CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Republican Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost has rejected a Democratic proposal meant to get around a legal technicality that could prevent President Joe Biden from appearing on the ballot here this November.
We’re talking about whether the law in constitutional and how it’s denying Ohioans right to vote on Today in Ohio.
Editor Chris Quinn hosts our daily half-hour news podcast, with editorial board member Lisa Garvin, impact editor Leila Atassi and content director Laura Johnston.
You’ve been sending Chris lots of thoughts and suggestions on our from-the-newsroom text account, in which he shares what we’re thinking about at cleveland.com. You can sign up here: https://joinsubtext.com/chrisquinn.
You can now join the conversation. Call 833-648-6329 (833-OHTODAY) if you’d like to leave a message we can play on the podcast.
Here’s what else we’re asking about today:
The threat to Joe Biden appearing on the November ballot in Ohio is growing with the latest development, which tells you everything you need to know about which political party poses the greatest threat to free and fair elections. Who’s the latest Republican to throw up a barrier?
Gov. Mike DeWine is touring the state this week to talk about reading and literacy. What’s the purpose of these appearances, including one in Cleveland on Tuesday?
Cleveland City Council is getting pretty annoyed with Mayor Justin Bibb. Why did the council decline to give the mayor the extra money he requested for lakefront planning?
A lot of us received smart meters on our houses from FirstEnergy in the past year and, truth be told, haven’t noticed anything different. But why might we all take notice if FirstEnergy installs the meters for the rest of its customers?
The strict anti-transgender legislation passed by the Ohio Legislature, is, as we expected, on hold. Why?
We talked yesterday about Mayor Justin Bibb’s hiring of his college roommate, someone involved in an ugly civil rights lawsuit in another city. On Monday night, Council members let the mayor have it for this hire. What did they say?
The latest campaign finance reports are in, so who’s got more money in the U.S. Senate race in Ohio, Sherrod Brown or Bernie Moreno?
One industry that has not figured out how to re-ignite its influence with Ohio lawmakers is the payday lending industry. Five years ago, Ohio law changed on these things. Let’s put that into perspective with some real numbers.
How things can change in just a couple of days. What’s the latest status on the Frontier Airlines flight from Cleveland to Jamaica?
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Read the automated transcript below. Because it’s a computer-generated transcript, it contains many errors and misspellings.
chris (00:01.195)
I’m hearing from quite a few readers these days about the ridiculous threat Ohio is posing to the presidential election by trying to prevent Joe Biden from peering on our ballot. Unprecedented, ridiculous. First thing we’ll be talking about on this episode of Today in Ohio, it’s the news podcast discussion from cleveland.com and the Plain Dealer. Chris Quinn here with Courtney Astolfi, Laura Johnston, and Lisa Garvin. And let’s get to it.
The threat to Joe Biden appearing on the November ballot in Ohio is growing with the latest development, which tells you everything you need to know about which political party poses a real threat to free and fair elections. Lisa, who’s the latest Republican to throw up a barrier?
Lisa (00:48.067)
I’m not sure. Well, we’ll get into it. But Attorney General Dave Yost sent a letter to the Secretary of State’s office saying that he rejected a Democratic proposal to certify Joe Biden as a provisional nominee before they hold their convention August 19th through the 22nd, which is, of course, past the Ohio 90-day deadline of August 7th. Ohio Senator Bill Demora, Democrat from Columbus, says he’s not surprised it was a Hail Mary move.
He says the secretary of state has really no ability to change the law as an executive. And it really is up to the legislature. And he, Demora says it will probably be solved via democratic processes, although he hasn’t specified which ones. He happened to be in Chicago for a walkthrough of the Democratic National Convention. And there he spoke with national party leader, Jamie Harrison. He says he was assured that Biden will be on the Ohio ballot one way or another.
You know, they had talked earlier about a mini convention before the deadline. That’s still a possibility. But DeMora says they’re awaiting instructions from D.C. So now exceptions were made in Ohio for both parties in the twenty, twenty twelve and the twenty elections. The Biden campaign says Alabama, Montana, Illinois and Washington have all granted provisional certification for twenty or did in twenty twenty.
Leroux says the Democrats could try to change that 2010 law that sets that August 7th deadline, which is 90 days. But Republican Senator Matt Huffman says he’s disinclined to take it up. He calls it a democratic problem.
chris (02:28.087)
Yeah, it’s which is unbelievable, right? He’s supposed to be serving all of Ohio, but he’s making about party. Look, I want to wrench this back because we’re all talking about the semantics of this law. It’s the law itself that’s not constitutional. What you’re basically doing is seceding from the nation. We in Ohio, we were basically arguing the legislature can pass a law that prevents us from voting in the presidential election, which is ridiculous. We all have a right as Americans.
to vote for the candidates in the presidential election, this law should not be allowed. That’s what Dave Yost should be challenging. This law crosses the line. It’s never happened. Never before has it happened that a candidate for one of the major parties is blocked. No state has that power. If this were to happen, what’s next? Does Michigan then pass a law keeping Trump off the ballot because they passed the law? The states don’t have the right to pass those laws. That’s not the way it’s supposed to work. This is all procedural.
Of course, Matt Huffman’s not going to do the right thing. The guy is pretty much the worst elected leader I think we’ve ever seen. He always plays party over the people. But think about what we’re talking about here. We’re talking about this like it’s some mechanism and that there’s a real problem. The problem here is that the Republicans in Ohio adopted a law that could prevent a candidate from appearing on the ballot. What kind of country does that sound like? Does that sound like something you might see in Russia or North Korea?
It’s certainly not something you expect to see here. This is ridiculous that we’re having this conversation. And if people don’t rise up and demand that be fixed, I’m not as certain as the Democrats that Biden will appear on the ballot. There isn’t an easy path here to this. The legislature is not gonna pass the law. Mike DeWine is silent. John Husted is silent. Dave Yost is not defending the citizens of Ohio to make sure they have their right to vote in this election.
He’s lined up with those saying, oh, well, it’s the law, it’s the law. What can we do about it? You gotta follow the law. The law itself is what’s wrong. It should be abolished. It should be ruled unconstitutional. How’s this different than the insurrection argument made before the US Supreme Court?
Lisa (04:39.311)
Well, but I do want to say that I think that Yoast’s decision was kind of grounded in the law. He did say that the Secretary of State does lack the authority to waive the deadline unilaterally as an executive. Only the General Assembly can do it, like they did twice before. He did say that Ohio law doesn’t permit provisional certification. I didn’t really delve into that to see whether that was true. He may challenge the law in the future. I don’t know. I kind of wished he did it yesterday or earlier, but...
Here we are.
chris (05:10.271)
What I’m getting at is the defending or not defending what the Ohio can do under this law shouldn’t be the argument. We have a law in place that effectively would block us from our right to vote in the presidential election, something that’s never happened before. And if that’s allowed, which Dave Yost is saying it’s allowed because you can’t change it, it’s the law itself that’s the problem. The law itself should be tossed out.
Lisa (05:39.37)
Agreed.
chris (05:40.491)
Look, the other thing people forget, Democrats voted in large numbers in the primary to put Joe Biden on the ballot. So you’re denying the rights of all those people that went to the ballot and said, I want Joe Biden on my ballot. The whole thing’s ridiculous. Dave Yoast should be lining up on the side of the people saying, I got to figure out the way to get this done instead of writing memos that play with the semantics of it. This is a serious moment. I’m hearing from a lot of readers that are now very worried.
Lisa (06:04.662)
Mm.
chris (06:09.159)
because there is not a single person using common sense to say, what are you talking about? Of course he’s gonna be on the ballot, let’s fix this. We have a gerrymandered legislature that will not change this law because they’re all thinking party, let’s keep them off. I think they’re a little bit worried based on issue one last August that this isn’t the slam dunk for Trump that everybody’s saying it is.
Lisa (06:32.127)
Well, Senator Demora does have two bills that he wants to introduce. One of them would be a short-term fix to this law. One would be a long-term fix. But he says that he doesn’t think Republican lawmakers want to help and they’re not going to take it up.
chris (06:45.411)
I think about that. Think about George Boinovich. Think about the legislators of the past who wouldn’t have thought for a second about depriving the Ohioans of their right to vote. And think about what we have today. People that are going to use semantics to say, oh, well, he can’t be on the ballot. Nothing I’m going to do about it. It’s a Democrat problem. Laura.
laura (07:06.736)
I just wondered what they were thinking in 2010 when they passed this, because ever since then, they’ve had to override it. So usually, in a perfect world, a law would fix a problem or be proactive to make life better. And what were they thinking passing this in 2010? I mean, that was two years after Obama was elected. Was it something nefarious then?
Lisa (07:27.041)
Mmm.
chris (07:27.855)
Everybody who cares about elections should be standing up, regardless of party, to say, this is a stupid law and it shouldn’t be there. Everybody should be making this right. And we live in a time where some of the people in Ohio accept this complete change and turnabout. Never happened before. It shouldn’t happen now. And everybody’s just kind of going, oh, well, shrug. Oh, well, that’s the way it is. The Democrats have to fix this.
Amazing. You’re listening to Today in Ohio. Governor Mike DeWine is touring the state this week to talk about reading and literacy. Laura, what’s the purpose of these appearances, including one in Cleveland on Tuesday?
laura (08:08.872)
The idea is to get the community on board with this new science of reading approach that’s been adopted by the state. Basically the law says that all of the public school districts in Ohio have to make this the way they teach reading by the 2024-2025 school year. Obviously that’ll start in August. And most schools already are. We’ve had a story last month that said about 90% of Ohio schools are already using the method.
and the teachers have been trained in it. But there’s still a lawsuit out there from a different idea of reading called reading recovery. What Mike DeWine is saying is that 40% of the students in Ohio lag in their reading skills, which is really scary. I’d like to point out for talking about this today on state testing day. So all the kids in Ohio public schools all had to have their good breakfast and their good sleep or they go out and they fill out the standardized test forms today. So we’ll see how they’re doing.
He wants to improve reading. He says this will help. And this method focuses on breaking down words, sounding them out, and mixing in phonics and vocabulary lessons. It’s different than former methods used. Balance literacy is one word they’ve, one name of it, or whole language, where students looked more at the pictures and context clues and sentence structure to work out a word they didn’t know.
chris (09:30.931)
So I don’t get why he’s doing this. They passed the law. Most of the schools, not all of them, but most of the schools have adopted it. What’s the purpose of going to each city and having these roundtables to discuss it? Is there resistance in the schools? You’ve got kids in the schools. Are you hearing anything?
laura (09:48.16)
heard anything. I’m a little past that third grade reading guarantee test, but I haven’t heard anything specifically. What really came up in the meeting in Cleveland, and they had one in Toledo yesterday, they have one in Cincinnati today, was that you have to incorporate the entire community because reading does not just happen at school. You cannot only learn at school. Libraries need to be on board. Parents, if they’re reading to their kids, they’re helping their kids with their homework.
If they’re going to help them, they need to know this new method because I do not know how to communicate with my kids about math. I know how to get the right answer, but if I’m trying to talk to them, it very quickly turns into a frustrated mess because I don’t know how to communicate to them the way that they’re learning. You have to get parents on board. You have to get everyone who helps kids learn to read on board, which I think is the point here. They had city council.
people, they had school officials, they had library people. So I think that’s the idea is getting buy-in from everyone.
chris (10:53.439)
Okay, you’re listening to Today in Ohio. Cleveland City Council is getting pretty annoyed with Mayor Justin Bibb. We’ve got a couple of stories we’ll be talking about today. The first is, why did the council, Courtney, decline to give the mayor the extra money he requested for lakefront planning?
courtney (11:07.302)
Yeah, Council put a pause on this piece of legislation. It involves the city’s contract with their main lakefront planner, field operations. And when this, you know, this contract was authorized by Council back, you know, over a year ago, Council imposed a $500,000 spending limit. Well, fast forward to the end of 2023 and Bibb’s team had racked up $760,000 in charges in excess of that spending cap.
And, you know, legislative bodies do not like when it feels like their spending authority is being ignored or they’re, you know, they’re not being consulted on the one main power they have, which is holding the city’s purse strings. And that really got under council skin this week. You know, if council doesn’t end up passing this money, which, you know, we’ll have to see, I think there’s a good chance that they do pay their bill. But if they don’t pass this money.
then the city is leaving its contract or field operations in this very awkward spot of it having performed a quarter of a million dollars worth of work for the city last year that the city isn’t paying it for. So it’s definitely in a pickle. Bibb probably should have come to council before he racked up the bill, not afterward. So they felt like they were part of this decision-making.
chris (12:29.255)
Well, I thought that the mayor didn’t have the ability, the board of control didn’t have the ability to spend money that’s not approved by council. So if council capped the dollars that could be spent on this, I’m confused, because the story said somebody was arguing from the administration that we didn’t spend any money, we didn’t have the authority to spend, but it seems pretty clear to me they did, and that’s not legal. That’s not a legal debt of the city. If the mayor has spent money,
without authority from counsel, he has not spent it legally. So I don’t get it, how did they do that?
courtney (13:01.39)
So here’s the nuance at play. They’ve racked up $760,000 in charges so far, but they haven’t paid their tab. So that’s what they’re asking council for permission to do. Can we pay our tab now? Because council spending cap is money out the door. And right now the city has just racked up bills that it has yet to pay in excess of that.
chris (13:25.299)
So the mayor has told them, go ahead, keep doing the work, I’ll get you paid, but he didn’t get the council authority to do that.
courtney (13:30.334)
Ahead of time and that yes that’s what councils upset about council before they act on this and move on this they want to know who in bibs administration let them rack up that bill they want to know which city official is the reason for this growing tab you know there’s also concerns on council that this is a growing tab it started as a five hundred thousand dollar contract and now in total bibs looking for nine hundred thousand so little concerned on the spending there but.
chris (13:43.272)
Yeah.
courtney (13:58.834)
It’s worth noting that all of this is happening in the midst of the Browns relocation threat to Brook Park. And the plan that this lakefront planner has been working on for more than a year now really features the stadium and, you know, presumably the team in that stadium as a centerpiece of its plan. So the city of the city wants now more money on top of what they overspent, you know, last year to figure out.
what to do in different scenarios on the lakefront. And it’s just hard not to look at that and think they’re looking at it and trying to figure out what happens if the Browns do pull out of downtown. So some of the money at play could be related to that. And I’m sure Bibb’s team wants to get going on whatever that planning is, but council’s pumping the brakes because of this issue from last year.
chris (14:48.667)
Well, one, good for council. That’s their job. They’re supposed to be the checks and the balances. They’re being the checks and the balances. They’re demanding accountability. And Bib has some explaining to do. Two, I think Bib has to, as part of this chess match with the Haslams, who are pretending that they might build in Brook Park, he has to move his pawn now and say, okay, well, if you’re thinking about leaving, we’ll plan the lakefront without you. We’re not going to let your games here, your threat to wait to make your decision for two years.
slow down the lakefront planning, we’ll create a vision without you and we’ll move ahead without you like you’re not there to pretty much call the bluff because it’s a big bluff. And then we’ll see where it ends up, but good for council. We’ll be talking about them again in a minute here. You’re listening to Today in Ohio. A lot of us received smart meters on our houses from First Energy in the past year, and truth be told, haven’t noticed anything different.
But Lisa, why might we all take a little bit of notice if FirstEnergy installs meters for the rest of its customers?
Lisa (15:52.075)
FirstEnergy and its stakeholders have reached a settlement on a modified plan to install smart meters for the remaining 694,000 of their 1.4 million customers. It’s all part of their grid modernization plan, but the price tag now will drop from $626 million to $421 million, and it will reduce the amount that residential customers will have to pay for these upgrades.
State utility regulators must approve this and they could make some changes if before it’s approved and other groups like the Ohio Consumers Council can weigh in with objections. First Energy spokeswoman Laura Saburkas says, of that 421 million, 418 million is for the installation of these smart meters. And then there’s $3 million a year available for rebates to customers who have smart thermostats in their homes.
They are hoping to give about 16,000 customer rebates every year. Smart meters give way more detail on energy consumption. They can identify outages more quickly. And of course, there’s no more need for meter readers. If this is approved without changes, however, there will be a slight increase to your bill. It’ll be about $1.50 a month for 750 kilowatt hours per month.
that would be down from an estimated $2.40 when the plan started out.
chris (17:15.875)
It is, if you look back over time, a lot of little nibbles. Buck and a half a month doesn’t sound like much, but when it’s a buck and a half a month here, a buck and a half a month for something else, by the time you’re done, we’re paying a lot of money to First Energy. And of course, nobody trusts them because they are one of the scummiest companies in the history of Ohio and bribed the legislature to jack us all for millions and millions of dollars. But we’ll have to see. Do you have one of these, right? You had one installed? Have you noticed anything different at all?
Lisa (17:20.894)
Mm-hmm.
Lisa (17:42.052)
I do.
Lisa (17:47.864)
Not really. I mean, my bill’s pretty consistent.
chris (17:50.571)
Yeah, me too. Okay, you’re listening to Today in Ohio. The strict anti transgender legislation passed by the Ohio legislature is as we expected on hold. Laura, why is that?
laura (18:03.768)
because of a lawsuit. So we talked yesterday about the rules that Governor DeWine put in place that the administrative legislative panel approved. That’s the ban on youth transgender surgeries, which could start as early as May 2nd. This is separate. This is the bill that DeWine tried to veto, which includes not only the surgery, but also gender affirming medication for minors. That was supposed to go into effect April 24th. There’s a temporary restraining order from
Michael Holbrook. He’s a Republican. It lasts for 14 days until he holds a hearing, whichever is shorter. So the ACLU filed this lawsuit on behalf of two 12-year-old transgender girls in late March, saying that this law violates four sections of the Ohio Constitution. That includes a single subject rule, which we all know the Ohio legislature does a lot, but doesn’t usually end up overturning laws.
but then talking about Obamacare, healthcare provisions, equal protection clauses. And the bill also, this is the same one that bans transgender girls from female school sports, that part is not being challenged. But if this bill stands and kids who are currently on medication can keep going, but there wouldn’t be any new medication for kids who are dealing with transgender issues, I feel like that would make families move from Ohio if they...
have no way to treat their kids.
chris (19:29.979)
Right. This law, even though Republicans in the legislature say it’s all about the parents, the parents should make the decisions, this law, of course, takes away that ability of parents to make the decisions for what’s the best interest to their kids, which was why Mike DeWine didn’t want to go with it. I mean, it is up to the parents on what they do with their kids, except for the Republicans in the legislature who use their dog whistles to generate help in their base.
laura (19:59.152)
Yeah, it’s interesting. The judge seems pretty smart on this case. He said it was not lost on the court that the General Assembly could not pass this portion of the act separately, the portion about the medication, and only pass it when they log rolled it in with the saving women’s sports provision that it was able to pass. Which yeah, think about that. Those are two different subjects. One’s about kids playing sports. One’s about the medical care of these kids.
Lisa (20:02.885)
that it was not lost.
Lisa (20:22.399)
care of kids and they could only get that happening, but it was the idea of the support.
laura (20:24.16)
and they could only get that pass when they put it with the idea of the playing sports. So you think you get a Republican judge, they might be more willing to side with Republican legislators, but it sounds like he’s taking this very seriously and looking at the merits of the case. But there’s all sorts of literature and experts that say, you know, suicide is higher for children dealing with transgender issues. And the reason DeWine vetoed it is said,
that he talked to parents that they would have lost their kids if they weren’t able to get them medical treatment. So this is a dire consequences and you’re right Chris, they say that they’re all about personal freedoms until it comes to something they don’t like.
chris (21:04.823)
Well, and look, there are lots of thoughtful Republicans in the state that don’t line up between the cartoonish actions of Matt Huffman. Matt Huffman was elected by a tiny fraction of Ohioans and is luring this over, doing ridiculously damaging things. And it’s nice to see that we have thoughtful judges that put aside party and look at the common sense. That’s why I keep wondering why people in the House would want that guy as their speaker, which is just a presumption that he can walk in and take it over.
laura (21:11.229)
Mm-hmm.
laura (21:15.442)
in Lima.
chris (21:34.663)
You’re listening to Today in Ohio. We talked yesterday about Mayor Justin Bibb’s hiring of his college roommate, someone involved in an ugly civil rights lawsuit in another city. We don’t want to rehash that here, but on Monday night, council members let the mayor have it for this hire. Courtney, what did they say?
courtney (21:50.078)
Yeah, this is heating up to be a huge controversy at City Hall, and we’re going to have to see what the mayor does next, but on Monday night, council members had harsh words for the mayor about his decision to hire his college roommate, who accused of violating an older black couple’s civil rights when he was a police officer in Washington, DC. Councilman Richard Starr straight up said McHugh needs to resign. He needed him. He wanted him to resign immediately.
But, you know, other members, including Councilman Kevin Conwell and Councilman Anthony Hairston, also went hard on this decision. These are Black, these are Black men who represent majority Black neighborhoods, and they know that Clevelanders for generations have had civil rights problems when they interact with Cleveland police. So they are particularly upset that Bibb would choose a police officer to staff this safety, safety position that oversees police.
Lisa (22:33.647)
And they know that people with a restricted generation have...
courtney (22:47.746)
when he’s been accused of these actions in the past, when he was a cop. Kevin Conwell, who’s usually pretty mild-mannered, he came out swinging and he said, what is the message that Bibb is sending to his police force with this hire at the top, a kind of a food chain here in the safety department? And Conwell even likened, when talking about civil rights abuses by police,
Conwell drew connections as to the other members about, you know, the Tamir Rice case and the Timothy Lohman, you know, shooting of Tamir Rice several years ago in Cleveland. He referenced, he tied it to the 137 shots fired case involving ex Cleveland cop, Michael Brelo. And he even likened it to Bull Connor, like the Birmingham Alabama commissioner who brutalized civil rights demonstrators in the 60s. These are harsh words coming from counsel.
And we’re going to have to see what Bibb does next. He, you know, I just checked with him yesterday. This, this is feels like such a volatile situation. I wanted to check to make sure, you know, in the 24 hours or so that it passed since the council meeting, McHugh hadn’t resigned. The city said he hadn’t, but what we don’t really know where it goes from.
chris (24:05.599)
And our editorial board body slammed the mayor on this today. Kevin Conwell has been the victim of police racial profiling University Circle. He knows the actual effect of this in the past. I’m astounded that the mayor is sitting silent on this. This, as you said, is a growing controversy. It is inexplicable. I don’t get why he did it. And the explanations they gave to you thus far.
We’re nothing to see here, nothing to see here. It’s all good. And it’s not good. You don’t often see city council members get up one by one, like you saw on Monday night.
courtney (24:40.986)
Yeah, absolutely. And I thought what was interesting here is that Councilman Richard Star specifically called out Bibb’s defense of the hiring of his college roommate for this job. Star basically said that the city, the city’s arguing like, you know, he wasn’t, he wasn’t like found of any, there was no sustained finding related to McHugh’s bias or integrity stemming from this case when he was a DC cop.
And stars like, okay, but that’s like saying it’s okay to hire Tamir Rice’s killer into a police department because he wasn’t technically fired for killing Tamir Rice. He was fired for another reason. And, and you know, it’s, it’s odd that Bibb’s administration has chosen that as its argument and defense of this hiring.
chris (25:24.595)
Yeah.
chris (25:32.635)
Yeah, I know. It’s dumb. Very bad public relations move, but it was a bad decision overall. This story is not over. You’re listening to Today in Ohio. The latest campaign finance reports are in Lisa, who’s got more money in the US Senate race in Ohio, Sherrod Brown or Bernie Marino.
Lisa (25:50.735)
Sherrod Brown by a long shot. He’s got about eight times more money than his challenger, Bernie Moreno. So at the end of March, Sherrod Brown had $16 million in his campaign war chest. Bernie Moreno has $1.7 million and he’s also got $543,000 from the Buckeye Values Pack.
So Moreno spent a lot of money in a very contested field. In the primary, he spent over $9 million, but he does have millions in personal wealth that he can tap into as the election, as the campaign season goes forward. And both Democrat and Republican national parties are expected to spend a lot of money in TV ads leading up to November.
So yeah, it looks like Sherrod Brown is still, and he has outraised everybody. He outraised all of the other challengers.
chris (26:41.039)
If the sleazy Republicans involved in this keep Joe Biden off the ballot, and then Bernie Marino won’t have to spend any money. He’ll win going away because Democrats won’t show up at the polls. They have nobody to vote for. We’ll have to see how this thing continues. You’re listening to Today in Ohio. We can get one more in. How things can change in just a couple of days. Courtney, what’s the latest status of the Frontier Airlines flight from Cleveland to Jamaica, which Susan Glaser has just spent a week writing about?
courtney (27:06.61)
Yeah, it’s canceled now. So that lasted just this was just a month after they started up the service. And now it’s going to stop running as of June 29. The flight was running between Cleveland and Montego Bay on Frontier Airlines. And a spokesman said the reason for them cutting the route is in part related to the State Department’s travel advisory for Jamaica, which you know, it tells Americans they should quote reconsider travel plans there. But the airline spokesman also said the demand just hasn’t been there.
to justify the route even for the rest of summer.
chris (27:43.711)
The Susan has done all sorts of writing about how she felt safe and what she did while she was there, but she did write a story saying, Hey folks, if you want to take this flight, you better do it quick because everybody on my flight had an entire row of seats to themselves. It’s not filled. She predicted it would go down. I don’t know that she was thinking it would go down in days, right?
courtney (28:02.547)
Yeah, this is a really quick turn of events.
chris (28:10.395)
It’s too bad. It’s a great place for people to visit. But right now the government is telling you, you should be wary of it because people go or in danger. So no more flight to Jamaica. You’re listening to Today in Ohio. That’s it for the Wednesday episode. Thanks Courtney. Thanks, Laura. Thanks, Lisa. Thanks to everybody who listens. We’ll be back on Thursday talking about the news.