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Financial data reveal political peculiarity
YOUNGSTOWN
Only a few weeks before her defeat, state Rep. Linda Bolon, one of the most powerful Democrats in the Ohio House, was giving money to her party’s caucus and getting very little back.
Her post-general election campaign-finance report for the time between Oct. 14 and Dec. 3, filed Friday, shows Bolon, of Columbiana, D-1st, gave a $10,000 contribution Oct. 22 to the Ohio House Democratic Caucus.
That was on top of the $100,000 she gave the caucus June 10.
The contributions to the caucus are designed to help Democratic House members and candidates in tight races.
But in return for all her contributions after the May primary, all Bolon received from the caucus was $1,612 worth of telephone calls by caucus staffers and volunteers to voters on her behalf.
It turned out that Bolon, assistant minority whip, the No. 4 position in House leadership, lost the Nov. 2 election to Republican Craig Newbold of Columbiana by about 5 percentage points.
In comparison, Newbold received $33,872 worth of printing and mailing of campaign literature during the final weeks of the race from the Ohio Republican State and Central Executive Committee.
Also, between July and September, that GOP committee and the Ohio House Republican Organizational Committee contributed nearly $50,000 to Newbold’s campaign.
Newbold gave more than $50,000 to his campaign.
Between June 5 and Dec. 3, Newbold raised about $130,000 for his campaign compared with about $100,000 for Bolon. Bolon was able to make that $100,000 contribution June 10 because she had $105,355 in her campaign account before June 5.
Campaign-finance reports show that in every state legislative race in the Mahoning Valley, the candidate with the most money won the election by comfortable margins.
In each case, that winner was the incumbent Democrat. The lone exception was Sean J. O’Brien, a Democrat running in the open 65th District seat held for years by Democrats.