Yesterday, former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell announced that he is forming a super PAC called Defend US in order to “devote my energy to harnessing the passion that lead [sic] President Donald J. Trump to an eight-point victory in our state.”
Blackwell served as a conduit between the Trump administration and Religious Right activists when he joined the president’s transition team, where he focused on domestic policy.
As a senior fellow with the Family Research Council, Blackwell has also pushed anti-LGBTQ rhetoric and myths, from claiming that homosexuality “defies barnyard logic,” to comparing it to kleptomania and dubbing it a “lifestyle” that can be “changed.” Following the 2014 killings in Isla Vista, California, Blackwell claimed that the attack that left six dead and fourteen wounded was a result of “the attack on natural marriage and the family.”
He has also defended Attorney General Jeff Sessions from accusations of racial bias, arguing that Sessions is the real victim of bias because he is a white Southerner. Like Sessions, Blackwell also has a history of undermining voting rights.
Blackwell unsuccessfully ran for governor of Ohio in 2006.
