Cincy Reporter

Gov. Mike DeWine says he hasn’t asked Donald Trump to endorse his campaign for a second term.

Left unsaid was it hasn’t been offered. Trump isn’t a huge DeWine fan. And former U.S. Rep. Jim Renacci, DeWine’s most formidable opponent in this year’s Republican gubernatorial primary, has met all the former president’s groveling requirements.

But Renacci probably won’t get the blessing from Mar-a-Lago because he’s likely to lose. And Trump believes embracing losers makes him look bad.

These decisions are never about qualifications. They’re always about Trump. If lightning strikes and Trump endorses DeWine in the primary, it will only be because he has decided DeWine is a shoo-in. Renacci, like everyone else in Trump’s life, is disposable.

When asked by The Columbus Dispatch if he wanted Trump’s support, DeWine’s mealy-mouthed answer was, “We’re always looking for support from a lot of people.”

What DeWine should have said was that he didn’t want Trump’s endorsement. He has enough bragging rights to win without it. His administration’s likely deal with Intel for construction of a multibillion-dollar computer chip factory in suburban Columbus would represent the largest single development project in state history. Plus, for doing the right thing, DeWine would forever be remembered as one of Ohio’s most principled governors, as someone who put the country’s future above his own.

DeWine has already engaged in far less Trump bootlicking than most Republican officeholders. For that he deserves a measure of credit. But in September 2020, he put Ohioans at risk by giving the Trump campaign permission to violate coronavirus safety protocols for a rally in Toledo. Neither George Voinovich nor John Kasich would have done that.

DeWine surely knows Trump is a monster. It would be hypocritical of him to accept the backing of someone who actively schemed to shred our democracy by overturning an honest and lawful presidential election, inciting a mob invasion of the U.S. Capitol and trafficking in demonstrably false conspiracy theories.

Like so many other Republicans who eventually fall into line with Trump, chances are DeWine has convinced himself his re-election is so important to Ohioans that it’s worth throwing his country under the bus, hoping the tire tracks don’t inflict much harm.

Into the Republican-run swamp that is Ohio politics come former Cincinnati Mayor John Cranley and former Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley, one of whom will be the Democratic nominee for governor. Both are worthy candidates. The personable Whaley has spent years building a network of friends throughout the state. She Is now president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors. Cincinnati’s growth gives Cranley a compelling story to tell. He is a Harvard-trained lawyer with an undergraduate degree from John Carroll University and he co-founded the Ohio Innocence Project.

Whaley and Cranley are longtime friends. The next few months may change that. The winner of the Democratic primary will begin the general election campaign as a huge underdog.

To stand a chance, the Democratic nominee will probably need help, of a kind, from the U.S. District Attorney for Southern Ohio. It is widely believed the feds have unfinished business in the House Bill 6 scandal, an alleged $61 million bribery scheme to fleece Ohio ratepayers that was allegedly engineered by FirstEnergy, using, to do its dirty business, compliant state legislators and maybe a sitting governor who has long been way too cozy with the Akron-based utility.

Former House Speaker Larry Householder was one of five Republicans indicted for their alleged involvement in the scam. And it’s widely assumed more indictments are forthcoming. If any of those indictments reach closer to the governor’s office, it could provide the Democratic nominee with an opening.

The culture of corruption that permeates Statehouse politics is so toxic, some Republicans genuinely don’t understand all the fuss about House Bill 6. Giving FirstEnergy what it wants, even if it requires duping taxpayers, has become part of their DNA. Nevertheless, Ohio has turned so bright red, the magnitude of the scandal may not matter much to voters.

History is also the GOP’s friend in this election. The last Republican governor to be denied a second term was C. William O’Neill in 1958. And that happened only because Republicans tried to sell voters a wildly unpopular “right to work” law.

With the general election more than 10 months off, it’s difficult to make a case for Cranley or Whaley winning. An endorsement of DeWine from Trump might disgust educated independents otherwise inclined to support the governor. But it also might motivate the large number of Republican voters who despise him to reconsider.

With the leading Republican candidates for Rob Portman’s U.S. Senate seat eagerly determined to embrace lies and extremism, damaging their own and Ohio’s reputation in the process, were DeWine to tell Trump he neither needs nor wants his endorsement, it would be one of the defining moments of DeWine’s 40-year career in public life.

Original source can be found here.