Ken Blackwell
John Kenneth Blackwell is an American politician, author, and conservative activist who served as the mayor of Cincinnati, Ohio, the Ohio state treasurer, and Ohio secretary of state. He was the Republican candidate for governor of Ohio in 2006, the first African American major-party candidate for governor of Ohio. He is a senior fellow at the Family Research Council. He is vice president of the executive committee of the Council For National Policy and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
Early life and education
Blackwell was born in Alliance, Ohio, the son of Dana, a part-time nurse, and George Blackwell, a meat packer. He has two brothers, Carl and Charles. He married his wife, Rosa, in 1969 while he was in college. They have three children. Blackwell is the nephew of Olympic long-jumper DeHart Hubbard, who was the first Black athlete to win a gold medal in an individual Olympic event, jumping more than 24 feet at the 1924 Paris Olympics.Blackwell grew up in Cincinnati's Avondale and West End neighborhoods. He attended Samuel Ach Junior High School and graduated from Hughes High School, where he met his future wife.
Blackwell attended Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio, on a football scholarship. He received a Bachelor of Science degree in psychology from Xavier in 1970 and his Master of Education degree, also from Xavier, in 1971. After college, he was invited to the Dallas Cowboys' training camp; he gave up football when told he would have to convert from linebacker to offensive lineman. He taught at Xavier from 1974 to 1991.
He has served as a trustee of Wilberforce University and Wilmington College. On April 25, 1987, Blackwell was made a Mason-on-Sight by Grand Master Odes J. Kyle Jr. of the Most Worshipful Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Ohio; thereby making him a Prince Hall Freemason. This African-American branch of Freemasonry was founded in the 19th century.
Political career
Blackwell became involved in politics through the Charter Committee, Cincinnati's third party. He was elected to and served on the Cincinnati city council.In 1978, he was elected as Mayor of Cincinnati, serving into 1980. One of his first priorities was to establish a crowd control task force, to study better methods of crowd control and injury prevention. This was in response to the deaths of 11 concert fans at a concert by the British rock group The Who at Riverfront Coliseum on December 3, 1979.
Blackwell is a member of the Council For National Policy and as of 2022 is vice president of the group's executive committee.
When Blackwell began to consider statewide and national offices, he became a Republican. He was appointed to serve in the administration of President George H. W. Bush as undersecretary in the Department of Housing and Urban Development, a position he held from 1989 to 1990. He returned to Cincinnati to run for the first district seat in the United States House of Representatives which was being vacated by Tom Luken. Blackwell lost to Luken's son, Charlie Luken, by a narrow 51% to 49% margin. Following his close defeat, Blackwell was appointed by President Bush as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights. Blackwell served in that post from 1992 to 1993.
In 1994, GovernorGeorge Voinovich appointed Blackwell as Ohio state treasurer to complete the term of Mary Ellen Withrow. She had been appointed as Treasurer of the United States by President Bill Clinton. Blackwell was elected treasurer in 1994 and was elected Ohio secretary of state in 1998. That year, Blackwell considered a run for governor, but Ohio Republican Party chairman Robert T. Bennett persuaded Blackwell to run for secretary of state instead, leaving the governorship open to Bob Taft. Blackwell was national chairman of longtime friend Steve Forbes' presidential campaign in 2000. Blackwell was re-elected secretary of state in 2002.
Ohio secretary of state
Involvement in the 2004 U.S. presidential election
As Secretary of State of a swing state, Blackwell played a prominent role in the 2004 United States elections. He was the state's chief elections officer, overseeing Ohio's elections process. He was named as an honorary co-chair of the 2004 Bush campaign.Prior to the 2004 presidential election, Blackwell announced he would enforce existing Ohio State election law decreeing that any person who appeared at a polling place to vote but whose registration could not be confirmed would be given only a provisional ballot; if it were later determined that the person had attempted to vote in the wrong precinct, then their provisional ballot would not be counted. He directed poll workers to refuse to distribute provisional ballots unless they were satisfied as to the voter's residence. The Democratic Party filed a lawsuit alleging that the policy was in violation of federal election law, specifically section 302 of the Help America Vote Act.
On October 21, 2004, U.S. district court judge James G. Carr issued an order rejecting Blackwell's policy. Blackwell appealed the decision to the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. On October 26, 2004, the Court of Appeals unanimously affirmed in part and reversed in part.
Democratic members of the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary asked Blackwell to testify about the Ohio election in two letters. He responded to the first letter, noting that he was already responding to requests from the Government Accountability Office and the Department of Justice.
On December 27, 2004, Blackwell requested a court order to protect him from being interviewed in the Moss v. Bush case, a challenge of the presidential vote. He fought a subpoena, arguing that the litigation was frivolous.
A report written by the ranking House Judiciary Committee member John Conyers, a Democrat, blamed Blackwell for "massive and unprecedented voter irregularities and anomalies in Ohio."
Release of Ohio Social Security numbers
On March 1, 2006, Blackwell's office accidentally published a list of 1.2 million Social Security numbers of Ohio citizens on a website along with their business filings. A federal class-action lawsuit was filed by Darrell Estep, who claimed that the release of the data had resulted in his Social Security number appearing three times on the public website. The lawsuit was settled on March 28, 2006, after the numbers were removed from the website, a registration process was enacted to view the data, and Blackwell's office agreed to make monthly progress reports to the court. The data was part of a centralized voter database, required by federal law. At that time, Blackwell promised to retain only the last four digits of the Social Security number in the database to prevent future problems.On April 26, 2006, Blackwell's office accidentally disclosed Ohio Social Security numbers, mailing out computer disks containing the names, addresses, and Social Security numbers of 5.7 million registered voters in Ohio. The list was released as a standard practice under the Freedom of Information Act and Help America Vote Act. Blackwell's office apologized, saying that the release of the Social Security numbers was accidental and that "all of the vendors who received the disks have agreed to return them."
Jim Petro, then Republican attorney general of Ohio, launched an investigation into the disclosure, citing a legal requirement to "investigate any state entity where there may be a risk of a loss of private data." Blackwell stated that he considered the issue to be closed, but Petro disagreed, saying that he would use "maximum due diligence" to ensure that the data was not copied before it was returned. Ohio law requires that individuals be notified if their Social Security numbers are compromised.
Diebold Election Systems
Ohio state senator Jeff Jacobson asked Blackwell in July 2003 to disqualify Diebold Election Systems' bid to supply voting machines for the state after security problems were discovered in its software.On April 4, 2006, the Columbus Dispatch reported that Blackwell "owned stock in Diebold, a voting-machine manufacturer. After discovering the stock ownership, Blackwell promptly sold the shares at a loss." He attributed the purchase to an unidentified financial manager at Credit Suisse First Boston who he said had, without his knowledge, violated his instructions to avoid potential conflict of interest.
When Cuyahoga County's primary was held on May 2, 2006, officials ordered the hand-counting of more than 18,000 paper ballots after Diebold's new optical scan machines produced inconsistent tabulations. Blackwell ordered an investigation by the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections.
2006 Ohio gubernatorial campaign
Campaign and national significance
Blackwell was the Republican nominee for Governor of Ohio in 2006. He beat state attorney general Jim Petro in the 2006 Republican primary. Blackwell's opponents in the general election were Democratic Congressman Ted Strickland, Libertarian professor emeritus Bill Peirce, and Green Bob Fitrakis. Blackwell chose Ohio state representative Tom Raga to be his running mate. Blackwell was the first African American to be nominated by a major political party as a candidate for the Ohio governorship.There had been increased national attention on the ability of the Republican Party to maintain control in Ohio. On a national level, The New York Times suggested that the results of the election would be a bellwether for the 2008 U.S. presidential election. According to a broad survey reported by The Plain Dealer on April 30, 2006, Ohio voters would "prefer to see a Democrat occupy the governor's mansion." John Stemberger, president and general counsel for the Florida Family Policy Council, however, was quoted as saying that Blackwell could "potentially be president of the United States someday, and the first black president at that."
On November 7, 2006, Ted Strickland was elected governor, defeating Blackwell by a 24% margin.