Ohio legislator Jay Edwards wants to get rid of dark money

Dig into the scandal surrounding House Bill 6, and you find will dark money at the core of the corruption scheme. This political moolah greased the way to bribery, indictments and prison time, not to mention notorious energy legislation, including subsidies for two aging coal-fired power plants.

Larry Householder, a former Ohio House speaker and big dark money fan, sits behind bars for his leading role.

Gov. Mike DeWine and his fellow Republicans who run the Ohio Statehouse have nodded toward making amends — without doing much. They did enact legislation repealing the controversial financial support for the state’s two nuclear plants, an initial driver of H.B. 6, pushed by FirstEnergy and allies.

What steps might the governor and state lawmakers take, short of what they clearly resist, for instance, ending the funding stream for those coal plants or reviving incentives for energy efficiency and renewable energy?

Actually, Ohio Rep. Jay Edwards of Athens County, the chair of the House Finance Committee, has a worthy idea. He wants to shed light on dark money by requiring some element of disclosure. Ideally, the light would shine in a full and most timely fashion. He has been joined by state Rep. Sarah Carruthers, a Butler County Republican.

Edwards recently told News5Cleveland and the Ohio Capital Journal that when it comes to dark money, the state needs “to get rid of all of it.” He added: “The big thing is we want Ohioans to figure out who is funding campaigns.”

Both Edwards and Carruthers cite their own experiences with the harm of dark money. In May, Carruthers lost her primary race. She was the victim, in part, of clashing factions in the House Republican caucus. She points to direct mail pieces grossly misrepresenting her record. Edwards is not seeking re-election, due to term limits, yet he suffered such hits, too.

“There’s no accountability,” he told the reporter. “They can lie about you. They can say whatever they want about things that aren’t true.”

This is what is so corrosive about dark money. Yet the damage hardly stops there, as the H.B. 6 scandal makes plain in highlighting its nefarious role.

In 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court invited an avalanche of dark money via its Citizens United ruling. The 5-4 court majority reversed decades of precedent in permitting corporations, unions and wealthy individuals to spend unlimited amounts of political money as long as they did not coordinate with candidates and their campaigns, or explicitly say “elect” or “defeat” a candidate.

The court took comfort in this measure of separation, arguing such independence would guard against the rise or the appearance of corruption.

Reality has not proved as reassuring. The amount of dark money has exploded, tapped by both parties. OpenSecrets charts the increase from $40 million in 2014 to $1 billion in the 2020 presidential year. In its ruling, the court reasoned that disclosure requirements could be helpful, but the giving has remained anonymous.

Thus, FirstEnergy secretly routed millions into “independent” spending vehicles, linked to Householder and DeWine, plus Jon Husted, the lieutenant governor, among others. More, the recent unearthing of text messages between these players hardly suggests a lack of coordination.

Imagine Ohioans learning then just how much FirstEnergy invested, and to whom the money was flowing. Might opponents have halted the bill?

Whatever the result, Ohioans would have benefited from knowing more.

So, Edwards and Carruthers have a deserving cause, and they have won Democratic backing. Unfortunately, opposition quickly emerged, from their own ranks at the Statehouse. Critics caution against chilling free speech and violating the privacy of those who wish to speak out.

At the federal level, soon after the Citizens United ruling, Senate Republicans filibustered disclosure legislation, though many once had supported improved disclosure. They did the same two years ago. What advocates must show is a

compelling reason for taking such a step. That reason takes the shape of countering the corrupting influence, dark money eroding public trust.

Look no further than the Supreme Court itself. Dark money has been central to the efforts of the Federal Society and related donors and organizations to gain influence with the conservative justices. With the stakes so high — the court deserving a prominent place in the presidential election debate — disclosure of those behind the funding seems imperative.

Recall the sage advice during the Watergate scandal five decades ago: “Follow the money.” As things stand, that is too difficult, and it is proving deeply problematic from the highest court to our own Statehouse.

Let’s hope Jay Edwards and Sarah Carruthers win enough support from their Republican friends, doubtful though that now seems. It is the least the Republican majorities could do to help clean up the mess of the House Bill 6 scandal.

Michael Douglas was the Beacon Journal editorial page editor from 1999 to 2019. He can be reached at [email protected].

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