Politics

A Democratic state lawmaker is announcing plans to challenge Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel in 2014.

Third-term state Rep. Connie Pillich, of suburban Cincinnati, said Monday she'll focus her campaign on fighting for working families, fellow small business owners and senior citizens.

Pillich has been a lawyer, businesswoman and captain in the U.S. Air Force.

Without using his name, she criticized Mandel for absenteeism from his state position during a failed run for the U.S. Senate last year and for not wanting the job.

Reaction to the IRS targeting several conservative groups is dividing some Ohio conservatives.

Tom Zawitowski is a Tea Party activist in Portgage County and was among those wrongly investigated by the IRS. The Ohio Republican Party this week sent out a email asking supporters to donate money to help fight the IRS. Speaking on All Sides with Ann Fisher today, Zawitowski called the email, “an example of how unconnected the Ohio Republican Party is with their base.”

The Chief Justice of the Ohio Supreme Court has a plan that she thinks will reform the process of electing justices. Justice Maureen O’Connor says she’d like to keep party affiliation of judges off the ballot in primary and general elections. And she wants Ohio to start placing judicial races at the top of the ticket, hoping that doing so will lead to more voter participation in those races. O’Connor also wonders whether it might be best to move Judicial races to odd numbered years so they get more attention from voters.