Through no prompting that their company would admit to, employees of Cincinnati Financial Corp. and its affiliates donated more than $125,000 to the campaigns of Ohio Supreme Court justices-elect Pat DeWine and Pat Fischer — an amount far exceeding the contributions of any other company or group to high court candidates.
Contributions compiled by CityBeat from the Ohio Secretary of State’s website show how a single company can play a prominent role in state judicial elections. Based in Fairfield, Cincinnati Financial is one of the biggest insurance companies in Ohio. Somehow, 141of its employees determined in lockstep that two retiring Republican justices should be replaced by Republicans DeWine and Fischer. They gave no money to Democratic candidates. And of the 141 employees, 131 gave money to both DeWine and Fischer. Most gave equal amounts.
Most of those employees work for the company’s Cincinnati Insurance subsidiary. Betsy Ertel, a spokeswoman for Cincinnati Financial, said the company played no role in their employees’ decisions to give money to the two Supreme Court candidates. Asked if the employees’ contributions – $72,975 to Fischer, $52,175 to DeWine – were coincidental, she said yes.
“We don’t ask associates to contribute to a particular candidate,” Ertel said. “They can voluntarily support any candidate they choose.”
Through its employees, Cincinnati Financial factored into the Ohio Supreme Court campaign finance picture like no other organization. The bulk of candidates’ contributions came from law firms, corporate and labor union political action committees and individual donors.
NiSource, a utility that owns Columbia Gas of Ohio, was one of the biggest corporate givers. Its PAC spread $21,100 among DeWine, Fischer and Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor, a Republican who ran unopposed. The PAC of FirstEnergy, another utility, gave $13,400 to Fischer.
Other insurance companies and lobbies were pikers compared to the employees of Cincinnati Financial. The PAC of Montgomery-based Ohio National Financial Services gave $6,700 to Fischer, $5,700 to O’Connor. Nationwide’s PAC gave $6,700 to DeWine. The Ohio Insurance Agents PAC gave $6,700 to Fischer, $6,200 to DeWine, and the Ohio State Farm Agents PAC gave $6,700 to DeWine, $4,200 to Fischer.
Two members of the Cincinnati Financial board of directors, brothers John and Tom Schiff, spearheaded employees’ giving to Supreme Court candidates. John Schiff, the former chairman and CEO, gave $7,200 to both DeWine and Fischer, his wife Lynn $3,600 to both. Tom Schiff, CEO of the John J. and Thomas R. Schiff Co., gave $7,200 to Fischer, $3,600 to DeWine. Charles Schiff, a vice president at that insurance agency, gave $3,600 to both.
[To view a full list of contributions by Cincinnati Financial and affiliate employees to DeWine and Fischer in 2016, click here.]
Catherine Turcer, policy analyst for Common Cause Ohio, said she doesn’t know why Cincinnati Financial employees backed DeWine and Fischer. She said that insurance companies, in general, have a stake in the composition of state courts.
“Insurance companies clearly want to pay out as little as possible to maximize profits,” she said by email. “Contentious claims end up at the Ohio Supreme Court, and it’s in their best interest to have a business-friendly court. The employees from insurance companies have been engaged in Ohio Supreme Court elections for many years.”
As for Ertel’s claim that Cincinnati Financial didn’t steer employees toward giving money to DeWine and Fischer, Turcer said the company “clearly encouraged its employees to donate to its preferred judicial candidate.
“This type of bundling of many smaller contributions allows the company to make a bigger splash than just one contribution from a company PAC,” she said. “Numerous smaller contributions from multiple sources are also less likely to make a judge consider recusing him- or herself from hearing a case involving the company.”
Alicia Bannon, senior counsel for the Democracy Program at the left-leaning Brennan Center for Justice in New York, also spoke of the insurance industry’s interest in state court elections.
“Many of the biggest spenders in state supreme court races are lawyers and business interests which regularly appear in state court – including insurance companies,” she said by email. “The National Institute on Money in State Politics estimates that, in 2012, candidates for the Ohio Supreme Court received $291,895 in contributions from the insurance industry, more than 8 percent of total contributions.
“Often, interests like these are seeking to influence who sits on state high courts and, ultimately, the decisions that courts are making,” Bannon said. “More than 95 percent of the public believes that campaign spending by special interests impacts outcomes on the bench. As judicial races have become more expensive and politicized, they pose a dangerous threat to the integrity of our courts.”
Both DeWine and Fischer serve as judges on Ohio’s First District Court of Appeals in Cincinnati. CityBeat left three voicemail messages for their secretary Monday and did not receive a return phone call.
Bill DeMora was campaign manager for John O’Donnell, a Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court judge who lost to Fischer by less than 1 percent of the Supreme Court vote. He doesn’t believe that Cincinnati Financial employees acted on their own.
“It comes as no shock to us that Cincinnati Financial Corp. made their employees give money to our opposition, someone they have known for years and who has rendered decisions in favor of insurance companies on a regular basis,” DeMora said. “Their explanation that it is a ‘coincidence’ is laughable and doesn’t pass the smell test of any rational thinking person.”
CONTACT JAMES McNAIR: jmcnair@citybeat.com / @JMacNews on Twitter / 513-665-4700, x. 142
This article appears in Nov 23-30, 2016.
