to-provide-life-saving-care-to-fetuses-surviving-abortions.html">Laura Hancock reports</a> that there are differences among abortion rights advocates and foes on whether the bill is redundant because a federal law already covers the issue.

Strike out: Republican U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan is cosponsoring a bill that would remove Major League Baseball’s longtime antitrust exemption in response to its commissioner’s decision to move this year’s All-Star game from Atlanta to protest recent changes to Georgia voting laws, Eaton reports. “Big Tech, Big Media, and now, Big Sports are working tirelessly to ‘cancel’ conservative voices,” said a statement Jordan, of Champaign County, issued Wednesday.

Raise a glass: Despite an 11% production drop due to the coronavirus, Ohio ranked fifth in craft beer production in the U.S., Marc Bona reports. Last year, the state was sixth.

Facebook comment: Facebook policy and legal team members met with the cleveland.com/Plain Dealer editorial board to lay out arguments against an antitrust lawsuit filed by Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost and 47 other AGs. As Jeremy Pelzer reports, Facebook officials asserted their company has plenty of competition and that policy disputes should be addressed via legislation, not legal action. To that last point, Yost replied: “Well of course the legislature did act -- it’s called the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890.”

Historical dispute: The Ohio Supreme Court heard oral arguments this week over whether the state’s historical society can buy out a lease from a Newark golf course located on an ancient Native American earthworks. As Pelzer reports, the Moundbuilders County Club argues the Ohio History Connection didn’t bargain in good faith because it didn’t tell the club about an appraisal valuing the lease at more than twice what the History Connection offered (based on the valuation of a second appraisal). The Ohio History Connection wants to buy out the lease in hopes of designating the Octagon Earthworks a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

More hospitalizations: On Wednesday, hospitalizations of people with COVID-19 increased above 1,300 to 1,302, a high that hasn’t been seen since the end of February, Hancock reports. Currently only 2.77 million people have completed the vaccine, which means receiving second doses or the single-dose Johnson & Johnson shot.

<b>Quadruple trouble:</b> Gov. Mike DeWine wants Ohio’s rate for new coronavirus cases to drop to 50 per 100,000 before he lifts his health orders. But when the new rate is released Thursday afternoon, it’s expected to be four times that, <a href="https://www.cleveland.com/datacentral/2021/04/new-ohio-coronavirus-cases-climb-to-four-times-the-rate-gov-dewine-wants-before-lifting-health-orders.html">Rich Exner projects</a>. Rising numbers over the last several days are expected to leave the rate at close to 199.8 cases per 100,000. This rate had dipped to 143.8 on March 18.

Tug o’ war: DeWine is not the only one fighting against lawmakers to maintain executive powers during the public health crisis, writes Politico’s Nick Niedzwiadek. From New York to California, and every state between, the pandemic has made lawmakers realize how much power they cede to the executive branch in the emergency, and any laws that pass will have implications for years to come.

Money magnet: The U.S. Economic Development Administration has awarded the Cleveland-based Manufacturing Growth and Advocacy Network (MAGNET) a $624,316 grant to launch a program that will help Cuyahoga County manufacturers respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, Eaton writes. The grant will provide hands-on consulting to help small and medium-sized manufacturers restart their production, relaunch using new technologies, refocus on growing industries, reconnect with customers, reskill their workers, reshore their supply chains, and resecure their businesses.

MLK tribute: U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown on Wednesday led a bipartisan commemorative reading of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Letter from Birmingham Jail on the Senate floor. The section Brown read addressed white moderates: “Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress.”

Common mistake: We featured in yesterday’s Capitol Letter a quote from Sen. Rob Portman responding to a question he fielded about former President Donald Trump’s call to boycott Major League Baseball: “How can I expect you to ask anything other than about Donald Trump?” The first word Portman said in the sentence was “Scott,” as in the Cincinnati Enquirer’s Scott Wartman, who asked the question, not “God,” according to Portman’s office.

Lobbying Lineup

Five organizations that lobbied on last legislative session’s House Bill 527, which would have prohibited transgender females from playing girls’ and women’s sports in high school and college. The bill didn’t pass, but it’s back this year. State lobbying forms don’t require organizations to disclose whether they’re for or against a bill.

1. The Catholic Conference of Ohio

2. The Ohio Department of Higher Education

3. Equality Ohio

4. The Ohio High School Athletic Association

5. Kent State University

Birthdays

Barbara Brisbane, legislative aide to state Rep. Mike Skindell

Straight From The Source

“I’m going to be careful what I say about Mr. Householder. But I will say, I am surprised he’s still in office, yes.”

-David DeVillers, the former U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio during an appearance at the Columbus Metropolitan Club on Wednesday. Per Andrew Tobias, DeVillers, the initial top federal prosecutor on the federal bribery probe into House Bill 6, also said he doesn’t expect the case will go to trial in 2021, in part due to a backlog in the judiciary caused by the coronavirus.

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