Ohio Lt. Gov. Jon Husted won’t say whether he was aware of a $1 million donation in 2017 to a political group that supported his gubernatorial bid. Instead, his office only reiterates that the group was not affiliated with the Husted campaign.
The massive donation came from Akron-based FirstEnergy, which collected more than $60 million in kickbacks over the next two years in exchange for $1.3 billion in financial aid to ratepayers – a bill that Gov. Mike DeWine signed into law just hours after its adoption.
The donation was discovered among a treasure trove of documents a group of news organizations including Capital Journal The Ohio Office of Consumer Counsel was contacted.
As Energy News Network and Floodlight reported last week, the documents also included emails showing that Husted lobbied DeWine to support aid. The lobbying came just 11 days after Husted abandoned his bid for governor and joined DeWine on December 1, 2017.
“Jon Husted called me to say he was meeting with DeWine about our case to try to accommodate him to help keep the plant open,” reads a December 12, 2017 email from a FirstEnergy lobbyist, Joel Bailey.
These plants were money-losing nuclear and coal plants that FirstEnergy wanted to bail out and then spin off.
In 2021, FirstEnergy signed a deferred prosecution agreement in which he admitted to paying bribes to elect a amiable Republican majority to the House of Representatives, which would elect a amiable speaker who would pass and protect corrupt aid.
The company also admitted paying a $4.3 million bribe to Sam Randazzo, DeWine’s pick to chair the Ohio Public Service Commission, who died by suicide last week. The state indictment alleged that FirstEnergy executives arranged the bribe with Randazzo that same night they discussed his suitability as a regulator at dinner with Governor-elect DeWine and Lieutenant Governor-elect Husted on December 18, 2018
A scandal arose put former House Speaker Larry Householder, R-Glenford, in federal prison for 20 yearsand former Ohio Republican Party Chairman Matt Borges for five years. Two more pleaded guilty and are awaiting sentencing. Another defendant, lobbyist Neil Clark, also died by suicide — wearing a T-shirt that read “DeWine for Governor.”.
DeWine and Husted have not been charged in the case and have vehemently denied wrongdoing.
However, they did not discuss it publicly just what they knew about Randazzo’s longstanding relationship with FirstEnergyor what they knew about the torrent of dark money pouring from FirstEnergy into Capitol Square to donate and protect the bailout. They also did not discuss what senior administration officials with close ties to FirstEnergy may have known.
Among the documents turned over after FirstEnergy’s settlement with federal prosecutors was a spreadsheet listing 501(c)(4) political donations the company made in 2017.
Such donations are called “dark money” because recipients do not have to reveal their sources. By law, dark money donations cannot go directly to candidates, but to them they can go to groups that support them, but should not coordinate directly with them.
The FirstEnergy spreadsheet is only now becoming public as the FBI investigated the scandal and the U.S. Department of Justice filed an indictment. During the 2019 relief bill battle, there were suspicions that FirstEnergy was financing the effort, but the press and public had no way of knowing because the money flowed through dark money groups – without which U.S. Attorney David DeVillers said there would have been a conspiracy. impossible.
Now that FirstEnergy’s 2017 donation to the Husted-affiliated group is known, fresh questions arise.
Special interests sometimes piously claim that they spend millions on politics solely in the interest of “good government.” But as Householder’s lengthy trial showed last year, corporate political donations are often – if not usually – intended to buy influence with members of government.
For this to happen, the government official would have to know that a special interest had occurred on his behalf. However, Husted – who is considering a run for governor in 2026 – would not say whether he was aware that FirstEnergy in 2017 donated $1 million to a group supporting his earlier candidacy.
His spokeswoman, Hayley Carducci, was asked whether Husted knew about the contribution and, if so, when he learned about it. She was also asked whether Husted convinced DeWine to support the FirstEnergy rescue; what Husted knew about Randazzo’s ties to FirstEnergy when he was chosen to regulate the company; and whether he knew FirstEnergy was flooding Cap Square with dark money in an attempt to pass and keep the bailout.
In an email, Carducci repeated her earlier statement: “The Husted Campaign never received this donation and is not affiliated with any of these groups.”
She added, “As for the remaining questions, we will not comment.”
