Clear politics, that looks at the average of the polls in ohio. Right now with 18 electoral votes, it is essentially a dead heat, with joe biden at 46 on average, the president at 45 . Why is it so competitive, 3. 5 months before the election . Think iteve, i mean, i is there are a number of things happening at once. You are seeing a major shift in the suburbs of ohio that a few decades ago or even a year ago, these suburbs outside of cincinnati, columbus, and cleveland, they were the base of the republican party. That is how a john kasich would have been elected or even a george bush. Those suburbs are now blue. It is largely women voters, old moderate voters, saying this is not a party we were a part of, and they are voting blue. They voted for Sherrod Brown. They voted for democratic mayors and councilmembers, and they are not going to vote for donald trump is november. If you take away the old base of the republican party, and it is tossup or either democrat, which it is, that makes ohio a much tougher state for republicans. That means they have to run up in the rural parts of the state, but these suburbs are a large voting bloc in the state of ohio, some republicans have really lost their old base. The second thing that has happened is the ohio economy, before covid, was already struggling. 2019 was our worst year, jobs wise, and 2009, between january 2019 and 2020, we lost jobs, farm breakroom sees where the highest in a decade, so the whileents bad policies, trade stuff, and broken promises were already impacting ohio in a negative way, including places he did well in 20, because he told them he was going to fight for them. No clearer than the gm land that shut down near youngstown. He told those people he was going to bat for them, dont sell their homes, etc. Gm shut down, moved to mexico. Trump did nothing about it, and then he blamed the workers for it. That story is played out in smaller ways around the state, so whether it is the democrats are fired up which we are suburbs shifting blue, or these economic policies just not working in ohio, that is putting ohio in play, and joe biden ends up being a very good candidate for ohio. Like Sherrod Brown, he can appeal across the state. But even before biden was nominated, donald trump has been underwater for a year. He knows he is spending millions of dollars on tv here, which is something he never wanted to do. He has visited ohio outside of the state, where he has golf courses, because they know they have been in trouble in ohio for a long time. Host this courtesy of the eight. Five thirty leadiden has a onepoint in one survey, a twopoint lead in another survey. David pepper, this is a state the president won by eight percentage points. Pennsylvania, michigan, wisconsin became key. Additionally, if you look past elections, ohio has gone republican in a president ial year. Guest yeah, i mean, obviously all of these midwest states are key. We think ohio is clearly in play. We are not surprised at these poll numbers. In 2018, Sherrod Brown won by more than he won in 2012, when obama was on the ballot. The district said he dizzily been drawn the districts had easily been drawn for republican victories, through the process of gende. Gerrymandering. That is the process you see shifting. You see something growing in ohio. 20, as i said, there were some ironton ohio, one named on the West Virginia border, arer rural towns, these towns that trump won by 60, 40, or more. In 2019, we ran Democratic Candidates against incumbent mayors, and we beat them by 60, 40, or more. Working,mics are not and people want to change, so whether it is suburbs, small towns, or big cities, which are more dominated by big democrats than ever, there is a lot of momentum here. Close. Io is always i think joe biden understands this. He is the kind of candidate that can run in all parts of the state. Int as Sherrod Brown won 2018 by more than he did in a blue year, we think ohio is a good fit for joe biden come november. Host we will be asking democrats who they would like to see as joe bidens running mate, so let me ask you that question. Who would be your first choice . Guest so i am not here to tell the Vice President who to pick. There are some wonderful people on that list. I do think making history by choosing an africanamerican woman would be very meaningful and would be one other part of his legacy. I also think that would excite ohio voters, and there are some wonderful people he has got to choose from. I will say, from our standpoint, most of the people on the list have been very good to ohio, have been here a lot. Kamala harris has been here a lot, Stacey Abrams has done a lot for ohio. Respect most of the folks on that list. Outside of that, i will leave it to joe biden to make the best choice. I know they are working very hard on the process. Host we are talking with david pepper, the chair of the Ohio Democratic party and the author of his latest book titled the voter file. Explain. Guest explain the book . Host . Guest yeah, so New York Times in addition host yes, please. Guest yeah, so, you know, in my day job, a lot of the books tackle into the dark money that hurts our system, gerrymandering is such a poison to our system. , it takester file a same approach. There is a lot of talk about the hacking that happened in 2016. Emails were hacked. We know that. Polling data was taken. And then we casually mentioned well, voter data may have been taken, too. What this book doesnt really explain the risk involved if, you know, Foreign Forces were able to get their hands on voter data, a database of voters that campaign used to, you know, inform the way they campaign, essentially that game plan for the end of a campaign, that would be a huge, you know, hype shat could really make a mes of politics. The book it is a fictional book, but when you see the voter files, the voter data that is now available is the crown jewel of a campaign, and this book walks into sort of the worst case scenario, if someone were to do that. But the book tries to get into other key themes, you know, even though we are talking a president ial race, 2020 is also a year where we have statehouse races all over the country. Those statehouse races really matter, because whoever wins those races will draw the district lines for the next decade, and gerrymandering of our legislatures and our congress has been one of the biggest poisons in politics that has made things so partisan, so divisive, so dysfunctional, so, yes, we have to focus on the president ial race, but dont not Pay Attention to your local statehouse races. Because if you care about gerrymandering, who you elect at the statehouse will determine if we continue to have a system of rigged, gerrymandered maps. In a state like ours, our Supreme Court races. The state Supreme Court in the state, like ohio, are also going to be determining if maps are valid. So my book, hopefully, has gotten good reviews. It is a good page turner. I hope it has some twists and turns that people like, but there is also some real discussion about issues people like. Even though, by the way, i am a democrat, i try to write my books in a way that republicans also enjoy them. I have a mix of characters, so for those of your viewers who will be calling the republican line, dont let the fact that im a democrat scare you off from buying a book that i think you will enjoy. Host the voter file is the third in a series by david pepper, who is joining us from cincinnati. As mentioned, his day job is the chair of the Ohio Democratic party. You mentioned outside influence in your fiction book. Robert mueller is writing this morning in the Washington Post , with the headline, roger stone remains a convicted felon, and rightly so. He writes the following, quote host he went on to write host he went on to write host and finally, there is this from Robert Mueller in Washington Post, host and Robert Mueller concludes, saying claims to the contrary are false. Your comments . Guest i am really glad he spoke out. Again, i do not know mr. Mueller at all, but i wish he had been speaking out more since they took his report. I am glad he spoke out. It is very clear that what the president did the other day, as nancy pelosi said, appalling corruption. This is someone who had the goods on trump. This was not about helping a friend, this was about trump helping himself and abusing the commutation process for his own benefit. I just saw on the way in that roger stone is not even eligible to have his sentence commuted until he shows up to prison, and trump did it even before that, so this is just one other example of deep corruption, and i am glad mueller spoke out. I am glad mitt romney spoke out. I am glad to meet in pennsylvania spoke out. Ohio are waiting for a port meant to say one word about this level of corruption. We already saw trump attack them both. A badge of honor for those to come i think. They are willing to speak out against corruption. Everyone should. And to the extent that everyone else is enabling it, they are part of it. This is all something adam he waspredicted when pushing the impeachment case, and mitt romney exhort them, did nothing, and lo and behold, this is exactly what they predicted. I wish i was shocked by this. I am not. I am glad mueller spoke out here i am glad romney and toomey spoke out cute i hope others do as well. One reason i think it is really that democrats not just win by a few points in a few key states, but that we should turn many states blue, ohio, florida, georgia, but we need to send a message that the kind of divisive, race and stuff we are seeing from trump, that this is not america, and we do not want to send that message to the world come about by just a couple of electoral votes. We want to say it loudly, as the world sees, wow, america really did reject this guy, and hopefully we show loudly, by winning decisively in so many places that republicans, who were afraid to speak out until now, because they do not want a mean tweet from donald trump, like he did against romney today, by people who know that this stuff is nonsense, aan their fear currently is donald trump. My hope is this is not a time for small ball politics. This is a time for democrats and many republicans who know better, who are joining the lincoln project, an independents, who know this is not who we are coming to join together and send the loudest message, in the way you do that is you win big. You campaign everywhere. 88 counties in ohio. 50 states in this country. You run up the score. Iss era, after november, over, and we start moving forward. Hopefully the kind of actions we saw about roger stone he is literally thumbing his nose at the country by doing this. Can you imagine . I cant imagine his own advisors told him do this. He does it anyway. He knows that most of these senators will let him do anything they want. They did not just go along with what he did in impeachment, they did not just look the other way, senators like rob portman literally voted to cover up evidence. That was a signal to donald trump, you can do anything you want. We are going to cover it up. We are going to live for you. And my hope is, he is rubbing our nose with this nonsense, that we look at all this, and we decide november 3, suite him out so decisively that never again will someone behave in this way, as our leader, showing the whole world what we have become. Host ann david pepper, you mentioned go big. That is the front page of the New York Times, biden makes a play for the states. Our guess is joining us from ohio. For ohio residents, the number is 202 7488003. It, do rinosssed have any problem with the fact we cut obama, biden, and company spying on my campaign . The whole company ran rampant, wild, and unchecked, lying and leaking all the way. No this is from the president. Caller good morning. Thank you for taking my call. I want to speak about donald trump in general, that he had nobody no political background whatsoever. Power, power, power. He did noty, and want to be president. In his own words, i want to be just like kim jongun. He loves vladimir putin. People need to realize what he is all about. He wants to be a dictator. He has no leader, he is just all. Bout power andy singer, entertainer megan traynor, she had a song outcome i know youre lying, your lips are moving, that is all about donald trump. Mali who iss from joining us from just north of you in cleveland, ohio. Good morning. Caller hi, david pepper. You mentioned that women are going to turn our state blue. I believe you, but then the pandemic happened to it we are trapped in our homes with our children. Some of us try to work fulltime from home. Stillondering if you are counting on women to power the shift blue, and how you plan to keep us mobilized, engaged, and i want an assurance that you are still counting on us and we can be there. Host thank you, molly. Did you hear the question and the comments . Guest i sure did. I heard both. Let me start with tim. I think donald trump shows true autocratic tendencies. That is his instinct. The people he seems to admire the most are autocrats. His instinct, whether it is attempts to shut down books coming out or just to ignore the judicial system and think that, you know, his Supreme Court argument that his own nominees to the Supreme Court rejected the other day was basically that he should be treated above the law. So he has those tendencies, and i think it is very clear, as tim said, but here is the point that i would make in terms of our history as a country. The founders would say we expected a president to think that way. That is what they wrote a constitution to protect against. I think the founders would say, yes, we actually thought that might happen. And they would not be shocked by a president who has these terrible tendencies that we need to vote out of office. I think the founders would be more shocked by the behavior in congress to not do anything about it. I think they would say, we gave the balance of powers, we gave leverage of power to the senate and the house, to stand up when a president behaves in a way that we feared may happen, and i think they would be even more appalled that the republicans in the senate and the house, the jim jordans, the rob portmans, will not do anything about it president who is showing exactly what tim said. So the problematic president is something our founders thought might happen, and i think they would be more shocked and more stunned that the people whose job it is to take an oath to the constitution, they take an oath to be independent, they are violating that oath when they coverup for the president during the impeachment trial as opposed to actually holding them accountable, which is their job. I think they would be even more appalled by the silence amid all the things that are happening. So i agree, tim, it is a problem. In the best solution, before the election, would be a sinner and a house that actually did their job and stood up to it. That would make it go away quick. Yeah,lorys question, women are saving our country, in ohio and across the country. It is the energy of women we saw from the womens march a few days after the inauguration, to women running for office, you know, i talked about our wins in ohio in 2018. Most of those pickups were women candidates. Most of the pickups in the u. S. House, when we swept into power there, were women. In the volunteers and the supporters that voted them in were more women, so, yes, women are powering, and i mentioned the suburban shift. The suburban shift in ohio is being driven by women. You know, some men, too, but more by women. So, obviously, we as democrats had better be talking to women through the end. If we should be fighting on womens issues, whether it is the right to choose. What i will also tell you, in reproductive rights, i think this issue is really important. We have reopened, and states like ohio and other states, with very little sensitivity to what working women say. Mike dewine here in ohio, who did a good job, by the way initially, and the way he reacts but he rushedc, to reopen, and said ok, i will go back to work, before they even had a child care plan. Now, what does that say to women, who are having to make that impossible choice between working and their kids . We i think the longterm have to do the public side has to do a much better job of thinking through all the public support systems that support ,amilies and working women single women working, in particular, before we say to all of them, we will go back to work and start doing all of this again. You know, this has to be much more of a workerdriven, ittomupdriven mindset than has been really from the top down. I think that has put people, women, families, working families, workers in general, in a very tough position. We are seeing it now on the schools reopening. The School Reopening has been pushed from the top, without any conversation with teachers and staff and schools about how you could actually do it in a way that was safe. So i think that a lot of these decisions are coming from the top down, and i think we are going to continue to have to go backward, because i think that approach is actually making one mistake after the next. And the childcare situation was a perfect example of that. Host to our radio audience, we are talking to david pepper, the ohio chair of the democratic party, previously served on the Hamilton County commission, a graduate of yale, both undergraduate and his law degree. Emma is joining us from buys ville, ohio, which is located where . Ander it is about an hour a half away from columbus, ohio. Host good morning to you, emma. Caller good morning. My question is are they ever going to put time limits on how long people can hold seats . And like that 90yearold woman who is a judge, i think there should be a time limit. Host thank you. I think you are referring to Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who is 86, but we get the point. Should there be time limits to how long you should serve on the Supreme Court . Guest i dont think there should be. I think, you know, we have seen over the years that justice is, when i felt like they were unable to continue, chose not to. But one thing about the law, and i say this as a lawyer, having clerked for a judge, you know, one good thing about the law and we know we get wiser with years it is one area where, as lo