It is with a sad heart that I write this today, part sad, part angry, honestly. Large numbers of people have written to me on both the energy mandates and the Heartbeat Bill. As you likely heard, Governor Kasich vetoed several pieces of legislation, including the Heartbeat Bill and energy mandates legislation.

HB 554 would have gotten rid of energy mandates that force energy producers to buy energy from sources that are not as efficient, thereby raising the costs to business and ordinary folks who simply need to heat their homes. With the election of Donald Trump, the insane energy policy coming out of Obama’s federal government will most likely change. Now, Ohioans will be trapped in government-forced mandates that will raise prices for all, and make Ohio less competitive and more expensive for the average citizen.

Also, the governor vetoed the Heartbeat Bill, HB 493, which simply states, if you can detect a heartbeat, you cannot kill the innocent human life in the womb through abortion. This bill would save the lives of over 20,000 babies, and spare entire families from the pain and suffering inflicted by abortion. Worse, Ohio Right to Life actually called for the governor to veto this bill. They argued that the Heartbeat Bill would not hold up in the courts.

If anyone was paying attention, the Obama and Clinton courts were soundly defeated in Ohio by the election of Donald Trump. The people of Ohio were quite clear that they wanted a new direction, new government and new courts. I would also add that we should not subscribe to judicial tyranny, but to the law of nature. Sometimes you do what is right by God, no matter who or what court is standing in your way. Our Founding Fathers understood the laws of nature, which is why they emphasized the importance of nature’s law in the very first paragraph of the Declaration of Independence, with this line: “the laws of nature and of nature’s God.”

We have the votes to override the governor in the House and Senate. However, I was told 11 representatives are either unwilling or unable to come back to Columbus to take this vote. We have all known for weeks that there was the potential for overrides. Many representatives and I adjusted our holiday schedules so that we were available to come back into town on the last week of this year to vote. That is what the voters are paying us to do! Even if you are coming back to vote no, the voters of Ohio deserve to see how you will vote on such pressing and urgent matters, not hide behind alleged scheduling conflicts.

As a business and marketing person, I was trained to avoid a technique called “bait and switch” at all costs. This is a concept where a company tells potential customers what the product will do for them, then when they purchase the product, it does not deliver on the promises the company has made. The company baits them into believing something, and then the public comes to find the product does not do what the company said it would do. The same applies to government and politicians.

I feel some in the Ohio Republican Party are doing just this. The party platform is clear. We are not a party that stands for mandates in the business and private sector. We are supposed to be a party that stands for free markets and letting consumers and markets decide. We are also supposed to be the party of family and life. But it appears what some politicians say they will do versus what they will actually do are two very different things.

Vast numbers of people have written to me on both of these issues, and all I can say is that I apologize. I would have been happy to come back to Columbus to vote YES on free markets and eliminate mandates, and to vote YES for babies and families. But that is not going to happen, because of a “Republican” governor and a “Republican super majority” in the Ohio House that refuses to act and do what they told the voters of Ohio they would do as representatives. That to me is bait and switch. That to me is tragic for the lives that will be lost. To me it is lying to the voters of Ohio. I will continue to take a stand and support the issues you elected me to support.