As Washington D.C. Bureaucrat Richard Cordray’s campaign continues to struggle amid multiple potential scandals, his lackluster candidacy is drawing unfavorable comparisons from the Ohio press corps to his party’s most infamous failed candidate. The Toledo Blade published a scathing editorial comparing Cordray to failed Democrat presidential candidate Hilary Clinton, who lost Ohio by over 8 points in 2016, labeling him “an inherently weak candidate” who is “underwhelming on the stump” and “probably cannot win.” With less than a year to go until Election Day, Cordray’s glaring problems as a candidate are already creating cause for heartburn among Ohio Democrats.
Here's more from the Toledo Blade:
The party apparatus is lining up behind Mr. Cordray, the former head of the federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and there is intense pressure on other candidates and their supporters to fold and get in line. The party has no right to do that, but it is also repeating an arrogant folly: Heads are being knocked on behalf of someone who probably cannot win.
Mr. Cordray is not as supercilious and shrill as Mrs. Clinton. That is a high bar. But, like Mrs. Clinton, he is an inherently weak candidate. He is underwhelming on the stump. He has lost races for the U.S. House, the U.S. Senate, and twice he has lost races for Ohio attorney general, though he also won that race once. He has been out of Ohio, distant and seemingly disinterested, with no presence here, for eight years. (There is little doubt that if he could have stayed in Washington he would have.) It is hard to see how he connects with average Ohioans in the era of Trump.
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