Ohio Rep. Ron Ferguson (R-Wintersville) has joined the campaign against Rep. Sara Carruthers (R-Hamilton), by publicly charging that her vote to support a Republican Jason Stephens (R-Kitts Hill) for speaker of the House cost the Ohio GOP its top three legislative priorities.
Carruthers said Ferguson was attacking her because “he wants to be speaker.”
“I don’t support him, so he is attacking a fellow Republican in a desperate and pathetic effort for personal power,” Carruthers said, adding that Ferguson helped direct “tens of thousands of dollars of dark money attacks” on her and her children.
Rev. Diane Mullins, also of Hamilton, is challenging Carruthers in the Republican primary March 19 for the seat she has held since 2019. The Butler County GOP has endorsed Mullins’ challenge.
In January 2023, Carruthers, along with 22 other Republicans voted in favor of Rep. Stephens. According to The Columbus Dispatch, Rep. Derek Merrin (R-Monclova Twp.) won the support of Republicans to lead the 135th General Assembly at first, but Stephens ended up winning instead.
The Democrats said that they believed Stephens would work with them to get bipartisan maps, which would implement the new school funding formula to support workers and infrastructure.
Ferguson said the Ohio Republican Party no longer trusts Carruthers because of her actions.
“Representative Carruthers was censured by the Ohio Republican Party,” Ferguson said. “The reason why that happened was because she broke her word to her colleagues, me being one of them, to support one person for speaker of the House, that being Derek Merrin. Instead, she voted with all 32 Democrats for a different candidate, Jason Stevens.”
This affected the state because they passed the least amount of legislation in 2023 since at least 1955, Ferguson said.
He said that because Carruthers supported Stephens, he recognizes her to speak on the floor of the House of Representatives, but the Republican legislators who did not support him are punished by not being recognized to speak.
“So a very few people who broke their words, Sara Carruthers being among them, are the only ones willing or able to speak on the floor of the house,” Ferguson said. “They aren’t speaking on behalf of the Ohio Republican Party because that’s who they got censured by.”
Ferguson said there were three things that didn’t get accomplished because of Carruthers.
“We did not get rid of the state income tax, which was a major priority of Republicans,” Ferguson said. “We did not pass universal school choice, which is a major goal of Republicans, and we did not pass the Second Amendment Preservation Act, which was another major goal of Republicans. So we did not accomplish those three things and had she simply honored her word, we would have.”
Carruthers said she wants to make voters aware of Ferguson’s character before voting.
“Voters should know what an unscrupulous and slimy individual he is and how he represents everything they hate about politicians,” Carruthers said.
