A Sudanese Cleveland Clinic resident returns to the U.S. after being blocked by Donald Trump’s immigration order. The U.S. Senate confirms Betsy DeVos as education secretary by a historically narrow margin. And Democratic state lawmakers propose legislation to prevent a sanctuary city ban. Today’s Ohio Politics Roundup is brought to you by Jeremy Pelzer.
Cleveland Clinic doctor allowed back in the United States: Dr. Suha Abushamma, a Cleveland Clinic internal medicine resident from Sudan, returned to the U.S. on Monday after she was blocked last week from re-entering the country because of President Donald Trump’s immigration order, reports cleveland.com’s Eric Heisig. Abushamma, who was on a trip to Saudi Arabia, returned after a federal judge in Washington state blocked part of Trump’s order prohibiting citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. for 30 days.
Clinic still plans fundraiser at Trump resort: The Cleveland Clinic’s foundation still intends to hold a fundraiser at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Feb. 25, despite objections from hundreds of doctors, nurses, and doctoral candidates opposed to Trump’s immigration order, Heisig reports. The fundraiser, to benefit the Cleveland Clinic Florida, has been held at the swanky resort for the past eight years.
19,680: That’s how many people in Ohio were born in countries on President Donald Trump’s travel ban list, cleveland.com’s Rich Exner reports. “Nearly half of those are natives of Somalia living in the Columbus area. The numbers are small, in part, because Ohio as a whole has a small number of foreign-born residents – just 4.1 percent in comparison to the nationwide share of 13.2 percent who are foreign-born.”
Betsy DeVos squeaks in: Trump’s U.S. education secretary nominee was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on Tuesday, with Vice President Mike Pence breaking a 50-50 vote. As cleveland.com’s Stephen Koff reports, it’s the first time ever that a vice president has had to break a tie on a cabinet nominee.
Reaction to DeVos’ confirmation was swift and heated. Koff writes that “teachers and liberal groups expressed outrage” while “school choice backers expressed glee.”
Sherrod Brown voted no on DeVos, as did every other Senate Democrat. “I can’t look Ohio parents in the eye and tell them she won’t put profits before education,” Brown said on the Senate floor.
Rob Portman voted for Devos. “She has made clear in her response to questions that she will be a strong advocate for our kids and our public schools,” the Republican said in a statement after the vote.
Dems hit Husted over DeVos support: Ohio Democrats took a swipe at Ohio Secretary of State (and potential GOP gubernatorial candidate) Jon Husted for praising DeVos, reports the Toledo Blade’s Tom Troy. In a release, the state party pointed out that DeVos’ PAC, All Children Matter, was fined $5.3 million for campaign finance violations from which Husted’s 2006 campaign benefited.
Lawmakers counter proposed sanctuary city ban: In response to proposed legislation seeking to ban “sanctuary cities” in Ohio, two Northeast Ohio Democratic lawmakers “want to pass a law barring the state from interfering with community decisions on immigrants,” writes cleveland.com’s Robert Higgs. State Rep. Dan Ramos of Lorain urged House Speaker Cliff Rosenberger not to hold any hearings on the proposed ban.
Kasich’s tax plan and you: Exner has a nifty calculator for Ohioans to figure out how their state tax bill would be affected by Gov. John Kasich’s budget proposal. The wealthy and some low-income residents would end up paying less in taxes, while the very poor, some middle-class Ohioans, and smokers would pay more.
White House says OSU attack was underreported: The White House on Monday released a list of 78 terrorist attacks to back up Trump’s claim that the media underreports on them – including the Nov. 28 attack at Ohio State University, as the Cincinnati Enquirer points out. The attack, during which a 20-year-old Somali immigrant injured 11 before an officer shot him, was covered extensively by state and national media, including cleveland.com.
Tweet the resistance: Cleveland.com’s Sabrina Eaton takes a look at the dozens of guerrilla Twitter accounts presumably set up by workers at various federal agencies to protest Trump’s policies. Some of the accounts have hundreds of thousands of followers; even Cuyahoga Valley National Park has its own “unofficial resistance page.”
Trump’s reportedly annoyed with SNL again. This time, it’s because White House press secretary Sean Spicer was portrayed by a woman (specifically, Melissa McCarthy) on Saturday Night Live last weekend, cleveland.com’s Joey Morona writes. “Trump doesn’t like his people to look weak,” an unnamed Trump donor told Politico. Spicer, for his part, laughed off the skit.
Pepper spices up Eastern Ohio: Ohio Democratic Party Chair David Pepper, speaking Monday at a union hall in Steubenville, said the candidates at the top of the Democratic ticket last year lost because they weren’t in tune with local issues, reports Dave Gossett of the (Steubenville) Herald-Star. Pepper, who’s on a “kitchen-table conversation tour” around the state, said Democrats “will have a strong case for change in 2018” on issues such as the economy and local government funding.
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