If Mike DeWine Surprised You By Vetoing the Bill Protecting Kids from the Transradical Agenda, Then You’ve Been Too Busy Guzzling Kool-Aid and Ignoring His Moderate Record Over the Last Two Decades

Where Was Jon Husted’s “Courage” Over the Last Five Years?

The big news yesterday was that Ohio Governor Mike DeWine vetoed House Bill 68 (HB68) that would have stopped the transradical industry from continuing its barbaric practices of performing sex-change surgeries on children and giving kids puberty blockers that alter their natural growth processes, as well as prohibiting biological boys/men from competing against girls/women in sports. This outcome wasn’t a surprise to me, but, based on the Right's reaction on X, it did surprise many people. The deal was sealed the moment Lieutenant Governor Jon Husted issued this last minute tweet two days ago telegraphing his opposition to what DeWine was going to do yesterday:

I’ve been asked my opinion on HB 68. I support it for two main reasons: Men should not compete in women’s sports. Permanent medical decisions concerning gender should not be made when you are a child. I hope the SAFE Act will become law in Ohio.

Keep in mind, the core elements in HB68 have been kicking around the Ohio General Assembly during the entire DeWine-Husted Administration’s five years in office, yet Husted said nary a word on the issue until less than eighteen hours before DeWine issued his veto. That, my friends, is the opposite of courage and screams political expediency knowing that, along with the baggage from their severe pandemic shutdown of Ohio, Husted did not want an HB68 veto being hung around his neck come 2026 during his run for Ohio governor. Husted is a political coward who has always made every decision based on one single question: will doing X hurt or help my political career? He went with left-wing Amy Acton’s views on the pandemic based on grossly miscalculating how hated shutdowns would become on the Right. He couldn’t afford to do it again on HB68.

When it comes to the core elements of HB68, the only three facts you need to know about—and should have driven DeWine—are these:

• The suicide rate for kids suffering from gender dysphoria who were put under the knife by their parents is HIGHER than the suicide rate for the confused kids who don’t get the life alternating and irreversible surgeries;

• The medical and pharmaceutical industry have NO IDEA what the long-term effects will be on the kids administered puberty blockers; and

• In every case we know of in the world, biological boys/men dominate sporting events when they face girls/women—at times dangerously so.

Even progressive countries in Europe are curtailing transradical treatments on children. Ignore all the pablum from the Left, transradicals, the Hospital Industrial Complex, and the media about what is best for the kids, supplanting parental choice, and the like. In no other area of life do we allow “medical treatment” that results in MORE kids dying and that hasn’t been based on long-term testing. Similarly, in no other sporting arena do we allow competitors to compete with an unfair advantage, especially when no amount of training can level the playing field. As the U15 FC Dallas boys’ team unequivocally showed when it beat the U.S. Women’s National Soccer team 5-2, boys/men simply possess significant biological advantages over girls/women when it comes to physical sports.

The bottom line is DeWine’s HB68 veto and Husted’s far-too-late tweet distancing himself from that veto are about far more than stopping the transradical agenda. The DeWine veto and Husted tweet represent a defining moment for Ohioans, especially for the Right. For far too long Ohio Republicans have guzzled the Kool-aid when it came to statewide elected officials and ignored people like me who consistently issued warning-after-warning about where those statewide elected officials were taking Ohio, or, more accurately, where they were NOT taking Ohio, which was to the top of the rankings on issue-after-issue. The Taft-Kasich-DeWine-Husted quad have never put forth a bold colors agenda that would have fundamentally altered the trajectory of mediocrity in which Ohio has been mired. Here are four core issues they refused to support:

• Making Ohio a right-to-work state;

• Eliminating the state income tax;

• Building a world-class airport in the Greater Columbus Area; and

• Freeze or cut state spending.

Conversely, here are four actions they've taken:

• Strengthened the power of Big Labor in Ohio;

• Expanded Medicaid under ObamaCare thereby swallowing 50% of the state budget;

• Created JobsOhio to pick winners and losers in the government subsidy business, which it has failed at miserably for over a decade despite spending billions; and

• Refused to make Ohio a true universal school choice state in which 100% of state funds follow the kid wherever that kid decides to go.

Make no mistake. The four issues the quad has refused to support are the only policy changes that could rocket Ohio from the bottom of the pack to the top. I’m being genuinely serious when I ask: can you name one issue in which there has been substantial improvement in Ohio since DeWine and Husted were sworn in five years ago? Taxes? Minor reductions. State spending? Ohio hit a record last year with massive increases projected over the next two years. Regulations? Still among America’s highest. School choice? No where near universal. Jobs? Less than 100,000 added in five years (so on average 20,000 per year as Florida added nearly 192,000 yearly, or almost ten times as many jobs every single damn year). Government dependency? Higher today than it was in January 2017. Local government taxes? More burdensome than ever. Protecting the unborn? Ohio now has one of the most radical laws in America.

Unlike the Quad, I did put forth a bold colors agenda for Ohio. Unfortunately, I didn’t have $1 billion fortune like Vivek Ramaswamy or a buddy like Peter Thiel to put $10 million in a PAC to promote me and get me on Fox News, so too few Ohioans saw or heard about that agenda because if you aren’t on Fox News, you just don’t matter. The ones who did were too distracted by the litany of other issues in front of them like the August Special Election, the November election, the “Blue 22” outrage, the State Central Committee election, the U.S. Senate race, and the 2024 POTUS race to give it much attention. As I’ve said before, other than the 2024 POTUS election, not one of those elections will impact their lives more than who becomes governor of Ohio in January 2027, as that person will determine whether Ohio becomes a great state once again based on enacting a bold colors agenda, or if it will remain a dead state walking destined to remain in the back of the pack.

DeWine’s latest squishy move shouldn’t have surprised you. If it did, get your head out of your derriere, as he’s showed us who he is for two decades. If you want a political coward who spent five years saying and doing nothing to protect confused kids and girls in sports and who finally opened his mealy mouth at the last minute knowing that his political career likely couldn’t take another hit, then Husted is your guy for 2026. Just don’t insult the rest of us by claiming Husted will somehow be something he simply isn’t and point to his last minute tweet on HB68 as proof. DeWine and Husted should each get a chapter in the book, “Profiles in Cowardice,” with their acts and omissions regarding HB68 featured as prime evidence of that cowardice.