OHIO POLITICS Trakas quits as GOP candidate

The former statewide candidate says he quit because he's 'a team player.'
By DAVID SKOLNICK
VINDICATOR POLITICS WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- Less than a month ago, the Republican primary race for secretary of state featured three candidates. That number is now down to one.
The last man standing is Greg Hartmann of Cincinnati, the Hamilton County clerk of courts, running statewide for the first time.
State Rep. Jim Trakas of Independence announced Friday he quit the race and is becoming general chairman of Hartmann's campaign. Franklin County Recorder Robert G. Montgomery officially withdrew Feb. 28 as a secretary of state candidate.
Trakas, a former Cuyahoga County GOP chairman, said Ohio Republican leaders urged him to quit the race during the past few weeks.
"It would be an expensive primary that would squander financial resources best used to win in November," Trakas said. "The party leadership asked me to step aside for someone better. I'm a team player, and I'll help [Hartmann] in Northeast Ohio."
Hartmann will face Democrat Jennifer L. Brunner of Columbus in the November general election for the secretary of state seat. Brunner resigned as a Franklin County Common Pleas Court judge last year to run for this seat.
Over the years, Ohio Republican Chairman Robert Bennett has persuaded candidates to get out of contested GOP statewide primaries focusing on the cost of the races. This was one of those cases, Trakas said.
Other races
But clearing the field for governor and attorney general is probably not going to happen, said John McClelland, a state Republican Party spokesman.
On Friday, Republican state party central committee members officially endorsed Auditor Betty Montgomery of Perrysburg over state Sen. Timothy Grendell of Chesterland in the attorney general's race. Montgomery served eight years as attorney general.
Despite Montgomery's endorsement -- an atypical decision by Ohio Republicans in a race without an incumbent -- as well as her large campaign war chest, Grendell said he won't withdraw.
The party has no intention of making an endorsement in the gubernatorial race between Blackwell, of Cincinnati, and Attorney General Jim Petro of Columbus, McClelland said.
Also Friday, U.S. Rep. Ted Strickland of Lisbon, considered the leading Democrat in the gubernatorial race, began airing his first television commercials statewide.
The biographical commercial focuses on Strickland's upbringing and discusses his character and values, said Jess Goode, his campaign spokesman.
The introductory commercial is similar to the ones Strickland aired in 2002 when a statewide redistricting plan added counties, including Mahoning and Columbiana, to his congressional district, Goode added.
skolnick@vindy.com