It was a surprise that so many people attended the Michael V. Ryan press conference at the Courtyard by Marriott in Hamilton, Ohio. The current Vice-Mayor of the city and city council member announced that he was running for Butler County Commissioner, and it was good to see such a diverse group of people coming out to show him support on a Monday afternoon. There were people of all ages and a nice, even number of men and women from all kinds of backgrounds, which showed broad support early in the process. When I first heard about it, I thought it was a great idea that someone from the group of anti-liberal rebels on the City Council would migrate into the commissioner seat that is coming up, where the incumbent, Cindy Carpenter, is up for re-election. Recently, she had been caught in Middletown, Ohio, campaigning for Democrats, and that pretty much sealed her fate among the many who have been unhappy with her over the years and have been calling her a RINO. Well, now people had more than speculation on the matter, and they were looking for alternatives. And Michael Ryan was making himself available, and people were excited about it. It was also surprising that several officeholders also showed up to lend their support. When you see Bruce Jones at a political event, you know something significant is brewing, because he tends to associate with emerging vigilance over the years that I have come to trust for several decades now. And as I peeked around the crowd to the back of the room, I saw Mark Welch, the West Chester trustee there, whom I wanted to talk to. It was a good crowd that had run out of seats, leaving many standing in the background and doorways to hear the future commissioner speak.
After the announcement, I took the chance to speak with Mark because I knew he was also thinking of running for commissioner, so it showed some significance that he was willing to come out and support Michael Ryan running. The other two seats for the commissioner have a few years left on them, so for Mark to show public support this early in the process was very admirable. And as we discussed, he has challengers for his trustee seat, which is up for re-election this year. And he is committed to protecting that seat, which I thought showed great teamwork by the GOP to help in several races, which I’d like to see more of. West Chester has been great because it has had some significant policies from the trustees over the years, which worked best when George Lang and Mark Welch served in West Chester simultaneously. The best path forward, which has made West Chester one of the best places to live in the world, occurred during this period. But since then, George has moved on to become State Senator, leaving Ann Becker to fill that void, which we all thought was going to be a good thing, as she used to be the President of the West Chester Tea Party, and the Cincinnati Tea Party, and she was a good friend. She was on 55 KRC all the time announcing on the radio Tea Party events and was a key to implementing fiscal small government ideas back into the Butler County Republican Party. But time has a way of eroding at people, and the person she once was isn’t quite so much anymore, and she has been siding with Democrats a lot these days, which has been a concern. Because the other guy, Lee Wong, is a known Democrat. So the trustees have moved more toward the Democrat side of things in dangerous ways.
Mark knows the situation, and he doesn’t feel like he can step away from the West Chester Trustee race because he needs help, so things don’t get out of control. At a minimum, Mark needs to win one of the two seats this year, with Lee also up for re-election. So while everyone is excited about Michael Ryan running for commissioner, the Republican Party needs to protect some of the best spots, which in West Chester is how the MAGA movement evolved in the Butler County area and set the foundation for what a prosperous community with good politics should look like. Ann Becker and I used to be close during all this, and I was very supportive of her in that other Trustee spot George left behind. And back then, we all planned to keep West Chester conservative by tag-teaming who would run and maintain a two-vote majority. It meant a lot that Mark was doing that with this Butler County Commissioner race because that’s how you get good management at these positions. It doesn’t do any good for everyone to beat each other up in primaries only to wonder why some knuckle-dragging Democrat ends up winning in the end, pretending to be a Republican, such as what we had for a long time in Cindy Carpenter. I can say that in Ann Becker’s case, she didn’t start badly. She and I parted political ways a bit when Trump came into the picture, and I was in full support of him early, while it took others a while to get there. Ann eventually did, but over the coming years, it got increasingly complex to hold the same Tea Party political philosophy, as life has a way of chipping away at our foundational beliefs. And at times like that, political challengers are healthy and needed. But knowing when to work together and when to challenge for the betterment of a party that serves the needs of a representative government can be tricky, and takes good people to do things for the right reasons.
Many great things are happening where Michael Ryan, as a commissioner, could be inspiring, especially given that Vivek Ramaswamy will soon be the governor of Ohio. Butler County is one of the biggest counties in Ohio, with high population density, so having Michael Ryan as one of the commissioners is a rare opportunity. Trump in the White House setting economic policies flowing down into all levels of government is showing great promise, which Vivek’s future administration will take full advantage of. Then, having an enterprising commissioner like Michael Ryan engage in that excitement is a great opportunity. What he has done with the City Council of Hamilton has been fun to watch; they have done things that have brought life back to the city that I never thought I’d see in my lifetime. And he could do so much more as a commissioner. But we don’t want to lose the West Chester seats, because that would be a step backward. So it was good to see some teamwork at key positions, covering each other with support where it counted. Elections are always opportunities. It’s rare to have such good people running for politics simultaneously in the same room, but that was certainly the case here. Michael Ryan and his very nice wife, Amanda, are good, solid people who bring a lot of pride to Republican politics and have a very bright future that is well deserved. But authentic leadership doesn’t just come in election wins; it comes in setting the table for victory on many fronts. It was also good to see that happening in the background at the Michael Ryan announcement for County Commissioner on a bright day in May 2025 was unfolding a new strategy, where so many opportunities were blooming everywhere. And in the Republican Party, several flowers have lost their luster and are wilting. Cindy Carpenter is one of them, and she needs to go. There is no reason to put up with wilted flowers who are Democrats in disguise when we have so many good, solid Republicans who are aligned with the MAGA movement. But everyone will need to support each other in these efforts.
Rich Hoffman
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