From the Seth Morgan for Auditor campaign:

Auditor of State candidate Seth Morgan, CPA was endorsed by both the Scioto County Republican Party and the Mansfield North Central Tea Party on Tuesday, March 9.

“Seth Morgan clearly is the peoples’ candidate for Auditor of State,” said Rob Scott, Friends of Seth Morgan Communications Director. “Not only is he garnering support of county Republican parties across Ohio, but also is supported by the Tea Party movement. Ohio Republican Chairman Kevin DeWine said just this week what an integral role the tea party movement will play in this year’s election.”

Additionally, the Knox County Republican Party , which neighbors Delaware County, chose not to endorse either candidate in the Auditor of State’s race but to allow the voters in Knox County make their endorsement on May 4.

Team Morgan is really racking up the county endorsements.

I’m waiting for the Yost’s campaign announcement of their endorsement from Belmont County. Their Chairman, Kent Moore, is not exactly a Morgan fan.

So what’s David Pepper up to lately, other than spending his allowance from his parents?

This morning, the Seth Morgan for Ohio Auditor campaign sent out a press release noting they were endorsed by Family First PAC:

Auditor of State candidate Seth Morgan, CPA was endorsed by Family First PAC for Auditor of State.

“Family First is honored to endorse Representative Seth Morgan CPA for Auditor of State. Seth Morgan has a proven record on the issues of limited government, school choice, pro-life, the sanctity of marriage, and responsible spending and taxation,” said Lori Viars, Executive Director of Family First.

“Seth has proven himself as a solid fiscal conservative and social conservative, as well as a man of integrity. With his credentials and experience as a CPA, Ohioans could not ask for a more qualified watchdog for our tax dollars,” Viars said.

Family First is a conservative political action committee serving Ohio and Northern Kentucky. More info can be found at www.familyfirstpac.org.

In other news, I’m quite concerned that Dave Yost’s campaign spokesman is Matt Borges. He recently worked on the John McCain campaign for President and has worked with Congressman John Boehner, but he is most famous for his role in the scandals that took place in the office of former Ohio Treasurer Joe Deters (Deters is now the Hamilton Count Prosecutor).

I don’t point this out, Seth Morgan and David Pepper would be more than happy to.

This is from The Cincinnati Enquirer (July 28, 2004):

COLUMBUS – Two top associates of state Treasurer Joseph Deters pleaded guilty Tuesday to misdemeanor charges involving campaign fund raising.

The guilty pleas of former Deters chief-of-staff Matthew Borges and former fund-raiser Eric Sagun conclude a year-long investigation by a grand jury in Cuyahoga County that threatened Deters’ ambitions to run for attorney general in 2006.

Deters, a former Hamilton County prosecutor and county Republican Party chairman, testified before the grand jury in June and will not face criminal charges, said Thomas Sammon, special Cuyahoga County prosecutor assigned to investigate the case.

Borges, 32, of Columbus pleaded guilty to one count of improper use of public office, a misdemeanor, and was fined $1,000 by Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge Eileen Gallagher. Court documents said he gave preferential treatment to certain brokers who made contributions to Deters’ re-election campaign.

Sagun, 35, of Columbus pleaded guilty to one count of election law violations and was fined $5,000.

Court documents said he solicited a $50,000 donation from Cleveland broker Frank Gruttadauria in December 2001 for the Hamilton County Republican Party when the two intended the money to benefit Deters’ re-election campaign.

At the time, Sagun was raising money for Deters and the Hamilton County Republican Party.

Gruttadauria is in prison for bilking his clients out of $125 million.

He has admitted masking the donation to Deters by running it through the county party’s operating fund – a secret account that can accept unlimited, undisclosed donations.

He also admitted to repaying clients and employees $7,000 for donations they made to Deters’ campaign.[...]

Sammon, who worked out the plea agreements, said if Borges is so convinced of his innocence, he should vacate his plea and go to trial.

“He pled guilty and is admitting to the charges,” he said. “How is he now saying he only did this for convenience sake?”

SG Cowen Corp. and Lehman Brothers Inc. hired Gruttadauria, and from 1999 to 2001 they did a combined $5.9 billion in investment trades with Deters’ office.

“If one reads what (Borges) admitted doing, he used the power of his office to gain favorable treatment for vendors that did business with the office,” Sammon said.

“To me, that’s a very serious offense.”

An attorney for Sagun did not return messages seeking comment.

Deters issued a one-sentence statement.

“I feel badly for Matt and Eric, but I understand why they wanted to bring this matter to an end,” Deters said.

I am all for redemption and second chances in life. Every one in life, at some point, sins and falls short of expectations.

But I don’t think you should get this type of second chance in public life if you are out there accepting $50,000 of kickbacks on behalf of state wide officials. And this was only what they could prove in court- PACs were set up to funnel in hundreds of thousands of dollars for firms that wanted to handle the tobacco money (the same money which Strickland is squandering), Firth Third Securities was fined $1 million for pay-to-play which also included $250,000 of donations in employee contributions to Deters, and 5 Columbus brokers exchanged $125,000 in campaign contributions for millions in state contracts. What happened in Joe Deters’ office, over and over again, was criminal, and certainly added to the toxic climate for Republicans that would eventually sweep them out of all but one state-wide office and out of the Ohio House majority in 2006.

The rumor is that this job was arranged by Jo Ann Davidson and the Franklin County GOP Chairman as a way to attempt to control Yost’s office if he is successful in November against the spoiled brat rich boy David Pepper. Other party insiders think that is a huge stretch to assume.

What would Borges end up being in the Auditor’s office? Yost’s official bribe taker? Dave Yost has such a fantastic record of fighting crime as a prosecutor and ensuring his office is run with the highest ethical scandals… so he really couldn’t have found someone more counter to his principles than Matt Borges.

From Seth Morgan:

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The Office of Auditor is very important to Ohio Republicans, if for no other reason than to have a seat on the apportionment board. With the announcement of Mary Taylor leaving the office to be John Kasich’s running mate, I think it is fair to say all political observers were surprised as to how there was apparently no preparation for her departure. And now, under the woeful incompetence of Ohio GOP Chairman Kevin DeWine, we will have a primary. oh boy!

On my Twitter account, I beat the spry Dayton Daily reporter William Herhsey by 4 minutes that Dave Yost will officially drop out of the race for Ohio Attorney General today (Monday) at 2:30 at the Ohio Republican Party headquarters in Columbus.

This is bad news for all of you concerned about seeing the reemergence of liberal former Senator Mike “gang of 14″ DeWine, with his F rating from the NRA and lack of principles, helped create the environment that swept Sherrod Brown, Barack Obama, and the Democrat majority into office. DeWine, who has been campaigning with mass emails about his wife’s lousy recipes, had a serious Republican challenger in Dave Yost, a tough-as-nails Prosecutor from Delaware County who was already been endorsed by 5 county parties. DeWine, with his support for entrenched special interests and the same lawfirms who wish to trade campaign contributions for special counsel work, was about to recieve the Janette Bradley primary-election treatment.

It is sad to see Kevin DeWine work so hard to clear the field for his second cousin.

However, Dave Yost has experience working as Delaware County auditor between 1999-2003. In addition to being an ethical principled conservative, he is a tireless campaigner.

Would I rather see Dave Yost screw with the party leadership and run for an office where his passion clearly is? Of course. But having Yost anywhere on the statewide ticket is fantastic.

This is not to discount State Representative Seth Morgan, another principled conservative who has taken the additional step of having his campaign run by tea party coordinators, many of which I know personally and would consider friends.

Morgan is credentialed for the job as a Certified Public Accountant. However, since Mary Taylor was Ohio’s first Auditor who was also a CPA, apparently voters don’t see this as an essential requirement.

He has also accomplished much more than most 31 year olds. He is an accomplished financial advisor to small and medium sized businesses. And, while elected to city council at age 23, helped pass major tax reform in the city Huber Heights.

However, he did lose his race in 2006 for county auditor. In addition, his important lawsuit against Gov. Ted Strickland to release details about his so-called “evidance based” education reform was ultimately unsuccessful.

Regardless, I couldn’t be a bigger fan of Morgan’s fire-breathing conservatism.

And the dark horse in this race is Franklin County Auditor Rob Montgomery, who has served in his current elected office since 2000. He is a principled conservative that I had the pleasure of meeting in 2006, when he was Ken Blackwell’s second choice to run for Lt. Governor.

The word is that Montgomery would have been the party’s choice instead of Yost, but Montgomery has been hesitant about announcing. But with a campaign fund of $400,000, he can transfer most that through the Ohio GOP accounts and other means into this race immediately.

I am almost 100% certain that Rob Montgomery will run, and he could quickly become the choice of the Republican establishment. Not only would this put Dave Yost into a similar position that he is currently as the outsider candidate for AG and he could lose anyway.

It pains me to write about this race at all, because I have so much respect for the three candidates running and are all incalculably better than Mike DeWine or Jon Husted. They are all fantastic candidates who can breath life into an otherwise soulless, lifeless Ohio Republican Party which is counting on voters growing opposition to President Obama to sweep them back into power.

The Kasich campaign, the ORP, and Chairman Kevin DeWine should have planned to avoid a primary mess completely so attacks could be focused on David “don’t shoot! just drive me to an ATM” Pepper.

Stay tuned!

State Rep. Seth Morgan, a principled conservative, announced today he is running to replace Lt. Gov-candidate Mary Taylor as Ohio Auditor.

Here is video from the press conference in the State House Crypt from this morning. I’m not sure if there could have been a better way to tick off the liberal Ohio state house news corps than to actively embrace the tea party movement like this:

Update: Seth may have a primary challenger already: Dave Yost.