If there are no sure things in politics, then Ohio’s 3rd Congressional district is about as close as you can come.
Like most other Ohio districts since new congressional lines were drawn in 2011, the 3rd has proven safe for its incumbent representative Joyce Beatty. The Democrat has won four elections since 2012 by an average margin of 38% and is seeking her fifth victory on November 3.
“I don’t think there’s any safe district, and certainly history has said that,” Beatty told ABC 6/FOX 28 in an interview leading up to Election Day. “I’ve had tough races from the beginning, but I think what people looked at was, what was in the best interest at the time for the 3rd district.”
The Blacklick resident faces a challenge this fall from a decorated Navy veteran and a Honda maintenance technician who lives 25 miles outside the district.
Mark Richardson, the veteran who later made his living in mortgage insurance, is running on the Republican line. Richardson said while previous challengers ran against Beatty “just because,” he is the first candidate to mount an aggressive door-to-door campaign to unseat the incumbent.
“I know it’s a Democrat district, I knew it going in,” Richardson says of the 3rd. “But I still believe in the people, and we’re all Americans first, what do (voters) have to lose? This is where we are after 10 years.”
Nicholas Moss is a first-time candidate and write-in hopeful. An Ohio State alumnus and Honda employee, he has traveled from his home in Raymond, Union County each week to knock on doors and ask for votes.
“People can go to my website and read my policies, it’s a common-sense starting point and we can build from there,” Moss said. “My ideas that I have now, I might not win, but somebody else might take it, pick it up and run with it.”
GUN VIOLENCE
Each of the three candidates is well aware that the 3rd District covers the hubs of gun violence in Central Ohio: the Hilltop, Linden and South Columbus neighborhoods. With the bulk of those gun crimes being committed with illegal firearms, Richardson says he would push for a nationwide federal gun buyback program.
“I guarantee you’re probably going to get half a million guns off the streets that are illegal,” Richardson says. “It’s not going to affect the 2nd Amendment at all, because it’s a voluntary buy back to have a massive reorganization of gun legislation, it hasn’t worked in how many years?”
Richardson is endorsed by Buckeye Firearms Association, which often lobbies and fights against gun control legislation at the Statehouse.
Beatty, long known as a stalwart for gun control reform at the federal level, is not opposed to a gun buyback. Her goals, however, stretch further.
“We (Democrats) have offered many things: closing the gun (show) loophole; making sure that if you can't go and get on an airplane, you should not be able to go and buy a gun,” Beatty said. “Also, being able to wait out the period so there can be a check on you, so they can do a background check.”
The latter is a nod to the Enhanced Background Checks Act of 2019, which passed the House on a party-line vote. Beatty did not co-sponsor the bill, but did vote for it. The bill has languished in the Senate since February 2019.
Beatty said she “believes in the right of people to have guns, if they know how to keep them in locked box, how to keep them safe, how to use them.”
Nick Moss, who says he’s known friends involved in gang activity in the 3rd district, said if elected to Congress he would leave gun reforms up to the states.
“At the federal level, we can also take steps to help the states out, to make sure they get the funding they need to be able to curb the violence,” Moss said. If local authorities would approve, Moss says he would vote to authorize federal authorities including ATF to enter Columbus and potentially seize illegal firearms, if necessary.
“People need to know that we’re going to try and do what we can, to stem that violence now,” Moss said.
HUMAN TRAFFICKING AND DRUGS
The stretch of Sullivant Avenue through the heart of the Hilltop is among the worst in the district, notorious for drug and human trafficking activity, which together drive prostitution. City of Columbus leaders have devoted special effort to revitalizing the corridor over the last two years.
Beatty said she has participated in those efforts.
“Congresswoman Ann Wagner, a Republican, co-authored with me much of our human trafficking legislation which has been successful,” Beatty said. “We also have legislation which I have sponsored and co-sponsored that no longer makes that person who was trafficked, the guilty party. They are the victim.”
Beatty also says she’s worked on federal legislation to end “suggestive” internet messaging, activity that leads to trafficking incidents.
“The job is far from being done; we need to certainly move the needle,” she said.
Richardson said it’s about increasing funding “to provide safety and security for these people to go to.”
“We also need to really step it up. We need to look at concentrated areas where that’s coming from, and work with a coalition of the other states that are really suffering from this,” he said. “Come together, for a solution.”
Moss believes the federal government has primary jurisdiction over human trafficking, especially when the offenders take their victims across state lines.
“People around here are even getting taken off the streets,” Moss said. “It starts down at the personal level as well at the federal level, we need better laws in effect.”
On drugs and prostitution, Moss says those problems “run rampant” on Sullivant Avenue.
“Let’s make laws that get the funding in here, for facilities that can help them,” he said.
COVID-19
On the COVID-19 pandemic, the House of Representatives continues wrangling with President Trump and Senate Republicans over a relief bill for Americans and businesses.
Moss said it’s simple: get money to the people that need it.
“I looked at the HEROES Act 2.0, there’s over $700 billion of extra money that don’t need to be in there just like the Republicans, they have put extra stuff in their bills,” Moss said. “The little people that really need that money, let’s get it out to them, come to an agreement on something. People deserve that.”
Moss said he’d like to see $2,000 paid to each eligible American because “that’s their money, let’s give it back to them.”
Richardson agrees, for the most part.
“What they’ve done with the COVID and stimulus, I can’t believe. Just make a bill for the people, give them the resources they need to keep a business open, put food on the table,” he said. “It’s just political theatrics.”
Battling COVID and poverty, Richardson signaled that connecting Ohioans with jobs is a way to ensure economic growth for the 3rd district, and proposed that he would expand upon the Trump administration’s use of “Opportunity Zones” in Central Ohio, which incentivize developers to invest in poorer neighborhoods by reducing or eliminating their tax burden.
Beatty’s focus is on relief and aid.
“We’re offering unemployment to those who have lost their jobs; if they still had their jobs, we wouldn’t need this,” Beatty said, noting the $1,200 stipend and $600 unemployment benefit paid to qualifying citizens was a bipartisan agreement.
“We have tons of people who are saying, ‘thank you because now I can feed my children,’” Beatty said. “When you look at this district, and especially the unemployment rate for brown and black people, I would do it all over again.”
Beatty said she supports another round of stimulus payments to individuals.
BIPARTISANSHIP AND CIVILITY IN POLITICS
The incumbent Beatty often touts her founding of the Bipartisan Civility Caucus on Capitol Hill, which he started with Republican Rep. Steve Stivers of the neighboring 15th district.
“We are very clear in our platform that you can disagree, without being disagreeable,” Beatty said. “We don’t have the same voting record, and that is not the intention of civility.”
Beatty’s voting and support record has been against priorities of the Trump administration between 90-93% of the time, according to the 538 Congressional Tracker.
Richardson claims Beatty’s record of opposing or even demonizing Republicans is reflected her social media posts disparaging members of the GOP.
“She needs to realize, there are 100,000 voters in the district who voted Republican,” Richardson said. “I’ve heard from people that she won’t return calls, she won’t return emails, and that’s been my experience too living in the district.”
While Richardson attended President Trump’s recent rally in Circleville and is fervently supportive of the President on Twitter, he said he agrees only with “some” of Trump’s policy goals, including Opportunity Zones.
As an independent candidate, Moss lays out policy ideas that lean both conservative and liberal but err on the side of small government. He says he’ll commit to working with whomever will cooperate on Capitol Hill.
“(Beatty) doesn’t work with the other side of the aisle,” he said. “I’m an independent guy as a write-in. Some Democrats that I’ve been talking to, they want the change. I’d like to see this district get back more to the middle.”
*A fourth candidate running a write-in campaign for the 3rd Congressional District is Angela Davis. ABC 6/FOX 28 made several unsuccessful attempts to locate and contact Davis for this story.