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You know, Ohio Education Association representing 120,000 educators who are united in their mission to create the excellent public schools.

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Mike DeWine looks back on 2025, the second to last year of his time in that office.

That's this weekend.

The state of Ohio.

Welcome to the state of Ohio.

I'm Karen Kasler.

Governor Mike DeWine has a stack of bills in front of him on property taxes, marijuana and intoxicating hemp.

And the grace period for absentee ballots to arrive at boards of elections.

As is nearly always the case, DeWine won't say what he'll do on legislation before he does it.

But he had things to say about other issues in our wide ranging conversation.

In full disclosure, we are coming to this interview from a breakfast that you host for reporters who regularly cover the statehouse, and you talk a lot in that breakfast about your priorities for the future kids in Ohio and some of the things that have happened in terms of the last couple of years.

For instance, infant mortality is down.

The science of reading.

You say that there's evidence showing that that's working.

More than 400,000 kids signed up for the Dolly Parton Imagination Library getting the books in the mail.

But I want to ask you about something you also mentioned about Ohio being at its lowest level since 2016 with foster kids.

Now, Ohio still has an opioid crisis, which is part of what sparked that.

How did Ohio get to this point where we're at the lowest point since 2016, when it comes to kids in foster care?

We've made some progress.

We have fewer kids in foster care than we've had in many, many, many years.

And we think the reason is we were very mindful about this.

And what we've been trying to do is to intervene earlier and give support to families before they break up, before there's, the child has to go into foster care for a long time, or we have a program that we started, actually, when I was attorney general, our start program, which when the mom or dad is addicted, what we try to do is surge in resources for the child, but also not forget about the mother and dad, because if they can get sober and they can get their life back together, then that child can go back to the mom and the dad or the mom or the dad.

And everybody is just is just is just better off.

I mean, the separation, even when it's absolutely necessary separating a child from the parents.

And many times you have to do it, it's not good not to do it.

But again, that in and of itself brings about trauma for that child.

And so if you can not have as many of those separations or had the separations for a shorter period of time, it benefits everyone.

And so that figure, if our lower number of kids in foster care we think is, is significant, but we still have a lot of kids in foster care and we have more to do.

Obviously.

Also at that breakfast, you showed us a countdown clock that you have that indicates how many days, minutes and seconds you have left until you leave office and you've talked a lot about how you've really enjoyed this job.

So I can't imagine you're looking forward to leaving.

But I'm wondering if that clock gives you a sense of urgency to accomplish the things you want to accomplish.

And are you worried that the next governor might not continue with your priorities?

Well, sure.

Jeb Bush gave me, this countdown clock, when I started my second term.

And it literally is a countdown.

And it shows, I think today is like 396 days and so many hours and so many minutes in so many seconds.

And so I have it on my desk every day.

I don't really need to be reminded that, our time is running out, but it's, it's a very stark reminder of that.

And look what we're trying to do this coming year.

The last year in office is to solidify, some of the things that we have been doing so that whoever the next governor is, the next legislature, they'll look at that and say, look, that was successful.

And we're starting, in just in a few days, our program about eyeglasses.

And the fact is that while law requires kids to be screened, to see whether or not they need an eye exam over kids, where it comes back a red flag.

Yeah, you need an eye exam.

Only a third of those end up getting an eye.

Actually, getting that eye exam and getting glasses if they need glasses.

So we're setting up we're going into 15 counties, a mobile unit.

We have a model for how this is done.

We know it works.

And what we hope to demonstrate over the next year is, hey, this is a good way.

It's a cost effective way to make sure that kids can see.

And if they can see, they're more likely be able to read.

If they're likely to read, they're likely to be successful in life.

That's you got to do the basics.

And this is certainly one of the basics.

I won't bother asking you if you're going to veto certain bills because you're not going to tell me, but I will ask you now that the House and Senate have agreed on some changes to marijuana and intoxicating hemp, you still have that where you could potentially line item veto that is kratom.

Next, you've talked about freedom as being something else you're concerned about.

Yeah.

We're still very concerned with kratom and will be taking action here very, very shortly.

Coming up, are you talking about an executive order like you did with intoxicating hemp?

And can you talk a little bit about what your concerns are and what you'd like to see change with regulation on kratom?

Yeah.

Well, first of all, intoxicating hemp.

What this really is, is hemp law was passed because hemp does not have much THC in it.

But what the scientists did and what the entrepreneurs did.

And we love scientists, we love entrepreneurs.

But these people were doing things they shouldn't have been doing.

But what they what they did is they just juiced it up.

And so it's still, they would argue, still till hemp, but it's, you know, very, very dangerous.

And, you know, we are seeing them make gummy bears out of it and things that kids would eat.

And they sold it, and it was not under the law because it was started off as hemp and so this bill changes that.

So we're going to now be able to regulate that, which is what we should be able to do, just like we do today with marijuana.

And so certainly I'm going to I'm going to sign the bill with kratom though.

Are you looking for the same kinds of regulations?

Yeah.

Well create a kratom.

It's just it's just it's just dangerous.

And so we need to regulate it or we need to ban it.

We need to do we need to do one or the other.

There is.

You have said that you regretted signing the bill, allowing sports gambling, and there's a bill that would expand online gambling that was introduced in the House this year.

People are already gambling this way.

Online gambling, or iGaming could bring in billions of dollars to the state.

If indeed that goes forward.

Is that something that you would support?

Well, I don't think we should expand gambling.

I did when I was asked the question a few weeks ago.

Do you regret signing the, sports gaming bill?

And my truthful answer had to be, yes, I do.

I mean, it looked like it was inevitable it was going in state after state.

But.

Well, I think I didn't fully understand it.

I imagine the legislature didn't fully understand, at the time was how what these gaming companies would do after it was legal and they would spend hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising.

And what makes that so pervasive and so dangerous, particularly for young men between the ages of 21 and 40?

This is the age group is really getting addicted.

Look, they don't have to walk into it.

They don't have to get in their car and drive to a casino and then go bet they reach in their pocket.

They pull that phone out and they go right there.

And what they're watching, you can't get away from it.

I watch a lot of Reds baseball.

I watch football and Bengals, but you can't get away from the advertising.

It's in your face and it's telling you in the fourth inning.

Here's what you can bet.

You know, such and such a pitcher, such and such a hitter.

Here's the parlay.

You can do what's in sports programing.

It's at the stadium constantly.

You cannot get away from it.

And so that what we've seen is that massive advertising has just brought about a lot of addiction.

And it's just a it's just a real a real problem.

And obviously you're worried about that extending to online game.

Yeah.

I mean look it's already bad enough we don't need to expand it.

You can be in a property tax task force after you vetoed some property tax related items in the budget, and they've come up with some recommendations, lawmakers have passed some of them.

There's still a list left, of things to consider.

There's still after this all volunteer effort to gather signatures to put an amendment to abolish property taxes on next year's ballot.

Are you wondering, are you worried that the legislature is not doing enough to really combat that by passing things that would give real property tax relief?

You know, I think the most important thing to do is reach some sort of balance.

When we have two competing interests that are very important to us.

One is we know we have people who are living in their house who are on a fixed income and everybody around them.

The valuation is going up and that means their taxes going up.

And we have people literally leaving their house, having to get out of their house that they've lived in for most of their life because they can't pay the real estate tax.

That's a problem.

It's also important, though.

We fund our schools, through two ways, really.

One is income tax from the state, and the other is local real estate tax.

And so we have to be able to support our schools.

These are these are our kids.

So how do you balance those two things?

So what I did is I put a working group.

I've vetoed some of the bills that, that that the legislature have.

But I put a working group together right away and I put people on there who are educators.

But I also put people who, you know, fully got what was going on local orders about what the tax increase, how it was hurting people.

And they came up with recommendations.

So what I'm doing, I think they were good recommendations.

I didn't love every one of them.

But it has to be a compromise.

This is what life is.

You have to make some compromises.

And so I like what he appreciated, what they did.

And now I'm going to compare that to the four bills that the legislature sent me.

And you know, then I'll make a final decision about those bills.

It would be chaotic if indeed property taxes were eliminated.

Well, look, what I tell people is, yes, you can eliminate the real estate taxes.

I mean, no one wants to pay any taxes.

We don't like taxes, so you could eliminate that.

But if you eliminate that, how do you fill that hole?

How do you support your local schools?

How do you support your local government, the law enforcement, the local sheriff, the local police department, all these things that we value and we know that we we have to have.

So yes, you could do away with the, real estate tax, but, you know, what does that mean?

You're going to end up with 35%, sales tax, making the number up.

I don't know what it would be, but it would be a huge number.

You know, in Ohio we don't tax food, for example, we don't tax some other things are sales tax is relatively low, and it won't be low if we don't have the real estate tax or if all of this is a balance.

How do you balance this out?

Since you took office, we've seen a number of high tech economic developments, including some of the biggest ones in state history.

Among those developments are data centers, and they're bringing billions of dollars into Ohio.

They're also really pulling, incredible energy needs.

But I want to ask you, are you concerned at all about the potential of an AI bubble that we keep hearing about?

Well, let me let me start with the data centers.

You know, we think that they really contribute to economic development.

It's not just the data center.

Data center.

It doesn't employ a lot of people, a lot of people to construct a data center.

So there's a lot of jobs.

But having those data centers there sometimes improves the infrastructure which other companies come in, frankly, and play off of.

So the data pretty much shows that having data centers does bring in other other business.

So that's the reason to do it.

What's the downside?

They use a ton of electricity and they use a ton of water.

And so I think we have to I'm I'm for them coming in.

But I think we have to continue to monitor that situation.

And we also have to, frankly, continue to encourage them to spread out throughout the state, not have every one of them.

And I'm exaggerating that a little bit.

But, you know, having the bulk of them in central Ohio, this is where we've seen the most of them come.

And so encouraging them to go other, other places.

But they are a driver.

We believe they're a driver of jobs and they're a driver of economic development on that energy question, you've said that to generate more energy in Ohio, you've thought about or at least seen the suggestion that small nuclear facilities might be needed for this.

Is that feasible?

Is that something that could happen in time for people who are really struggling to pay their electric bills now?

Well, it's not going to it's not going to deal with the immediate problem.

It's not going to happen during my my term in the United State or in the in the governor's office.

It's not.

But if you look at the future, yeah, we're going to be going to a small nuclear, ten years from now, 15 years from now, certainly 20 years from now, that's what you're going to be seeing all across all across this country.

Why they will have to, at that point, develop the technology.

So it's cheap enough to do.

Second, they are non-carbon creating and it's really the our best shot, of doing that.

We've seen some countries, France, for example, pretty green country.

They've gone nuclear.

They went new for many, many years ago.

So that's where we're going.

And immediate future, Ohio's going to rely mostly on natural gas.

Why?

We have it here.

It's ours and we're going to continue to use it.

But we need to be looking at the future with nuclear as well, because it's coming.

We also want to play a part in that industry.

For example, a piped in Ohio, center, a company in there.

Now, they're the only the only.

Manufacturer of the fuel for nuclear facilities that in this country that is all in the United States and for national security.

And we also have a local interest in it.

We want them to continue to expand.

They have a great opportunity, a little Pike County, to create a massive number of jobs there over the next ten, 15 years.

And I think that's what you're going to see.

So so our energy policy is look all the about do we want wind?

Yeah, we want wind.

We want solar.

But we also know that for the great needs that we're going to see for in the immediate future at least, a lot of it's going to be natural gas.

And I think out into the future that's going to become nuclear.

On the natural gas point, there's drilling going on on state lands, fracking in state parks.

Are you concerned about how that's been going?

Have you been monitoring that?

Because certainly there are people who are concerned about that.

We always monitor things, you know, what's going on, what the law says today as fracking can occur, not you can't drill down in a state park.

You can be X number of miles away or how far away and then actually go, yeah.

And that's how they do it today with, with fracking.

That is producing money.

That's going to our state parks and, you know, allowing us to, to help with the infrastructure so more people can enjoy our state parks on February 3rd, the temporary protected status for Haitians is ending.

And you have talked about the impact of what that's going to be for people in Springfield.

Obviously President Trump has wanted this to end.

He's also talked about some he's made some very negative racist comments about, Somalians, where we have a lot of Somali people living in the second highest population of Somalis in the United States, in Ohio.

Let's talk about the Haitians first, about what's going to be the impact on February 3rd to the Springfield area.

Well, the basic facts remain the same.

These are Haitians.

And when Fran, I talk with with manufacturers, when we talk to employers and we've had them in our house that meetings and what they tell us is, is this, that these patients are filling jobs that they couldn't fill any other way, that, yes, they may have some cultural problems or challenges and they've got some problems with language.

But the Haitian to want to work, they want overtime and they're reliable.

They show up and they can pass a drug test and they're filling jobs that wouldn't be filled, but for them.

So to get to your question, on February 3rd, most of them will become illegal.

They're illegal now.

They came in illegally and the administration is pulling that back on February 3rd.

So once that happens, these employers tell me we can't obviously we can't employ them.

It would be illegal for us to employ them.

We're not going to break the law.

So one day like that early February 10th thousand, we don't know the exact number that are working no longer will be working.

So that's going to be a blow to the economy.

In that in that part of the state, we're seeing some of the Haitians, for example, who are, buying houses in Springfield, houses that maybe were run down.

They're putting sweat equity into it.

They're working.

They're putting some of their own money into it.

All that goes away.

And that we've seen Springfield really come back in the last few years.

One of the reasons in the last few years it's really moving forward is these Haitians who are in there and are working and they're contributing to that economy.

They're starting restaurants, they're eating, they're doing all the things, and there's a lot more economic activity that that will go away.

What do you tell Ohioans?

What do you tell people from Somalia who are living in Ohio, who are concerned about some of the comments that President Trump has made?

And, look, I would say to any anybody, whether they're Somalian or Haitian or wherever they're from, what, you know, if if you want to come here and work, you want to raise your raise your family, you know what we care about that.

That's good.

What we really care about is not what you look like.

Not what you where you came from.

What we care about is what you believe.

You embrace what we embrace in this, in this country.

Q First Amendment, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, respect the rule of law.

You know, if that's what it's about, that's what's unique about the United States.

That has always been our criteria.

Yes.

You know, now we've deviated from that many times throughout history where we've said, this group can't come in, the Chinese can't come in, this group can't come in.

But that's really what this country is all about.

That's how we grow.

That's how we prosper.

We want people who want to work and raise their families.

But also they need culturally, yeah, to keep their own culture about what they eat.

Well, but we want them to embrace what we believe in this country.

And that is, you know, what this republic is, is all about.

You mentioned the First Amendment.

There's a lot of legislation that's coming through that deals with religion themes, the Ten Commandments potentially being displayed in classrooms, teachers being allowed and permitted to teach the positive influence of religion on American history.

The requirement of a video from a pro-life, anti-abortion group showing fetal development.

Are you concerned?

And you are a deeply religious person, but are you concerned that there's too much religion in public policy, especially Christianity?

Well, I don't know if there's too much religion.

I mean, I think that all of us should be motivated.

You know, people ask me, for example, you know, you allow your religion to get involved.

Look, we all it impacts who we are.

How we were raised is what we believe.

And so you can't strip, you can't strip that away.

I think the the important thing, whether we're looking at colleges colleges are good, good example.

What do we want in colleges.

We want people to be able to have First Amendment rights.

We want them.

We don't want them to express hate, but we want them to debate issues.

We want to see that in, you know, our colleges.

Nothing wrong with seeing that in in our high schools as well.

What we're trying to develop in this country is critical thinkers.

We want our kids, whether it's my kids or now, my grandkids or anybody else's.

We want them to become critical thinkers.

Why we want them to be good, good citizens doesn't mean they're always going to agree with each other, but we want them to have a rational basis for what they do.

So that is what we need to encourage.

I think, you know, right, in our education.

So in your last year in office, will you be pushing for some of the things that you've talked about as being important to you, for instance, a primary seatbelt law or some more regulations on guns, given that those two things are the leading cause of death for kids?

Well, we're continue to do to, a couple things.

One is we've developed a way to assist local communities by sending in the highway patrol when they want us to, and work with the local police and target violent repeat offenders.

Many times, the victims are teenagers.

Those are the kids who are getting killed.

So that is very, very important, something we know that we can do.

I don't need any any legislation.

I can just go do that.

And we know that that is already making a difference.

We also know that a change that we made in the law several years ago with distracted driving has made a significant difference.

If you compare the last two years since we've had distracted driving law prohibiting it in Ohio versus the previous two, we've seen auto fatalities go down 11%.

So that's huge.

We can take those numbers down even further if we have what we call a primary seatbelt law, which simply means that you have to wear a seatbelt and the officer can can write you a ticket if you don't have one.

We will see an uptick, significant one in seatbelt use when that happens.

And that will save lives.

A direct correlation between number of lives saved and wearing a seatbelt.

So these are yes.

We're going to continue to to work on this.

Can you do the seatbelt law by executive order.

No.

So you do need the legislature and they've shown that they're not willing to.

Well no I haven't given up on that.

Just after our interview, DeWine did as he told me he would and issued a request to the Ohio Board of Pharmacy to use an emergency rule to ban all synthetic kratom and other dangerous compounds derived from the active ingredient in kratom as illegal drugs.

DeWine has said he expects to endorse the Republican candidate for governor next year, but he hasn't yet officially back to the make.

Ramaswamy, who is running against wine's former Department of Health director Amy Acton.

The likely Democratic nominee.

DeWine says he's been meeting with Rama Swamy to discuss policy, but isn't saying when he might endorse him.

Next week, a conversation with House Speaker Matt Huffman and Minority Leader Donny Isaacson.

That is it for this week for my colleagues at the Statehouse News Bureau of Ohio Public Media.

Thanks for watching.

Please check out our website at State News Talk or find us online by searching for State of Ohio Show.

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Thanks for watching, and please join us again next time for the State of Ohio.

Support for the Statehouse News Bureau comes from Medical Mutual, dedicated to the health and well-being of Ohioans, offering health insurance plans, as well as dental, vision and wellness programs to help people achieve their goals and remain healthy.

More at Med mutual.com.

The law offices of Porter, right, Morris and Arthur LLP.

Porter, right, is dedicated to bringing inspired legal outcomes to the Ohio business community.

More at Porter.

Right.

Com Porter Wright inspired every day.

You know, Ohio Education Association representing 120,000 educators who are united in their mission to create the excellent public schools.

Every child deserves more at o h e talk.