Season of Ohio Republican Dirty Tricks Begins

Oh, those wiley Republicans. Today's front page of the Dispatch describes the Ohio Republican Party's latest batch of dirty tricks.

Mysterious, huge public records requests that a Stow woman made to Gov. Ted Strickland and other Democratic statewide officeholders were the work of the Ohio Republican Party.

Jennifer Thrasher, a University of Akron graduate student, made the requests while working as a summer intern at the party's headquarters, a top Republican official acknowledged Wednesday.

The requests seek hundreds of thousands of records - six months' worth of e-mail messages to and from dozens of officials in each agency - and are causing headaches for Strickland, Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner and Attorney General Marc Dann.

Make no mistake, I've been critical of the Governor for the cause of these records requests...the theft of critical security data from an intern. That said, all of this doesn't have much to do with that theft, but more to do with partisan politics.

Most people hooked into the party knew about Thrasher's work as a puppet for the GOP for quite a while. I recall hearing about her involvement during mid summer (I think). Fearing political repurcussions, Republican leaders chose to have a third party...a college student...make these requests rather than have any ill will fall back to the party.

And the point of all of these massive records requests?

The governor complained about broad records requests in an interview last week and said he suspected there might be "political motivations" behind Thrasher's request because Auditor Mary Taylor, the only Republican statewide officeholder, did not receive one.

"We can find ourselves just absolutely bogged down in doing nothing but trying to respond to these requests, but we are trying to respond to them as best we can," Strickland said.

Thrasher's requests did not mention her affiliation with the Republican Party or her reason for asking for the records, and Ohio law does not require her to do so.

Also the Governor's office and Brunner are seeking to recoup partial costs for this records request from Thrasher.

Lawyers for Strickland and Brunner have spoken with Thrasher about her request and in letters asked her to make an advance payment for the minimum cost of printing e-mail messages so that they could be reviewed and redacted. Strickland's office wants $3,680. Brunner wants $1,400.

David Marburger, counsel to the Ohio Newspaper Association's Coalition for Open Government, said state law does not allow officials to charge people for the costs of printing records as part of a redaction process.

Lawyers for the governor and secretary of state said they are allowed to recover that cost.

Every time I've ever put in a public records request I've had to state how much I'm willing to pay for my request if costs need to be recouped. Both the federal government, as well as the state, does this. From my understanding most branches of the government have policies in place which waive costs on these record requests for relatively small requests and for media. The problem with Thrashers request in the first place is that it's meant to tie up state government. It's a a diversion tactic. Thrasher falls into neither of the exceptions for fee waivers and she's doing this with the guidance of Bob Bennett, so naturally our officeholders are seeking to get costs back for the amount of copying they're doing. 

My only question is how Thrasher plans on paying for all this. I'm sure a lowly graduate student doesn't have $5,000 to blow on a records request. I sure know that I don't.  Be interesting to see if the Ohio GOP cuts her a check.

Kicked from office, unable to govern, no real scandals occuring (like bathroom sex or Tom Noe) Republicans are resorting to their original obstructionist games to cause a stir.

Pretty lame really.