Governor Kasich speaks at Ohio CAT
Ohio Gov. John Kasich speaks to supporters during a rally at Ohio CAT in Broadview Heights on Tuesday, March 8, 2016.
(Lisa DeJong, The Plain Dealer)
John Kasich chugs past Marco Rubio in Michigan. Hillary Clinton spends election night in Cleveland. And PG Sittenfeld gets a Luke Skywalker endorsement but some rough treatment from his hometown newspaper. Read more in Ohio Politics Roundup.
New this morning: Quinnipiac University has fresh numbers on the state of the Democratic presidential race in Ohio, less than one week out from the March 15 primary.
The national race tightens: "Donald Trump and Ted Cruz are locked in a tight Republican [presidential] race ... according to results from a new national NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll," NBC News' Mark Murray writes. "Trump is the first choice of 30 percent ... followed by Cruz at 27 percent, John Kasich at 22 percent and Marco Rubio at 20 percent."
It's a significant bump for Kasich, especially considering that he's ahead of Rubio.
Kasich survives Michigan: The Ohio governor went from hoping to win Michigan to polling last in Michigan to fighting a close race with Cruz for second place there. It qualifies as a comeback, given the rough month Kasich has had since New Hampshire. And it gives him a confidence boost heading into next week's Ohio primary - a must-win for Kasich. My analysis.
Why this was a good night for Kasich: Rubio finished a distant fourth in Michigan and Mississippi. He - and not Kasich - had widely been considered to be the candidate best-positioned to unite the GOP establishment against Trump and Cruz. Not anymore.
Kasich "took the stage at his election night party before half the Michigan votes were in," the Washington Post's David Weigel writes. "He declared a second place finish while that was very much in doubt. And then, almost as an afterthought, [he] shoved ...Rubio" out of the race.
Clinton spends Tuesday evening at Tri-C: "Hillary Clinton stuck to local issues in her speech Tuesday in Cleveland, where she promised to invest in manufacturing, small business and clean energy if elected president," cleveland.com's Sara Dorn reports.
"She struck a positive tone in her short speech at Cuyahoga County Community College's Metropolitan Campus, where a mixed-race crowd packed the gymnasium not far from predominately black neighborhoods in Cleveland. She went so far as to compliment her primary opponent, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. 'This has been a campaign focused on issues,' she said. 'And I'm proud of the campaign Senator Sanders and I are running.'"
Clinton won the Mississippi primary but the Associated Press and TV networks called Michigan for Sanders late Tuesday in what was a very close race between the Democratic rivals.
Here comes the Big Dog: Former President Bill Clinton will campaign on his wife's behalf today in Columbus and Dayton, cleveland.com's Jeremy Pelzer reports.
Here come the ads: Clinton and Sanders are battling dollar for dollar on TV in the Buckeye State. Trump is spending big money, too. And Kasich appears to be relying heavily on a supportive super PAC. Here's my look at the early advertising buys.
Inside the minds of Ohio voters: The cleveland.com Ohio Votes 2016 project aims to get inside the heads of voters to see who they support and why in next week's presidential primaries.
The first round posted Tuesday. Learn why Stacie Gregory, a Trump supporter, is OK with his rude remarks about women. Hear why Bill Nash backs Trump in spite of the businessman's position on undocumented immigrants. Links to all interviews are available here.
More to come throughout the week on cleveland.com.
Inside the mind of Urban Meyer: Trump asserted last week that the Ohio State football coach was a fan of his, despite there being zero evidence to support the claim. After Buckeyes' first spring practice Tuesday, cleveland.com's Doug Lesmerises went straight to Meyer.
"Meyer didn't respond," Lesmerises writes. "It's reasonable for a football coach to not want to deal with politics. But when Trump name drops you, at the very least you need to be presented with the chance to respond. So I read Trump's words back to Meyer."
Ohio's first big election year lawsuit: For years, 17-year-olds have been allowed to vote in primaries, provided they would turn 18 by the general election. And, for years, reports cleveland.com's Mark Naymik, "at least some of Ohio's boards of elections" have not been counting these teens' votes for primary presidential candidates. The reasoning is complicated, owing to the fact that it's delegates, not candidates, who technically are being nominated.
On Tuesday, the Fair Elections Legal Network "filed a lawsuit in Franklin County asking a judge to order [Secretary of State Jon] Husted to instruct elections officials to count 17-year-olds' votes in presidential primary races." And Sanders, popular with young voters, filed his own suit.
Out of this world endorsements in the Ohio Senate race: "The force is with United States Senate hopeful PG Sittenfeld after Star Wars actor Mark Hamill announced his endorsement of the Cincinnati councilman," the Cincinnati Enquirer's Rebecca Butts reports. "Meanwhile, former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords is endorsing former Gov. Ted Strickland."
The Hamill endorsement is fun for Luke Skywalker fans, but the Giffords blessing carries more significance in this Democratic primary. Sittenfeld has hammered Strickland over his shifting positions on gun control. Giffords, who survived a 2011 shooting in her Arizona district, has emerged as one of the nation's highest profile advocates for tougher gun regulations.
Ouch: Sittenfeld's hometown Cincinnati Enquirer, noting that it's "had a front-row seat to the 31-year-old's City Council career," counters some of his biggest campaign brags.
"Sittenfeld says he's been a leader on gun violence in the community, but he rarely talks about the issue, isn't a member of council's law committee and didn't attend recent listening sessions in each of the police districts," the newspaper's Sharon Coolidge writes. Also: "Sittenfeld leaves the impression in other parts of the state that he played a personal role in police-community relations, which have garnered national praise. But, in fact, he was in high school when the city's most innovative police reforms were instituted after the 2001 riots."
State lawmaker modernizes the 'dog ate my homework' excuse: State Rep. John Barnes, a Cleveland Democrat, says he failed to vote on the House Republicans' original version of last year's state budget because of a technical glitch with a phone app that was supposed to alert him to the roll call. The excuse came as Barnes and his primary rival, Jill Miller Zimon, met with the cleveland.com/Plain Dealer editorial. The endorsement went to Zimon.
In unrelated news ... "Ohio's part-time state lawmakers make more money than most Ohioans, but their state salaries would shrink and grow in line with the rest of the state's workers under a new proposed constitutional amendment," cleveland.com's Jackie Borchardt reports.
"A group called Ethics First is pushing a measure that would set state lawmaker pay at or below Ohio's median household income, adjusted every other year. Currently, state lawmakers earn $60,584 per year. ... Ohio's median household income was $49,644 in 2014."
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