CLEVELAND – Josh Mandel, a Republican candidate for the Senate in Ohio, is waging an unadulterated campaign to pull his party further to the right, in part by destroying the state’s Republican governor.
The day after the governors of Mississippi and Texas withdrew mask mandates and other guidelines to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, Mandel on Wednesday asked Ohio Governor Mike DeWine to do the same.
“I think Mike DeWine is an establishment politician who accepted peer pressure and the collective thinking of the liberal media and other weak governors across the country when he should have been a leader,” said Mandel, a former state treasurer with two mandates. in an interview.
Mandel’s comments escalate his attempt to position himself as the Republican most in sync with former President Donald Trump in the race to succeed Republican Sen. Rob Portman, who will not seek another term next year.
Mandel amplified the lie that the election was stolen from Trump. He relentlessly attacked an opponent, former Ohio Republican Party president Jane Timken, for the good things she said about a Republican House member who voted for Trump’s impeachment. And since appearing last week at the CPAC conference for conservative activists in Florida, Mandel has labeled DeWine – whose career in Republican politics dates back to 1977, when Mandel was born – with words like “mole” and “RINO”, which means Republican in Nome only.
In another sign that he wants to open his own far-right strip in a primary campaign that could soon be packed with other pro-Trump conservatives, Mandel said on Wednesday that the masks are not effective against the coronavirus.
“There is no science or mathematics to show that this has been useful,” he said, neglecting data and guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other experts who confirm that properly covering your mouth and nose helps prevent the spread of viral particles. .
“No,” Mandel replied when asked if he would continue to wear a mask in public if DeWine suspended his term. “We need to stop the mask’s mandates immediately. And I’m going to stop wearing a mask. I have the freedom to make decisions based on what is best for me and my family. And that went beyond the limits.”
A DeWine spokesman, Dan Tierney, said it was too early to ease all mandates and restrictions. He did not respond to Mandel’s attacks on DeWine.
“We still have a pandemic. We still don’t have collective immunity,” said Tierney. “The good news is that we are getting a bigger supply” of vaccines and “there is light at the end of the tunnel”.
Mandel’s most recent moves illustrate how he is trying to define a Trumpian tone and rules of engagement in the early stages of the primaries campaign. Timken, the former state party president, has been a close ally of Trump, but early efforts on his behalf to secure Trump’s endorsement have been unsuccessful. After days of pressure from Mandel on Twitter, Timken this week retreated of his praise for Congressman Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio, one of 10 Republicans who voted for Trump’s impeachment in January.
Timken is also an ally of DeWine. As chairman of the state party, she discouraged calls for a primary challenge that grew out of conservative frustrations – which Mandel is using the aggressive pulpit of his Senate campaign to expose – with DeWine’s continued insistence on masks and other social detachment guidelines.
DeWine’s relatively cautious approach to the pandemic, especially compared to the approaches of other Republican governors, earned him bipartisan praise at the start of the crisis. A Baldwin Wallace University survey of likely voters last fall found that nearly 72 percent of respondents approved of how DeWine was dealing with the pandemic.
“Ohio pioneered and fared better than many other states in combating the pandemic,” said Timken in an e-mailed statement, beginning with an implicit compliment to DeWine. “With the reduction in Covid-19 cases, the increased availability of vaccines and the arrival of spring, now is the time to fully reopen Ohio’s economy and ensure that all children can attend school in person.”
Timken, unlike Mandel, said that “I will continue to wear a mask personally when I think it is appropriate, but that is a personal choice that every citizen of Ohio should be free to make, which is why we should also end the mandates of government mask “.
Another important factor in deciphering Mandel’s anti-DeWine message is who he can face in the general election if he wins the nomination.
Dr. Amy Acton, who was DeWine’s first health director and became a household name in Ohio last year during televised briefings on the state’s pandemic response, is considering running for Democrat. Each time Mandel criticizes DeWine, he blows up Acton by name too. Mandel said on Wednesday that he would “appreciate” the opportunity to run against her because “she was a total failure”.
A spokesman for Acton declined to comment on Wednesday.