Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine Needs to ‘Grow a Pair’ and Stand Up to Trump

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With all due respect to the Buckeye State, the co-hosts of The New Abnormal think its elected officials could do with a little more backbone.

Gov. Mike DeWine and Rob Rue, the mayor of Springfield, both demonstrated their lack of spine this week, suggesting only in the mildest terms that Donald Trump might want to reconsider a promised visit to the city after the former president made the baseless claim during last week’s presidential debate that its Haitian residents were kidnapping and eating people’s pets.

The “unbelievable slander” by Trump and his cronies, including running mate JD Vance, has “led to numerous bomb threats and stuff like that—to the point where schools had to be closed and all sorts of things, all of which were extremely predictable,” co-host Andy Levy says. “As proof of that, I offer the fact that we predicted them.”

Rue nevertheless said at a recent press conference only that Trump’s visit would strain Springfield’s already exhausted security resources. DeWine added at the same event that, though he hoped Trump would stop spreading hateful misinformation, it wasn’t his place to correct him.

“Like at some point… you have to fucking grow a pair—a pair of ovaries, a backbone, something,” says co-host Danielle Moodie. “Something that lets the people know in your town that you actually give a damn about them and their safety.”

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Then, Radley Balko, an investigative journalist who writes the newsletter The Watch, joins the pod to talk about Trump’s plan to forcibly eject between 15 and 20 million immigrants should he be re-elected in November.

“They’re going to deport a lot of people who are either legal residents or are U.S. citizens,” Balko says. “You also can’t really deport that many people in any sort of way that is judicious or fair or affords any sort of due process… It’s going to be based on what they look like. So: People who aren’t white, basically.”

Plus! A conversation with David Rothkopf, CEO of the DSR Network and Daily Beast columnist, who kicks it off with a discussion on his latest piece, “The Worst Political Violence of 2024 May Lie Ahead—Thanks to Trump.” Cheery stuff!

Listen to this full episode of The New Abnormal on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon and Stitcher.