Report: Energy Company at Center of FBI Case Funneled $1 Million to DeWine Election Efforts

It’s been over seven months since the FBI announced a criminal complaint stemming from Ohio House Bill 6 (HB6). Arrests were made for what feds call a bribery and racketeering plan bankrolled by First Energy Solutions to elect state representatives and a House Speaker that would ensure the bill passed (and stopped efforts to repeal it) – giving a $1.3 billion bailout to two Ohio nuclear energy plants.
A new report lays out the $1M relationship between First Energy companies and Ohio Governor Mike DeWine’s campaign.

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New Ohio Website Makes Electronic Filing of Campaign Finance Reports More Transparent

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose announced he fulfilled his pledge to bring more transparency to the Secretary of State’s office.

Unanimously passed at the end of 2020,  Senate Bill 107 (SB107) is an act to “allow certain entities to file campaign finance statements electronically, to require the Secretary of State to make the information in those electronic statements available online.”

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Conservative Organizations Call For Next Ohio House Speaker to Have Character, Be Supporter of Faith and Family

Even as the Ohio House of Representatives looks to replace disgraced Speaker Larry Householder, a coalition of conservative organizations is urging lawmakers to be thoughtful in how they do so.

Householder and four others were arrested July 21 in connection with a $60 million federal bribery probe in connection with the Legislature’s 2019 bailout of FirstEnergy and its nuclear power plants.

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Ohio House Dems Accuse Republicans of ‘Rigged’ Committee Process

  The Ohio House Democrats of the Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee have accused their Republican colleagues of rigging the vote on House Bill 6 (HB 6). The Democratic members of the subcommittee released a joint statement on Wednesday claiming the hearing to be a “rigged-process.” Joe Price, senior manager of government affairs and energy commodities at Timken Steel, testified as a proponent of the bill representing his employer on Wednesday. When State Rep. Kristin Boggs (D-Columbus) tried to question Price, she was denied the opportunity to do so after Rep. Nino Vitale (R-Urbana), chair of the subcommittee, claimed that the five minutes for Price was up. “I’m sorry we’re really trying to limit to five minutes as I stated earlier, including questions,” said Vitale in the hearing on Wednesday Following the testimony, Boggs, Rep. Casey Weinstein (D-Hudson), and three fellow Democrats on the subcommittee walked out of the hearing without comment and were absent for more than an hour. “If this is just going to be a show trial, then we’ll let them do it by themselves,” said Rep. David Leland (D-Columbus), according to The Cleveland Plain Dealer.  Vitale and the committee had agreed on a limit of five minutes per witness.…

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