If you can’t win on the strength of your candidate, go to the arcane book of technicalities called the Ohio Revised Code and try to disqualify your opposition. That’s the latest play out of the Montgomery County Democratic Private Club, run by Mohamed Al-Hamdani, who got away with breaking the law before he was even in office (see DPS: Special meetings are to avoid scrutiny).

Al-Hamdani filed a complaint with the board of elections with an imaginary friend, Brenda Blausser (her name is misspelled- it should be Blauser, who is a “PARTY UNC” according to her voter record) whom he calls (wrongly) a Republican.

He wants former Trotwood Mayor, Mary McDonald, (full disclosure- I’ve printed a mailer for McDonald).disqualified from her run for Montgomery County Commission against Debbie Lieberman, since he claims McDonald can’t run as a Republican because she failed to resign from her elected position as a precinct captain in the Dem Party. From his filing nonsense:

Mary McDonald is a duly elected member of the Montgomery County Democratic Party Central Committee from TR4-D, in an election on May 3, 2022. (See Exhibit 1) Because she is an elected Central Committee member, Ohio Revised Code §3513.191 is the controlling statute. As an elected office holder for which she was nominated and elected at a party primary, she must file a “Declaration of Intent” which shall: ” … (a) be filed not later than 4:00 p.m. of the 30th day before a Declaration of Candidacy and Petition is required to be filed under §3513.05 of the Ohio Revised Code;
(b) be filed with the same official with whom the person filing the Declaration of Intent is required to file a Declaration of Candidacy and Petition;
( c) indicate the political party whose nomination in the primary election the person seeks;
( d) be on a form prescribed by the Secretary of State.”
Mary McDonald has not filed a Declaration of Intent as required by the Ohio Revised Code.

MONTGOMERY COUNTY BOARD OF ELECTIONS FORMAL PROTEST RELATING TO THE CERTIFICATION OF MARY MCDONALD TO BE PLACED ON THE REPUBLICAN PRIMARY BALLOT FOR COUNTY COMMISSIONER FOR THE ELECTION ON MARCH 19, 2024

To be clear, the election isn’t on March 19, 2024- since there are no primary challengers in this race. The election is Nov 5th, and by that time, Ms. McDonald will have voted in the Republican primary, where she’ll have practically no choices anyway. This whole question of who is a member of a political party is really a joke. Need proof? Here’s a few examples:

Mary McDonald was the Mayor of Trotwood which is elected in a non-partisan election (no party labels are on the ballot, and any “primary” is merely a “thinning of the herd” because American Politics think we’re all too stupid to pick anything different than catsup or mustard in elections. You can watch a Pecha Kucha presentation I made long ago calling it “Coin flip politics”

Mary was considered a Dem because she had voted in a primary election and requested a Dem ballot. She also had been elected as a “precinct captain” in Trotwood for the Dem Party. In the last election, Yvette Page, ran against her. Yvette was also a Dem. The Dem party should be ecstatic- 2 strong dem candidates- they can’t lose. Let the people decide? Awe, Hell no.

Instead, the party went through a bunch of voting gyrations to “endorse” Page over McDonald, despite their constitution requiring them to automatically endorse incumbents. You can read more about this mess and watch my video in this post: What does “endorsed democrat” mean? And why you should ignore it.

What happened that night was that people who don’t live in Trotwood, tried to make a decision for the people of Trotwood in advance. How very undemocratic.

After being snubbed, and losing the election, McDonald did what other’s before her have done- she switched parties (or so she thought). The protectionist party, the friends and family, the monarchy, doesn’t like people who don’t do as they say. Some other Dems who’ve left the fold in recent years:

Judge Dick Skelton had the nerve to spend $250,000 of his own money to unseat Francis McGee Cromartie from the Common Pleas bench. Dick switched parties and beat the former Mayor of Dayton James H. McGee’s daughter and took his lifetime appointment to the bench where he can be a lousy judge (he’s the one that allowed Al-Hamdani to break the Sunshine Laws).

John McManus ran a hard race against State Rep Jim Butler in the old R leaning 41st Statehouse seat. McManus came the closest ever in a district that was gerrymandered strong Republican. (full disclosure- I’ve printed materials for both McManus and Butler).He had no help from the local party. He then ran for Treasurer as a Republican and beat the appointed incumbent, member of the monarchy, Russ Joseph like a rug.

Jacqueline Gaines is now on the ballot for a judgeship, after being told she couldn’t run by the party, who chose Angelina Jackson, over the insider Tony Schoen in the last race. Jacqueline is now an R and running for common pleas against Jennifer A. Petrella for the R nomination. No D’s are running.

I can’t tell you how many times Phil Plummer, who I routinely call “Phil “the torturer” Plummer on this blog, has tried to get me to run for County Commission as an R. It’s sad. If you need to know what I think of Phil and his jail- go read this post and watch the video: Cruel and unusual punishment in the Montgomery County Jail

Now, back to real issues with candidates and legalities. I identified a school board member on the Dayton Public School board who didn’t live in the district anymore. It’s a requirement. When a local Republican Huber Heights Council Member got divorced and had to move out of his house- to Beavercreek nobody seemed to raise a ruckus until way later, see: Huber Heights is another nexus of corruption These are real issues- yet, the BOE did nothing. Neither did the State AG, the local prosecutor, the list goes on. I even identified that Dr. Adil Baguirov, the DPS board member- had committed voter fraud, along with his business partner, claiming to live in a house on Maryland Ave. Nothing. (Btw- Baguirov has now changed his name to Al Bagiro probably because if you search his name, he shows up on this site too much. And, btw- he also ran for County Recorder and got beat, after I forced his resignation from the school board).

And if you want the final question of who is a dem or not a dem, in the 2022 election there was a four way primary to run against Mike Turner for Congress. The results had me beating the other three to be the party choice. The Montgomery County Democratic Party refused to acknowledge my win, my candidacy or grant me access to the party databases, fundraising, participation on the slate cards, or the discounted postage available to the political parties.

This party is as bad as Trump- claiming elections don’t matter. Except when their candidate, queen of the monarchy, Debbie Lieberman is facing a real challenger.

And, Debbie has some baggage. I doubt you’ll read all 6000+ words of this investigation (When the wrong answer and no response spells corruption and coverup) which showed how Debbie’s assistant, John Theobald, steered a $200K no-bid county health department contract and a Montgomery County Board of Elections $25K contract- no bid to The Wilderness Agency. The agency that did Lieberman’s campaign work- and the one that Theobald is now trying to claim 51% ownership of so they can be qualified as a Service Disabled Veteran Owned Business. It took Debbie over 7 months to quietly ease Theobald out of his cushy government job as her bat boy. Despite ample evidence, no investigation was made of Theobald or this contract steering.

But, that’s how we roll in Montgomery County. Where protecting the status quo is job 1. The idea of letting voters decide who wins elections here is still blasphemy when it comes to the two parties. Our unwritten rules about never challenging judges, about how we’ve divvied up the prosecutors office and the sheriff’s office to each party are just standard operating procedure.

Let’s also be clear, the Montgomery County Democratic Party is a very small group of people, many of whom got 5 signatures and ran unopposed to be precinct captains. The party can’t fill all the seats (see how many “Vacant” positions there are) and a very small subset actually show up. The ones guaranteed to show up- are either related to, or work for elected officials. Patronage jobs guarantee the people in power- have power. This is not a welcoming or friendly to strangers group (unlike the excellent and friendly South Dayton Democratic Club).

What is the purpose of even having primaries, if a small group of people think they should select who is on the ballot or not on the ballot? This isn’t supposed to be the Crips and the Bloods- it’s supposed to be the bedrock of a democracy.

In the end, this will be much ado about nothing. The local BOE will split 2-2 and it will go to the Secretary of State- and he’ll rule to allow Mary McDonald on the ballot. And, Al-Hamdani and Debbie Lieberman will be sitting there together, crying in their beers on election night when each of them gets beat by former Dems who they helped drive out of their own party.