Ohio Politics Explained: Nazi home-school, DeWine's budget and public corruption

Ohio's governor outlined how he'd like to spend the state's money this week. An Upper Sandusky couple was "unmasked" as the leaders of a pro-Nazi home-school group. And a major public corruption trial dove deep into dark money.

We break down what it all means In this week's episode of Ohio Politics Explained. A podcast created by the USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau to catch you up on the state's political news in 15 minutes or less.

This week, host Anna Staver was joined by statehouse bureau chief Anthony Shoemaker.

1) Nazi home-schoolers

Ohio made national news this week when an Upper Sandusky couple was exposed for leading an online community devoted to sharing pro-Nazi curricula for home-school parents.

According to Vice and HuffPost, the couple used a Telegram messenger channel called “Dissident Homeschool" to share their lessons with more than 2,000 people.

Elected officials from across the political spectrum condemned the curricula, but they didn't agree on what could be done to prevent something similar from happening again.

Democrats think more oversight of Ohio's home-school families is worth discussing, but Republicans aren't convinced that would prevent parents from sharing hateful ideologies with their children.

2) Dark money deep dive

Federal prosecutors say Former Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder conspired with others to pass a $1.3 billion bailout for two nuclear power plants in exchange for more than $60 million in bribes.

Householder says he's innocent, and this week the jury who will decide who's telling the truth got a crash course in dark money.

An FBI agent and prosecutors walked jurors through text messages, bank statements, calendar entries and other records to demonstrate how FirstEnergy backed Householder's plan to win back control of the Ohio House.

3) The governor's big budget

Gov. Mike DeWine released his budget this week, and it focused heavily on investments in education and mental health.

He asked lawmakers to give parents a $2,500 tax deduction for their children, expand eligibility for school vouchers, eliminate the sales tax on baby items like diapers and invest $300 million in capital improvements and equipment for career tech education.

Republicans and Democrats both said there was a lot to like about DeWine's proposals but the devil will be in the details as they spend the next several months making changes.

4) Redistricting redo?

Former Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Maureen O'Connor thinks Ohio needs to change the way it does redistricting, again.

"It's something I'm spending time on now with a core group of people," O'Connor said during a Columbus Metropolitan Club luncheon Wednesday. "We're talking about it very seriously."

Voters changed how Ohio draws boundaries for state and federal lawmakers by amending the state constitution in 2015 and 2018.

But when it came time to actually draw the maps, O'Connor and the court rejected several versions of each as unconstitutional. Republicans strongly disagreed with those opinions while Democrats supported them.

And the whole mess left O'Connor with the opinion that "there would be no elected officials on the redistricting commission in an ideal format."

Listen to "Ohio Politics Explained" on Spotify, Apple, Google Podcasts and TuneIn Radio. The episode is also available by clicking the link in this article.

The USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau serves The Columbus Dispatch, Cincinnati Enquirer, Akron Beacon Journal and 18 other affiliated news organizations across Ohio.

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Ohio Explained: Nazi homeschool, DeWine's budget and public corruption