House Bill 6 was Ohios largest public corruption scandal. Why haven't the laws changed?

Columbus, Ohio – the former spokesman for the House spokesman from Ohio, Larry Householder because he made national headlines. The Fallout deformed the Republican leadership. Almost five years later, the laws, which made a bribery scheme possible in the amount of $ 60 million, remain largely intact.

“Forget what you learned Schulhaus Rock …,“Said State Rep. Bride Rose Sweeney, a Westlake Democrat.” All you need is a sufficiently sufficiently generous checkbook, state laws that protect you and a legislator that is ready and willing, and your options are almost endless. “

With enough dark money, she warned, it is possible to “buy a speaker, to change the entire composition of the legislature” and to say goodbye to a law that gives First Energy with a financed taxpayer with rescue packages of 1 billion US dollars for two nuclear power plants.

To prevent another scandal like House Bill 6, SWEENEY and three other democratic legislators introduced a three -part reform package.

• House Bill 250 would prescribe the disclosure of dark money donors. These are funds that were lodged to influence elections by charitable organizations called 501 (c) (4) organizations that do not have to disclose their participants in the law.
• A second, impending law would be aimed at the petition blocking tactics with which the ballot campaigns led by citizens were canceled.
• The third proposal would prevent individuals and companies that donate to political candidates because they receive government contracts.

“The scandal of the Bill 6 house was not an off, it was no coincidence,” said Sweeney. “It wasn't a man or a group of bad actors. It was as usual.

But when it comes to dark money, these invoices end up in a legal gray zone that is characterized by the judgments of the Supreme Court of the Us Court of Justice, which restrict how far states can go to the regulation of campaign donations and expenses.

“There are limits for what we can do on decisions of the Supreme Court …”, said governor Mike Dewine. “But transparency is something, an area to which we can probably have a problem with the decision of the Supreme Court.”

House's spokesman, Matt Huffman, a Lima Republican, also said reporters that the state's hands were bound.

“This is a problem that is outside the Statehouse,” he said.

Huffman added that dark money groups can win elections.

“We don't have something like that in our political campaign,” he said. “So if there is a certain proposal that if someone does something that is illegal, I would like to know about it.”

In May 2024 Cleveland.com received records showed that a non-profit organization called Liberty Ohio received $ 300,000 from Firstergy, while it was pushing on House Bill 6.

A firstergy lobbyist described the group in an e -mail from 2019 as “Huffman's C4” to the group, although recordings do not indicate that Huffman controlled the group or did something illegal.

Political non -profit organizations such as Liberty Ohio are legal and common, but the public prosecutor's office of the federal prosecutor's office was used to facilitate the 60 million dollar -top system from Firstergy.

Read more: Matt Huffman played down the connections to the Dark Money Group. New records show that it paid thousands to his political team

The spokesman for the House of Representatives also said reporters that he was working on his own ethics reform laws, although he is probably only introduced in autumn.

“Often the legislators simply don't know the rules,” said Huffman, adding that he wanted to consolidate ethics monitoring to a single agency.

It is not the first time that he made this promise.

In 2023, Huffman said that he wanted to pursue a “more proactive” approach for ethics training before leaving the Senate in 2024 due to borders.

During the legislator's reform, the house would eliminate the OHIO election commission with the house in the choice of the house, a cross -party body that enforces the laws on campaign financing. Instead, his duties would be handed over to the State Secretary or the local election administrators.

Your reasons for eliminating the commission include what you consider as an increase in the disruptive symptoms. In these cases, they draw candidates and campaigns to costly, time -consuming junctions.

Both Republicans and Democrats have promoted ethics reform since the homeowner was arrested, but efforts remain.

Former Rep. Derk Merrin, a Republican and former householder in Toledo, introduced a comprehensive draft law in 2023 to tighten the disclosure rules for lobbyists, supervisory supervisory authorities and civil servants.

Its measure-house Bill 16-Hatten two hearings over two years.

“Some people are only worried about being taken as a state representative or completing their next fundraiser,” Merrin told reporters in 2023.

Democrats say that responsibility falls on the Republican majority. With limited power in the Statehouse you can suggest reforms-but you cannot survive without gop support.

MP Dani Isaacsohn, a Cincinnati Democrat, was elected after the home owner scandal. He expected him to enter a “corrected” legislator who strives to restore public trust and prevent future corruption.

“I was shocked when I arrived here to determine that nothing had been done,” said Isaacohnn. “That the culture had not changed at all. That no invoices had been passed to deal with the defects that led to House Bill 6 scandal.”

Anna Staver covers the state government and politics for Cleveland.com/the dealer.