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Cafaro's elevation to the top spot came after current Senate Democratic leader Columbus Sen. Ray Miller chose not to run for the post.
Cafaro, a 30-year-old Hubbard Democrat, beat back a challenge from Dayton-area Sen. Tom Roberts to be named leader of the Democrats, who are vastly outnumbered 21-12 by Senate Republicans.
"I think our caucus was looking for something completely different and new and a creative approach to both policy governance as well as a political sea change as far as our branding is concerned," said Cafaro, who had been serving as assistant minority whip.
COLUMBUS - Less than a week after Democrats failed to win back any seats in the Ohio Senate, Minority Leader Ray Miller announced he would not continue as head of the 12-member caucus.
Hubbard Sen. Capri Cafaro, who was appointed to the body in 2006, and Sen. Tom Roberts of Dayton, who has several decades of legislative experience primarily in the House, both showed interest in the top spot.
"If my colleagues would come to the conclusion that they would be best served with me as their leader, then I would certainly do so with great fervor and determination," said Cafaro. "But I'm happy with whatever role that my colleagues feel I can best serve the caucus."
Roberts said he was also very interested in becoming minority leader. He added, however, that he could only commit to serving from 12 to 18 months in the role.
He said he could bring his legislative experience to bear next year as lawmakers consider Gov. Ted Strickland's much anticipated school-funding plan.
COLUMBUS -- The state official under investigation for authorizing a personal records search of Joe the Plumber has been placed on paid administrative leave.
Ohio Job & Family Services director Helen Jones-Kelley, a supporter of President-elect Barack Obama, was suspended after a check of state computers and state e-mail found connections to political fundraising, which is not allowed on state property.
The fundraising activity related to Obama's campaign, to which Jones-Kelley contributed $2,500.
WASHINGTON -- Democrats in Ohio won two congressional seats from Republicans as votes were tallied early Wednesday, boosting the party's nationwide gains and evenly splitting Ohio's representation to Congress between the parties.
Democratic State Sen. John Boccieri captured the seat of retiring GOP Rep. Ralph Regula with 54 percent of the vote over Republican State Sen. Kirk Schuring of Canton. Boccieri said voters in the district that comprises Stark, Wayne and parts of Medina and Ashland counties wanted change after years of Republican control over the country.
"Our campaign was focused on restoring the middle class and making sure people are able to go to work and have a job and be able to afford to send their kids to college and not spend an entire day's pay filling up their gas tank," said Boccieri.
In a district that includes much of Cincinnati, Ohio legislator Steve Driehaus defeated 14-year incumbent Republican Rep. Steve Chabot with 51.8 percent of the vote. His showing was bolstered by an above-average black turnout for president-elect Barack Obama. Driehaus also "got a nice bounce" from suburban crossover voters, his communications director, Joe Wessels, reported.
See a slide show of some images from Cleveland election parties as supporters gathered to watch returns.
Barack Obama is elected president of the United States in a historic bid for the White House.
This slide show was created by The Plain Dealer night picture desk.
In own words: Mason says 'Race is not a factor in prosecutions'
CLEVELAND -- Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Bill Mason says he's upset about racial disparities in the county's criminal justice system and will undertake a major study of how to fix the problem.
But he says his office is not to blame for the issues, and he disputes his portrayal in a Plain Dealer series last month.
The newspaper examined hundreds of drug cases dating to 2000, the year Mason was elected. The review found that white defendants were 55 percent more likely to get a misdemeanor than black defendants charged with the same crime. And white defendants were 35 percent more likely to receive drug treatment as an alternative to conviction.
The statistics were published as part of a two-day series illustrating the issue by comparing the outcomes of like cases involving white and black defendants.
Mason plans a comprehensive study of race in the county's criminal justice system. Despite his concerns over the fairness of the stories, he said the newspaper's statistics have left him feeling both troubled and called to action. He wants to compare the outcomes of cases involving indigent black defendants represented by court-appointed attorneys with those who hired their own, he said.
"I want to tell you that the enthusiasm and the momentum that I feel here in Ohio is going to carry us to victory here in Ohio and throughout the country," McCain said at a rally in Hanoverton in Columbiana County.
KIRTLAND -- In a last-minute campaign stop today, one-time presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton urged more than 1,000 people at the Lakeland Community College to vote for a change and elect Barack Obama.
Getting into the spirit of Halloween, the former first lady said she had planned on dressing up in a scary outfit but that John McCain had already taken the George Bush costume.
She said the nation can't afford the "trick" of another four years of the same kind of government that George Bush gave us. She said we needed the "treat" of Barack Obama in the White House.
She excited the standing-room-only, placard-waving crowd with reminders of how good things were "the last time there was a Democrat in the White House, as I remember."
She said in those eight years more than 22 million new jobs were created, the income of the average American family rose by $7,500 and they ended the year with a budget surplus.
• Previous story: Cuyahoga County employee denies improperly checking driving record of 'Joe the Plumber'
• 'Joe the Plumber' endorses McCain on campaign tour, says Obama would make America 'socialist'
If you ask Ohio Republicans, it's because Joe -- whose real name is Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher -- had the audacity to ask Democratic candidate Barack Obama about his tax policy.
If you ask Ohio Democrats, including Gov. Ted Strickland, it's merely a routine practice to check up on the suddenly famous to see if they owe child support. And people are curious.
Ohio's inspector general, the State Highway Patrol and others have launched investigations trying to pin down why state and law-enforcement databases were accessed by people seeking information on the now internationally known Wurzelbacher.
State Department of Motor Vehicles information about Wurzelbacher -- the suburban Toledo man thrust into the presidential race in mid-October after his questioning of Obama's tax policy became a theme for Republican John McCain -- was accessed seven times, according to Lindsey Komlanc, a Department of Public Safety spokeswoman.
CLEVELAND - Sen. John McCain, on Monday, labeled his presidential rival Sen. Barack Obama and Democratic congressional leaders as "dangerous" to the economy because of expected substantial spending and tax increases.
McCain's comments followed a briefing in Cleveland this morning with some GOP officials and business leaders.
He said a Democratic-led Congress would supply no checks on Obama's economic proposals. He said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi are of the same mind as Obama.
"My friends, this is a dangerous threesome," the Republican presidential hopeful said at the Renaissance Cleveland Hotel. He said an Obama presidency would lead to a trillion dollars in new spending and tax hikes for the middle class.
Cleveland was the first stop of a six-city swing today for McCain that will Dayton and Vandalia, Ohio, before he heads to Pennsylvania.
With McCain was Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor; Jack Kemp, a former congressman; Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Meg Whitman, former CEO of eBay.
McCain said he intends to cut the 15 percent capital gains tax in half for about a year, then reduce the tax to 10% for retirees.
"I will protect your savings and retirements account," he pledged.
McCain said he would help end the housing mortgage crisis by trading more secure government-backed mortgages for at-risk home loans.
He said he wants to allow workers to carry their health-care plans from one job to another and would ease costs on health-care policy owners with a $5,000 tax credit.
Cleveland businessman David P. Morganthaler, at the briefing with McCain, said he was worried about Obama's plans to tax wealthier people.
"More taxes would mean less jobs," said Morganthaler, founder of venture-capital firm.
Barack Obama will return to Ohio on Monday.
The Democratic presidential nominee will stop at Memorial Civic Center in Canton, 1101 Market Ave. N.
His speech is set to begin at 12:30 p.m. Doors will open no later than 10:30 a.m.
Tickets are being distributed from 2 p.m. to 8 p.m. Sunday at Obama's campaign offices in Canton at 111 Second St. NW; Alliance at 15 S. Arch Ave.; and Massillon at 35 Erie St. N; and the Stark County Democratic Party office at 4220 12th St. NW.
Expect him to be back in the Buckeye state later this the week.
Black support for Sen. Barack Obama is so strong that high turnout among these voters in battleground states like Ohio will greatly contribute to Democratic victory, said the author of a presidential poll on black voters released this week.
"High turnout, with 95 percent of the black vote going to Obama, could be a definite factor in Obama winning Ohio," said David Bositis, senior research associate at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies in Washington, D.C., which conducted the survey.
The poll says Obama is likely to receive 94 percent of the black vote nationally, which would tie him with President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964.
Conversely, black support for Sen. John McCain could be in "record low territory," probably 5 percent, he said.
Bositis said this could have implications for Ohio. In 2004, 16 percent of black Ohio voters supported President Bush over Sen. John Kerry. Nationally, the figure was 11 percent.
CLEVELAND -- The Democratic Party's power couple begins two days of separate appearances in Ohio on behalf of Barack Obama.
Former President Bill Clinton is scheduled to speak Thursday at a campaign rally in Cleveland for the Democratic ticket. From there, he's going on to Columbus and a fundraiser with Gov. Ted Strickland and other leading Ohio Democrats.
On Friday, Clinton's wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, plans to lead rallies for Obama at Youngstown State University and in Delaware in central Ohio. She will be in Youngstown at YSU's Beeghly Center at noon and at Buckeye Valley Local High School in Delaware at 3 p.m.
Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin also is scheduled to return to Ohio on Friday, for an outdoor rally in the northern Cincinnati suburb of West Chester.
HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. -- John McCain seeks to change the course of a campaign moving decidedly in Barack Obama's direction Wednesday night in the third and final presidential debate.
With less than three weeks until the Nov. 4 election, the 90-minute debate focusing on the economic crisis offers the Republican senator from Arizona what could be one of his last big chances to persuade voters to give the race another look. Polls show Obama, the senator from Illinois, with a clear lead nationally and in several key battleground states.
McCain was keenly aware of the stakes he faced after two debates in which supporters suggested he was insufficiently forceful against Obama.
Over the weekend he promised to "whip" Obama's "you know what," and aides indicated McCain would criticize Obama on tax policy.
For months, McCain and his campaign have tried to convince voters that Obama is an inveterate tax raiser whose spending priorities on health care and other issues would mean higher taxes on people of all incomes. Obama has said he would raise taxes only on people making over $250,000 per year.
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Washington -- Two prominent former U.S. senators who support John McCain warned this morning of "a potential nightmare" on Election Day and afterward if measures aren't taken to monitor precincts in battleground states including Ohio.
John Danforth, a former senator from Missouri and a former United Nations ambassador, said he is deeply concerned "that this election night and the days that follow will be a rerun of 2000, and even worse than 2000."
It could be worse than the hanging chad controversy and recounts in Florida, and lead to political accusations and court fights that could delay the country from knowing the election's true outcome.
What a difference a couple of weeks make.
Boosted by growing concern about the Wall Street meltdown and Main Street credit freeze, Sen. Barack Obama is closing the gap for Ohio's 20 electoral votes in next month's presidential election, according to the latest Ohio Newspaper Poll.
The Illinois Democrat now trails Republican Sen. John McCain by two percentage points -- well within the poll's margin of error of 3.3 percent.
"It's a statistical dead-heat," said Eric Rademacher, interim co-director of the Institute for Policy Research at the University of Cincinnati, which surveyed 876 likely voters across the state Oct. 4-8.
The poll was the second of three telephone surveys commissioned by the Ohio News Organization, a group of the state's eight largest newspapers.
The first poll, conducted Sept. 12-16, showed McCain leading Obama 48 percent to 42 percent, with 5 percent of the respondents saying they'd vote for independent Ralph Nader or Libertarian Bob Barr and 5 percent undecided.
The Ohio Newspaper Poll: EconomyThe new poll found McCain's lead down to 48-46.
Ohio has been gaining more voters with college degrees and liberal viewpoints. Its share of minority voters is growing. And its share of white working-class voters, who for several decades have cast Republican ballots, is falling.
On the color scale where red is Republican and blue is Democrat, Ohio is considered purple. But "I think it's now poised on the brink of being blue-ish," says Ruy Teixeira, an expert on political demography at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. Teixeira co-directs a Brookings project examining red, blue and purple America, which on Friday released a new study of states, including Ohio.
Conservatives consider Brookings to be moderately liberal. Yet data collected by a longtime Ohio GOP observer and adviser also shows that while the parties can flip in any election, Democratic presidential candidates on average have increased their party's margins in every Ohio region over the last 40 years.
Pollsters and political operatives are cautious about sweeping conclusions, saying they see politics, not demographics, as shaping this year's election. Eric Rademacher of the University of Cincinnati notes that Republicans were ascendant in Ohio politics in the 1990s, "and people said, 'It's a red state, it's a red state.' And yet Bill Clinton won it twice."
Related content
• Cuyahoga County investigates fraudulent voter registrations linked to ACORN
WASHINGTON -- John McCain and the Republican National Committee launched a new attack on Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Friday by attempting to link him to ACORN, an activist group the GOP accuses of nationwide voting fraud.
ACORN, a 38-year-old community group that fights for the interests of low- and moderate-income families, denies the Republicans' fraud allegations. Obama denies that he has any role with ACORN beyond serving as its attorney more than a decade ago in a lawsuit that forced Illinois to comply with federal voting access laws.
That didn't stop McCain and other Republicans from attempting to plant doubts about Obama in voters' minds by trying to tie him to ACORN in a press phone call, an online ad and a new Republican National Committee Web site.
"He is clearly not telling us the truth," McCain campaign manager Rick Davis said of Obama.
ACORN, which stands Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, runs a variety of programs to assist low- and moderate-income families. Its program to register 1.3 million new voters around the country encountered glitches in places like Cuyahoga County, where the organization submitted several dozen apparently fraudulent voting applications that are under investigation by the Board of Elections.
NEW BOSTON -- Inside their gun shop, Lock Stock & Barrel, owners Rebecca and Ralph Scott display a digital clock that counts down the minutes until Republican John McCain becomes president. They are confident that it reflects the sentiments of their customers in this Appalachian city along the Ohio River.
"They have looked at the scratch marks on the tree," Rebecca said, referring record of supporting gun bans. "People come in here who have a fear of losing their guns."
But the couple worries about what's going on outside their small brick storefront in Scioto County, a socially conservative but independent voting region of 79,000 people that's become a bellwether for the state and the backdrop of a Thursday evening rally by Democrat presidential candidate Barack Obama.
"I see a 50-50 split in the county," Ralph Scott said.
Though he says he has seen one "Gun owners for Obama" bumper sticker, he believes McCain isn't losing the debate over the Second Amendment to either Obama or his running mate, Joe Biden.
"It's the economy," he said.
With an unemployment rate of 9.3 percent, the economy remains the dominant issue, which polls show plays in Obama's favor.
Tonight's vice presidential debate is being treated as the campaign season's big event, a potential ratings booster with high stakes for Sarah Palin and Joe Biden. Not to mention for Gwen Ifill, the public broadcasting journalist whose moderator duties are stirring up a minor controversy of their own.
It's not that Ifill is new to the beat. You'll recall that in 2004, she came to Cleveland to moderate the Dick Cheney-John Edwards debate at Case Western Reserve University.
But this year, a minor flap has erupted with the realization by some that Ifill is writing a political book, "The Breakthrough: Politics and Race in the Age of Obama." Conservative pundits say they are outraged. They say they fear that Ifill, a long-time public affairs reporter, will be biased toward Biden because they believe she holds favorable views of the man at the top of the Democratic ticket, Barack Obama. Others say this is much ado about nothing.
Jeff Darcy, The Plain Dealer's editorial cartoonist, offers his take (pdf) on the flap in today's newspaper.
• Rollcall vote (205-228) of the House of Representatives
WASHINGTON -- Nobody from Ohio liked the $700 billion Wall Street bailout that the House of Representatives defeated on Monday in a 228-205 vote.
Ten Ohio members of Congress voted against the bill: Democrats Dennis Kucinich, Marcy Kaptur, and Betty Sutton and Republicans Steve LaTourette, Steve Chabot, Jim Jordan, Bob Latta, Pat Tiberi, Mike Turner and Jean Schmidt.
Its seven Ohio supporters included every member of the state's congressional delegation who will retire at the end of year -- Republicans Ralph Regula, Deborah Pryce and David Hobson -- along with House Majority Leader John Boehner. Democrats Tim Ryan, Zack Space and Charlie Wilson also backed the plan.
• Find the top counties, cities and precincts in Ohio for newly registered voters at cleveland.com/datacentral.
One in four newly registered voters statewide lives in Democratic-rich Cuyahoga County, with most of those in Cleveland.
Such figures could bode well for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, who is relying on the county and other urban centers to give him a victory in November.
Franklin and Hamilton counties, which include Columbus and Cincinnati, respectively, round out the top three counties with the highest number of new voters.
Across the state, nearly 40 percent of the 700,000 newly registered voters live in precincts that Democrat John Kerry carried with at least 60 percent of the vote in 2004, according to a Plain Dealer analysis of voter registration data and 2004 election results from the Secretary of State's office.
The Democratic vice presidential candidate hammered away at the struggles of middle-class America, from low wages to high health-care costs, and accused the current administration and Republican candidate John McCain of ignoring their plight.
"Eight years later, what are we hearing? Another Republican who is telling us the exact same thing," Biden said. "We have seen this movie and as we all know, the sequel is always worse than the original movie."
COLUMBUS -- Former Attorney General Marc Dann must pay back more than $40,000 in upgrades and security enhancements to his Youngstown house paid from his political funds while he was still in office.
The Ohio secretary of state's office, which is auditing Dann's campaign spending, said the new security windows, doors and lights, and the alarm system were hardly legitimate political expenses for his campaign committee.
"Mr. Dann must immediately refund to the committee the full value of all expenses related to the security enhancements to his personal residence as there was no legal justification for . . . use of campaign funds for that purpose," wrote J. Curtis Mayhew, the secretary's campaign finance administrator.
Mayhew sent Dann a four-page letter demanding the payment within 21 days or he would face a hearing before the Ohio Elections Commission.
Presidential campaign rallies scheduled in NE Ohio
Sen. Hillary Clinton will hold campaign rallies in Elyria and Akron on Sunday on behalf of Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama. Both events are open to the public. Tickets are not required, although an RSVP is encouraged.
Doors open at 11:30 a.m. for the first event at Lorain County Community College,1005 N. Abbe Road, Elyria. To RSVP, go to here.
Doors open at 2 p.m. for the Akron event, at the Ellet High School gymnasium, 309 Woolf Ave. The program begins at 3:30 p.m. To RSVP, go here.
Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain and his running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, will hold a rally Tuesday near Youngstown. The event is at 4 p.m. at Winner Aviation, 1453 Youngstown Kingsville Road N.E., Vienna. Doors open at 1 p.m. Tickets will be available starting today. For information, go here.
Palin also will attend fund-raisers around Ohio next week.
WASHINGTON -- Sen. Hillary Clinton's visits to Akron and Elyria on Sunday to stump for Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama are coming not a moment too soon for anxious Ohio Democrats.
With two new polls this week showing a tight race in Ohio, Democratic officials say they worry that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has boosted GOP nominee John McCain's prospects in the state, and that Obama has his work cut out for him if he wants to secure Ohio's crucial 20 electoral votes.
Obama will need to not only sharpen his message about his differences with McCain on economic issues, officials in several key swing counties said this week, but also continue to seek plenty of help on the campaign trail from popular Democrats like Clinton, her husband and Gov. Ted Strickland.
"My, my, wouldn't she have liked to see this turnout," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, gazing out at roughly 300 people gathered in Statuary Hall to honor Tubbs Jones, who died unexpectedly last month when an aneurysm burst.
Friends of Tubbs Jones ranging from Bainbridge Township GOP Rep. Steve LaTourette to House Democratic Whip Jim Clyburn of South Carolina remembered her as a friend, fashion critic and prankster unafraid to needle anyone from Fox News commentator Bill O'Reilly to President Bush.