Ohio Secretary of State candidate in VW

DAVE MOSIER/independent editor

State Senator Frank LaRose, a candidate for Ohio Secretary of State, was in Van Wert on Friday to talk to local Republicans at a luncheon held at Willow Bend Country Club.

LaRose, an Eagle Scout as a boy and a former Special Forces Green Beret in the United States Army who served in Iraq and Kosovo, among others, and is a graduate of The Ohio State University with a business degree, talked about his earlier life and his reasons for running for Secretary of State.

LaRose, an Akron area native, said his time in the Boy Scouts as a youngster also inspired his wish to serve in the military, because his scoutmaster, a World War II veterans, would talk about his war experiences while gathering around the campfire.

After 10 years in the military, LaRose decided to run for elected office after first looking at the private sector, and was elected to the Ohio Senate in a district where most elected officials were Democrats.

That interest in politics came as a non-traditional student at Ohio State, when he started getting involved in Republican politics.

“I had this passion for the causes that we believe in, for limited government, for free markets, for the power of free individuals to start a business and grow it and not be penalized by some bureaucrat for doing so,” he said.

LaRose said he has gotten a reputation as the “election guru” of the Senate, which came about after current Secretary of State John Husted, who is running for governor, asked him, as the only military veteran in the Senate, to look at improving Ohio’s military voter registration process.

Noting his support for President Trump, LaRose added one reason he is running for Secretary of State is so Democrats won’t be able to control the 2020 election and the redistricting process in 2021.

“They call themselves Fair Districts for Ohio, but don’t be fooled, they’re all about Democrat-leaning districts for Ohio,” LaRose said. “I’m the one standing in the way of keeping them from doing that.”

The state senator also said he remembered a question he had to answer when applying for a secret security clearance in the military: “have you ever contemplated overthrowing the government.”

LaRose said that, while he knew the answer the military was looking for, he said the question got him thinking, and is, in some respects, why he is running for Secretary of State. The state senator said he realized that overthrowing the government is just what Americans do every time they elect new people to office.

“That’s the result of overthrowing the government peacefully, using ballots instead of bullets,” LaRose said, adding: “That’s worth fighting for, that’s worth defending.”

Also speaking at the luncheon was Judge William Zimmerman, who was elected last November to a six-year term on the Ohio Third District Court of Appeals.

Zimmerman, a Sidney resident and former Shelby County Probate-Juvenile Court judge, got a laugh when he talked about the differences between being a juvenile court judge and an appellate court judge, noting that he went from “herding cats” in juvenile court to being the “head librarian” at the court of appeals.

“It’s really different,” Judge Zimmerman noted.

The judge talked about the influence of technology on the judicial process in the 21st century, with cell phone tracking, genetics, drones and personal privacy, brain scans, and other technology all legal issues courts have to deal with.

“In the 21st century, is all a new playing field,” he told local Republicans.

While commending the Supreme Court of Ohio for holding education seminars on technical and other legal issues, Judge Zimmerman said judges also have a responsibility to deal with the changes.

“We can’t sit on our hands, judges, lawyers, law enforcement, we have to evolve with it,” he concluded.