Renacci selects conservative filmmaker for running mate

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Dec. 2—WEST CHESTER, Ohio — Making a direct pitch for the conservative vote as he seeks to block Gov. Mike DeWine's path to the Republican nomination, former congressman Jim Renacci on Thursday pegged a producer and writer of religiously and politically themed films as his running mate.

The most recent production from Joe Knopp, 47, is last year's The Trump I Know, a documentary and positive portrayal of the President from last fall just prior to his loss to now-President Biden. Mr. Knopp interviewed the then-President Donald Trump and members of his family for the film and has also spoken glowingly of former Vice President Mike Pence.

"I'm just proud to stand next to a guy that has business experience, real-world experience, who didn't go to college to learn how to become a politician, which I really believe is how the system was designed," Mr. Knopp told The Blade prior to the announcement.

The would-be lieutenant governor has also produced other films that have found success among conservative audiences, including 2019's controversial Unplanned. It told the story of Abby Johnson, a former abortion clinic director turned anti-abortion activist, and he has been involved in the Dove Award-winning film I Can Only Imagine of 2018 and Woodlawn in 2015.

Mr. Renacci had listed Mr. Knopp last month among a long list of "influencers" of his campaign. The announcement of his selection as running mate took place in heavily Republican West Chester just north of Cincinnati.

Raised in an orphanage outside Philadelphia with two sisters because their parents had addiction issues, Mr. Knopp now hails from Springboro south of Dayton. He enlisted in the Air Force, which brought him to the Wright-Patterson base at nearby Kettering. He met wife in Ohio and stayed, graduating from Wright State University with a bachelor's degree in finance.

"I didn't really have a family to go back to," he said. "So Ohio became my family, and that was 30 years ago."

Mr. Renacci said he began the vetting process for a running mate three months ago, talking to about 20 people, including state legislators.

He said he got to know him when the two were unexpectedly seated together at an event and began talking.

"I realized that he met much of the criteria that I was looking for — an outsider, business person, somebody not like DeWine-Husted who have 65, 66, 67 years of political baggage," Mr. Renacci said. "And also a fresh face who cares about family, who cares about freedoms, who cares about Ohioans."

Mr. Trump endorsed Mr. Renacci in 2018 in his failed bid to unseat Democratic U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, but the former president has yet to endorse anyone in the 2022 Ohio governor's race. Also trying to flank Mr. DeWine from the right is central Ohio farmer and businessman Joe Blystone.

In a November, 2020 tweet, Mr. Trump seemed to invite a primary challenge to Mr. DeWine after the governor recognized Mr. Biden as the president-elect early on, dismissing President Trump's narrative that the election had been stolen. Mr. Trump has continued that narrative since as he has hinted at a 2024 rematch.

Mr. Renacci has challenged Mr. DeWine's conservative credentials, calling him the "Cuomo of Ohio" in his response to the coronavirus pandemic and criticized his federally funded lotteries to spur vaccinations.

Mr. Knopp said he met Mr. DeWine at the time that he was promoting Unplanned. He said he tried to talk to the governor about abortion, the focus of the film, but he said he found the governor disinterested. He said he found that puzzling given that lawmakers were moving at the time toward passage of the so-called Heartbeat Bill, which would all but ban abortions in the state once a fetal heartbeat was detectable.

As an Ohio Republican, he also voted for Mr. DeWine for governor in 2018.

"Mike DeWine has been around for 45 years," Mr. Renacci said. "How much more time do you want to give him to fix the state? Jon Husted's been around since 2000. How much time do you want to give him to fix the state. It's time."

The DeWine campaign declined to comment for this story.

Like the top of the ticket, Mr. Knopp criticized Mr. DeWine for his response to the coronavirus, noting that his children missed out on a year of in-school instruction and socialization.

"My church was shut down...," he said during the press conference. "Two miles down the road, the only abortion clinic in Dayton, Ohio was open. ... How does a pro-life governor allow that? I don't understand it."

While he conceded that Mr. DeWine did not order churches closed with his stay-at-home order during the early days of the pandemic, he and Mr. Renacci said clergy and parishioners were scared into voluntarily closing.

Mr. DeWine's health director did order all ambulatory surgical facilities, which include abortion clinics, to cease elective procedures last March early in the pandemic when personal protection equipment was still scarce. But the courts ultimately allowed the clinics to continue operating.

Mr. Renacci served in Congress from 2011 to 2019, representing a northeast Ohio district. A former mayor and councilman of Wadsworth, he had previously planned to run for governor against Mr. DeWine in 2018 before being convinced to shift to the Senate race.

So far, the 2022 Democratic field consists of Cincinnati Mayor John Cranley and Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley.

"Jim Renacci continues to prove that he is too conservative for the majority of Ohio voters," Whaley spokesman Courtney Rice said. "By asking anti-abortion crusading filmmaker Joe Knopp to join his team, Renacci and Knopp are cementing themselves as the out-of-step, extreme conservative pick in the Republican primary."

First Published December 2, 2021, 12:28pm