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samplegirl's Journal

March 13, 2024

Dewine and Husted should be in prison!

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine and Lt. Gov. Jon Husted are dripping with the stink of public corruption
DAVID DEWITT
FEBRUARY 16, 2024 4:30 AM

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine and Lt. Gov. Jon Husted during their victory party for Ohio’s gubernatorial race at the Ohio Republican Party’s election night party at the Sheraton Capitol Square on November 6, 2018. (Photo by Justin Merriman/Getty Images)
Power. Politics. Greed. Bribery. Regulatory capture. The buying and selling of government. Robbing the people blind.

In the wretched hustle of public corruption, modern Ohio Republican state politicians make the notorious “Ohio Gang” of the Teapot Dome scandal look like rank amateurs.

Consider the latest: Three-and-a-half years after news of the largest bribery scandal in Ohio history broke, citizens are seeing fresh indictments with damning new details about the breadth and depth of the depravity, including how the entire operation reached into the orbit and actions of Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine and Lt. Gov. Jon Husted.

Let’s marshal our facts.

What we know
The latest indictments concern a $1.3 billion dollar bailout that Akron-based FirstEnergy has already admitted to the federal government that it paid more than $60 million in bribes to purchase. Former Republican Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder and former state GOP Chairman Matt Borges are serving federal prison sentences for their roles. Two other lobbyists cooperated and are awaiting sentencing, while a third died by suicide wearing a “DeWine for governor” t-shirt.

In December, the feds charged Sam Randazzo with 11 felony counts. Randazzo is a lawyer and longtime energy consultant whom DeWine nominated to chair the state’s top utility regulator, the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio.

On Monday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost announced state felony charges against Randazzo and former First Energy CEO Chuck Jones and former Vice President Michael Dowling for their alleged roles. The three were arraigned in Akron on Tuesday and each pleaded not guilty.

Among the new allegations was that Randazzo had a corrupt relationship with the FirstEnergy executives stretching back to 2010, allegedly serving as general counsel to the Industrial Energy Users of Ohio while secretly being paid as a consultant for FirstEnergy: Randazzo settled disputes over electricity rates on terms acceptable to the energy companies, then channeled the settlement money through shell companies where he skimmed off a portion, the indictment said.

The indictment said the money was really intended to be a cash payment to the industrial users so they would drop their opposition to a rate hike FirstEnergy was seeking. Through that “side deal,” a powerful utility paid off powerful industries to make way for a rate hike on all FirstEnergy customers, if the allegations are true.

Between 2016 and 2019, FirstEnergy paid $13 million into Randazzo’s shell companies, the indictment said. Of that, Randazzo passed $7.75 million to the industrial users and pocketed the rest, it said.

DeWine’s chief of staff, Laurel Dawson, was married to a man who had been a paid lobbyist for FirstEnergy — and who had received a $10,000 loan from Randazzo in 2016, the indictment said.

Ohiocapitaljournal.com