Traficant withdraws from event

Dayton Daily News

SPRINGBORO

James Traficant, the former Ohio congressman from Poland, dropped out of a Springboro Tea Party rally scheduled for Saturday at North Park, his manager said Friday.

Traficant, one of the event’s headliners, planned to join the rally via a live feed from his Cleveland radio show, according to George Saadi, his manager and talent agent.

Traficant, whose 17 years in Congress were curtailed by a seven-year term in federal prison for corruption, decided to withdraw because of a posting on the Springboro Tea Party’s Twitter site, Saadi said.

Earlier this week, Chris Koch, a Republican candidate for Warren County commissioner, Linda Oda, a Republican candidate for Warren County Auditor, and Robert Owens, Constitution Party of Ohio candidate for Ohio attorney general, joined State Sen. Shannon Jones, R-Springboro, and Sen. Jon Husted, R-Kettering, a candidate for Ohio secretary of state in withdrawing from the rally.

Like Jones, Koch, Oda and Owen said they decided to withdraw from the rally because of a posting on a Twitter site maintained by Sonny Thomas, founder of the Springboro group. The posting made derogatory and violent comments toward Hispanics.

“I have withdrawn as a speaker at the April 17th Tax Day Rally. Racially insensitive remarks cannot be tolerated,” Koch said in an e-mail on Thursday.

In a press release, Owens said, “I fully support the Tea Party movement and the great patriots and leaders who want to restore our American system, but we must remember that there are legal and Constitutional ways to resolve national and state problems including illegal immigration. Regrettably, the organizer’s comment was totally out of bounds.”