(PartiallyPolitics.com) – In 1960, there was a political scandal surrounding the Board of Elections in Mahoning County, Ohio. The Republican secretary of state had at the time been mad that the voting machines had not operated properly in the May primary which resulted in the Democratic boss being replaced by Philip Rogers as director.
Over the next few years, Rogers’s position and authority within the state grew especially in relation to election administration and technology. His stance was focused on integrity and in time he also became the chairman of the county party. His focus had not been on nationwide ideological battles, but instead, it was focused on the working-class precincts of Youngstown.
At the time there was a lot of upheaval in the Mahoning Valley, with the Mafia turf wars, and organized crime playing a big role in the area. Out of Rogers’ five children, his oldest daughter moved away to Florida giving birth to a son in 1978.
That son is Florida governor Ron DeSantis, who is expected to announce his decision regarding the 2024 presidential election soon. While DeSantis had never lived in this corner of the industrial Midwest, it bears a lot of similarities with the cultural grievances faced by other such places that have helped propel DeSantis on the national scene.
In his recently published memoir, DeSantis disclosed that he had been raised in Tampa Bay but that his upbringing had “reflected the working-class communities in western Pennsylvania and northeast Ohio” where his parents had come from.
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