The U.S. Senate race out of Ohio looks to be one of the top Senate race to watch for 2024 when it comes to Republicans look to flip seats currently held by vulnerable Democratic incumbents. Polls show a close race for Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) as he runs for reelection, which may be why Ohio Democrats have been calling attention to how a potential opponent of Brown's, Secretary of State Frank LaRose, has moved his office space.
In September, LaRose moved from 180 E. Broad St. to a new location on Civic Center Drive. The move drew the attention and criticism from many state Democrats, including state Sen. Bill DeMora, a Democrat representing Columbus, as it's the same building for campaign lawyers Baker Hostetler.
Townhall obtained a letter with the Secretary of State letterhead on it from the secretary's office sent electronically to DeMora. The September 12 letter comes from Paul Disantis, the Chief Legal Counsel and Director of Public Policy for the Secretary of State.
"First, I’ll note that while you admit in the interview our decision to relocate the office is 'not illegal under the definition of the law,' you proceed to offer your own personal 'smell test.' I suspect this test is heavily biased toward your background as a longtime partisan operative who regularly criticizes the Secretary of State," the letter mentions, citing DeMora being quoted in a local NBC news report when it comes to what he says are concerns about the secretary's office bulding and the location's proximity to the campaign.
At one point in the letter, Disantis clears up concerns about LaRose's office as secretary is close to his campaign. "The address listed on that paperwork is for the Columbus office of Baker Hostetler, the law firm that represents Secretary LaRose’s federal campaign. His campaign has no formal office," the letter notes.
"It should be noted here that if the Secretary wanted to find an office with proximity to a law firm providing political representation to his campaign interests, we wouldn’t need to leave our current location. Our current location houses the Dickinson Wright law firm, which represents the Secretary’s state campaign committee," the letter also goes on to lay out. "No concern has ever been expressed about our proximity to that law firm because this entire narrative is silly, misinformed and clearly designed to score political points, which is why no serious journalist thinks this is a story."
The letter also makes clear the issues the secretary has experienced at the 180 E. Broad St. location. The matter in part comes down to "rising crime rates in the greater metropolitan area" as well as "evidence of financial distress." There's also mention of threats to employees at this location:
Let me start by addressing the timeline behind our decision to pursue relocation to a new headquarters facility. This process began shortly after Secretary LaRose took office in 2019, when he asked his senior team to begin exploring relocation opportunities. To say that our current location, the Continental Plaza at 180 E. Broad St., is struggling would be an understatement. This is certainly a hardship facing many downtown properties confronting a pandemic recovery, the rise of remote work, and the reality of rising crime rates in the greater metropolitan area, but we’ve seen evidence of financial distress at the current property for several years, from facility disrepair to a reduction in support staff. In May of 2023, foreclosure proceedings began on the property, resulting in the appointment of a receiver and the scheduling of a sheriff’s auction. These developments are well documented in Business First.
Since taking office in 2019, Secretary LaRose has had a particular concern about the building’s lack of secure parking options, as threats against election personnel are a real and growing vulnerability nationwide. Some of our employees have received threats on their lives and property due simply to their association with their jobs, and we regularly work with law enforcement to mitigate those realities. Most of our 135 employees must find and pay for their own parking at nearby garages, lots, and metered spaces. Due to the nature of our work, these loyal team members are sometimes required to arrive early and work late, especially during an election. This often requires staff members to accompany each other when walking to and from their vehicles, as some employees have experienced vandalized vehicles and even aggressive harassment by people approaching them in unsecured garages or on nearby sidewalks outside of traditional daylight working hours.
This is also a move years in the making, before LaRose announced his Senate run:
Secretary LaRose determined this security threat to be an unacceptable risk to our staff, and he asked our senior team in 2021 to revisit the relocation effort, with a focus on efficiency and security. By that time, the post-pandemic economy had created more affordable options in the downtown area. The Secretary asked his team to prioritize locations with an attached parking option to enhance employee safety. In a political context, that effort got underway more than a year before Secretary LaRose filed his candidacy for re-election to the office he currently holds and 18 months before filing campaign paperwork with the Federal Election Commission. Therefore, your assertion that “all of a sudden now they have to move because Frank LaRose has to be close to his [U.S. Senate] campaign” is demonstrably false.
The letter goes on to detail in length how the decision was made to come to this location as well, which includes mention of the unanimous and bipartisan approval that the secretary received:
In partnership with the Department of Administrative Services, our exploration of several properties in and around the Columbus area continued through 2021 and into 2022. Our staff first visited the property at 200 Civic Center Drive (our new location) in June of 2022. As the news report indicates, we did explore other options that either proved to be cost prohibitive or lacked adequate parking options for our employees. Simply put, the Civic Center Drive location offered an overall reduction in our lease, as well as an attached parking garage that can safely accommodate our full time, in-office staff. This proved to be a challenging combination to achieve, but we anticipate that the more streamlined and modern facility offered at the new location also will help with employee recruitment and retention. We made the decision to finalize this property in consultation with our entire bipartisan staff, including our bargaining unit employees, some of whom began working with this office under then-Secretary of State Sherrod Brown back in the early 1980s.
On two separate occasions this year, we appeared before the General Assembly’s Controlling Board to explain the relocation effort and secure funding for the move. We first received unanimous, bipartisan approval to expend funds related to the move in January of 2023, again nearly six months before Secretary LaRose filed paperwork with the FEC...
Also addressed is the cost to taxpayers, which has been the subject of many media reports, though the letter notes "no tax dollars will be spent to finance the relocation." Disantis' letter explains that "[t]he overall cost of the new lease is lower than that of our current arrangement, and the one-time costs associated with the move will be covered with revenue received by our office through business filing fees."
Despite the clear information laid out in the letter, the Ohio Dems website has been unrelenting in covering LaRose's move in their news section, with no less than 10 times articles September 8. The Ohio Dems X account has also made several posts about the move, including one in late September with LaRose wearing an obviously fake movers outfit.
Great deal on a new moving company! No upfront costs — only $600,000 in hidden fees.
— Ohio Dems (@OHDems) September 28, 2023
Contact Frank LaRose at 200 Civic Center Drive for all moving inquiries, official Secretary of State business, and campaign information. pic.twitter.com/qOewKAMGn1
Liberal media in Ohio has also been all over the story, with one particularly outrageous example coming from the Ohio Capital Journal, which sought to connect the move to "ethical questions" and how LaRose's "ability to do that job impartially has been called into question."
Such examples, however, amount to partisan politics, including when it comes to efforts to pass Amendment 1 that LaRose spearheaded, a failed amendment that would require ballot initiatives to receive 60 percent support to pass, as well as the rabidly pro-abortion Issue 1 ballot initiative for next week's election. It's worth noting the OCJ has misled in their coverage of Issue 1. One example even includes LaRose's decision to endorse former and potentially future President Donald Trump, who won the state by about 8 points in both 2016 and 2020.
Businessman Bernie Moreno and state Sen. Matt Dolan are also running in the Republican primary to challenge Brown next November.
According to last month's Emmerson College poll, Dolan is up 2 points ahead of Brown (38-36 percent), LaRose is up 1 point ahead of Brown (39-38 percent), and Moreno loses to Brown by 2 points (33-35 percent). All those are within the margin of error, with the poll's write-up noting that "Brown Faces Competitive General Election." All forecasters currently consider the race to be in the "Toss-Up" category.
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