Sherrod Brown Cancels Staged Event After Environmentalists Show Up with Protest Signs

U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) has a new name among his political opponents. “Chicken.”

Brown “chickened out,” according to his opponent in the U.S. Senate race, by canceling a press conference Wednesday after he discovered it wouldn’t go off as planned.

“The re-election campaign for U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown canceled a news conference meant to highlight his environmental record just hours after a group invited to support the senator said it would picket instead of endorse Mr. Brown,” the Toledo Blade reports.

The event was scheduled to take place at Middlegrounds Metropark with Toledo Mayor Wade Kapszukiewicz and environmentalists in attendance. The senator was in Washington, D.C., for the big cloture vote regarding soon-to-be Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, but Brown had reportedly lined up staffers from his campaign to be in attendance.

If all went according to plan, Brown would be presented as Ohio’s environmental warrior.

Middlegrounds is on the banks of the Maumee River, which flows into Lake Erie. Last year in September, the river experienced a toxic algal bloom. The Toledo-Lucas County Health Department warned people not to have contact with the water, or let their pets in the water.

Kapszukiewicz, the Toledo mayor, and a group of environmentalists “will make the case for why Sherrod is the only Senate candidate Ohioans can trust to fight for clean water and a safe environment,” the Brown campaign said in a news release.

Among those invited was Advocates for a Clean Lake Erie, the Blade reports. The group had been expected to support the Democratic senator, who is running against Republican U.S. Rep. Jim Renacci (R-OH-16).

“Please feel free to attend as well as to bring along anyone from your organization who may be supportive of Senator Brown’s position,” wrote Gretchen DeBacker, who is Mayor Kapszukiewicz’s legislative director and campaign manager, in an email to supporters.

Senator Brown an environmental hero? Not so fast.

As it turned out, Advocates for a Clean Lake Erie coordinator Mike Ferner was not all that thrilled with Brown’s record on Lake Erie.

“I’m not sure what part of Sherrod’s record indicates why he ‘is the only Senate candidate Ohioans can trust to fight for clean water and a safe environment.’ As best we can tell, he never even came out in favor of an impaired status. It’s hard to say for sure, since of the hundreds of post cards we sent to him over the last two years I haven’t talked to anyone who got a response,” Ferner wrote.

Ferner’s group then issued its own press release Wednesday morning, saying it would picket before the 2 p.m. news conference. Two hours later the Brown campaign sent an email saying the event was canceled because of a scheduling conflict.

“After finding out his staged PR stunt might include a few people who disagree with him, liberal career politician Sherrod Brown chickened out and cancelled the event,” Leslie Shedd, spokeswoman for Renacci’s campaign, told The Ohio Star.

In stark contrast to Brown, Renacci is one of the most bipartisan members of Congress, Shedd said.

Renacci “has a history of rolling up his sleeves and working with both sides of the aisle to get things done,” she said. “That’s leadership. We don’t need more chickens in the Senate – we need more leaders like Jim Renacci.”

Both the Toledo mayor’s office and Brown’s office blamed each other for canceling Wednesday’s event.

Ferner told the Blade his group was never notified of the event’s cancelation and members arrived Wednesday afternoon at Middlegrounds with their protest signs.

“We really don’t know what happened other than nobody from the mayor’s office and the Brown campaign showed up,” he told the Blade.

Ferner’s group has criticized the senator for not supporting an impaired status for Lake Erie or a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency cleanup, he said.

“When it comes to Lake Erie, Senator Brown needs to tell voters exactly what his policy is for Lake Erie because so far we haven’t seen much to celebrate,” he wrote in a news release, which also lists five questions about the lake it plans to send Brown and other candidates running for office in northwest Ohio.

“Senator Brown has supported millions of dollars in funding for the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative and for more Department of Agriculture-funded buffer strips, but as laudable as those things sound, neither of them will tell us who is responsible for the pollution going into the lake or hold anyone accountable,” Ferner wrote.

Read the entire Toledo Blade story here.

Mike DeWine is the real environmental hero

As The Star reported Tuesday, Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine, who is running for governor atop the Republican ticket, noted during an Oct. 1 gubernatorial debate that his office filed suit against DuPont alleging that the company had polluted Lake Erie through its Teflon manufacturing process.

“That should be a jewel of Ohio,” DeWine said of the Lake and its river system. “I sued DuPont for what they have done over many years, making Teflon. They knew it was dangerous, they continued to put it out, and we sued on behalf of the state.”

DuPont Co. and its spinoff Chemours Co. were sued by Ohio for dumping a chemical used in Teflon, an action the state said went on for 60 years even though the company knew it was toxic to humans.

Where has Sherrod Brown been with regard to this action? Where was Richard Cordray, who preceded DeWine as Ohio’s attorney general?

Only the Republican, DeWine, has stepped up to the plate and led on this issue. But don’t expect him to get any praise from the Sierra Club and the other liberal environmental groups tied to the Democrat Party.

 

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Anthony Accardi is a writer and reporter for The Ohio Star.

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