Ken Harbaugh
Ken Harbaugh (Democratic Party) ran for election to the U.S. House to represent Ohio's 7th Congressional District. He lost in the general election on November 6, 2018.
Elections
2018
General election
General election for U.S. House Ohio District 7
Incumbent Bob Gibbs defeated Ken Harbaugh in the general election for U.S. House Ohio District 7 on November 6, 2018.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Bob Gibbs (R) | 58.7 | 153,117 |
 | Ken Harbaugh (D) | 41.3 | 107,536 | |
| Total votes: 260,653 (100.00% precincts reporting) | |||
 = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Democratic primary election
Democratic primary for U.S. House Ohio District 7
Ken Harbaugh defeated Patrick Pikus in the Democratic primary for U.S. House Ohio District 7 on May 8, 2018.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Ken Harbaugh | 80.2 | 24,042 |
 | Patrick Pikus | 19.8 | 5,937 | |
| Total votes: 29,979 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Republican primary election
Republican primary for U.S. House Ohio District 7
Incumbent Bob Gibbs defeated Patrick Quinn and Terry Robertson in the Republican primary for U.S. House Ohio District 7 on May 8, 2018.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Bob Gibbs | 77.9 | 42,274 |
| Patrick Quinn | 11.4 | 6,211 | ||
 | Terry Robertson | 10.6 | 5,765 | |
| Total votes: 54,250 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Campaign themes
2018
Campaign website
The following themes were found on Harbaugh's campaign website.
| “ |
HEALTH CARE BRING HEALTH CARE COSTS DOWN. All families should be able to take their kids to the doctor without worrying whether the bills will bankrupt them. All retirees should be able to fill prescriptions without worrying the medicine will cost more than their house payment. Our Congress must work together to bring these costs down. Let’s allow Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices so we can pass those savings on to hardworking Ohioans. Congress should vote on a bipartisan bill to fund the health insurance markets. They should be fixing health care rather than taking it away from people. And they should be working together. I'll work with anyone from either party who wants to help people with pre-existing conditions, who wants to reduce insurance premiums, and lower prescription drug prices. FIGHT FOR AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE FOR EVERYONE. I have a daughter who needed 4 surgeries before she was 4 years old. No family should have to wonder, like ours did, whether they will be able to pay for the critical care a child needs. Rural hospitals should not be shut down to fund tax cuts for the wealthy. I strongly support bipartisan efforts to fix our healthcare system, and am encouraged by the efforts of individuals like Gov. Kasich, Sen. Murray, and Sen. Alexander who have reached across the aisle to propose reforms to our healthcare system. ENCOURAGE INNOVATIONS IN TREATMENT AND CARE. For those who can afford it, America has some of the best health care in the world. Yet we spend more money on health care than any other developed nation for worse outcomes. Ohioans are better at solving problems than politicians in Washington. We need to unleash the potential that innovation can bring, both in the medical and life sciences, and create competitive marketplaces for affordable health care coverage. JOBS LEVEL THE PLAYING FIELD. Ohio workers are the best in the world, and they deserve a level-playing field. We must fight not just for Made in America, but Made in Ohio. We must rebuild our roads, bridges, schools, and power lines. These projects should be contracted to Ohio companies, the work should be done by Ohio workers using Ohio steel, and the outcome will be a stronger Ohio for our children and grandkids. And let’s get rid of tax loopholes for corporations that ship jobs overseas. Let’s make Ohio the best state in the country in which to start and run a small business. FIGHT SO-CALLED “RIGHT TO WORK” Every Ohioan who does an honest day’s work should be able to support a family and get ahead. Right to Work legislation undermines workplace safety and diminishes collective bargaining power across the state. I stand with Ohio’s workers in rejecting Right to Work, so that our laborers can earn fair pay for a day’s work and the financial security to provide for their families. INVEST IN A 21ST CENTURY INFRASTRUCTURE FOR A 21ST CENTURY ECONOMY Ohio’s infrastructure is suffering from years of neglect on the part of our representatives in Washington. We must rebuild in order to attract new businesses and put Ohioans to work. This investment must be massive, and go beyond roads and bridges to include a 21st-century electrical grid and a commitment to renewable energy. We will stand up to those who pit jobs against the environment. That is a false choice. We can attract decent, good-paying jobs to the Ohio 7th without ruining our water and air. ENDING THE OPIOID EPIDEMIC WE NEED TO STOP THE BLEEDING We have a crisis here in our state. More than 5000 Ohioans overdosed last year. Opioid fatalities rose 36% in 2016 and overdose numbers for 2017 outpaced those. These drugs are flooding our state and destroying Ohio families. The Stark County morgue had to buy a freezer truck to keep up with the death toll. In the face of these tragedies, Representative Bob Gibbs has voted to cut health care, defund treatment centers, and close rural hospitals. We must take immediate steps to treat people suffering from addiction and prevent new crises from forming. Currently, only 10% of Americans addicted to opioids have access to treatment. There are programs in this country that have proven an ability to prevent relapse after an overdose. Certified Community Health Behavioral Clinics (CCHBCs) are specialized clinics that increase capacity, collaboration and access to treatment by partnering with hospitals, schools, prisons, and courts. Currently, Ohio does not have CCHBCs. We need to replicate those programs here in Ohio, and create others using similar models, so that everyone who needs treatment receives it without delay. WE NEED TO BREAK THE CYCLE During my ride-alongs with local law enforcement, officers have said again and again: “We cannot arrest our way out of this problem.” We have to stop viewing the opioid epidemic as a simply a crime wave. Many of our substance-addicted Ohioans were prescribed these drugs by doctors. We have spoken to patients who were sent home from routine surgery with 90 pain pills when they only needed 2. In many ways, this is a man-made epidemic. Many of our doctors have begun to rethink prescriptions and this is a good start. In Lorain County, the Recovery Courts have been proven to significantly reduce drug use and crime, and are more cost-effective than any other criminal justice strategy. I will work to replicate this successful system across the District to break the cycle of addiction in our communities. WE NEED TO REINSTILL PURPOSE We need to empower recovering addicts to rejoin society. Ohio’s own Road to Hope empowers those in recovery to reintegrate back into their communities. The addicted person receives “support, guidance and faith necessary to become a productive member of society, while living a regimen of daily sobriety.” Personal Responsibility is at the heart of that program. Job training and workforce placement have been proven to dramatically decrease the relapse rate of addicts in recovery. If elected, I will make sure that these successful programs receive the resources they need to help our neighbors get back on their feet. EDUCATION FIGHTING FOR CHILDREN, AND FOR OUR FUTURE. When I became a parent, my priorities changed. Suddenly it wasn’t all about me. Every choice I made was for my kids. At the end of the day, that’s what this campaign is all about: our children. And building a future they can believe in. A future they deserve. Every child deserves a great education. Instead, over the past seven years, Ohio’s student performance has dropped from 5th to 23rd in the nation. It’s time for that slide to end. REVITALIZING OHIO’S SCHOOLS. 50% of Ohio’s school districts have deteriorating buildings. We need to invest in our children’s places of learning. Our teachers need our support, and our schools need to be upgraded. When we talk about infrastructure we should be talking more than roads and bridges -- building world-class schools should be a part of any infrastructure bill we pass. But we must be good stewards of that investment. We need to use our resources more efficiently. For too long, for-profit charter schools have been an inefficiency dragging down our school systems, treating children as profit centers instead of our most precious treasures. If a charter school is doing right by its students, that’s great. But the success of one school cannot come at the expense of others. Any school receiving public money must be held to the same standards as traditional public schools. Above all, our kids cannot be treated as revenue generators, enriching a few for-profit companies while public education goes underfunded. Public schools in our state should be active centers of learning and the lifeblood of their communities. PROMOTE POST-SECONDARY OPPORTUNITY. I support making community college more affordable and creating more partnerships between local small businesses and college students. Ohio should be open for business. For those students who choose to go to university, getting an education should not mire you in debt. The government and predatory lenders have to stop profiting off student loans. We should simplify the process and index Pell grants to inflation to stop pay increases. I would support creating stronger national service programs that incentivize students to give back to our country. VETERANS WE NEED MORE VETERANS IN CONGRESS. Congress today has fewer military veterans than at any point in modern history. But we are poised to change that. In 2018, more vets are running for office than at any moment in my lifetime. Because of the growing inability of Washington to deal responsibly with the threats facing our nation, veterans from both sides of the aisle are stepping into the breach. We need lawmakers who grasp the cost of going to war. And we need leaders with the moral authority to speak on these issues, leaders who have themselves been on the front lines of these challenges. When I joined the Navy, I swore an oath to the Constitution, not to a party or even to a President. Too often, our representatives in Washington forget why they’re in DC -- to fight for us. I am running for Congress to return to a time when our representatives put country over party, service above self, and fought for opportunity for all. I think that’s a message that everyone -- Republican, Democrat, or anywhere in between -- can get behind. WE MUST FUND OUR MILITARY TO KEEP AMERICANS SAFE. In the days after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, I led a Combat Reconnaissance Aircrew in an intelligence collection mission against North Korea. Before takeoff, I briefed my crew. “Keep your guard up. We are facing an enemy that is still at war with the United States. They may think America is vulnerable right now, but that is why we are here. Treat every decision like your life depends on it.” Today, we face our gravest geopolitical challenge since 9/11. Our country remains at war in Afghanistan, we have troops engaged in North Africa, Iraq and Syria, and Russia continues to bully our allies. Meanwhile, North Korea has the ability to directly threaten the American mainland with nuclear missiles. Now, more than ever, we need decision-makers in Washington who understand the nature of these threats. We need lawmakers who grasp the cost of going to war. And we need leaders with the moral authority to speak on tough issues, leaders who have themselves been on the front lines of disasters. WE NEED TO DO RIGHT BY VETERANS AND THEIR FAMILIES. We owe a debt of service to our veterans. That includes providing timely medical care, unfettered access to mental health services, and continuing education benefits. For service members transitioning back to civilian life, we must value them as assets to their communities, not liabilities. Most of all, we cannot allow families of the fallen to shoulder their burdens alone. We must eliminate the “widows’ tax,” and we must do it now. Families who have lost a loved one in the line of duty deserve the full range of promised benefits.[1] |
” |
| —Ken Harbaugh's 2018 campaign website[2] | ||
Campaign advertisements
The following is an example of an ad from Harbaugh's 2018 election campaign.
|
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Ken Harbaugh Ohio Congress. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
- United States House of Representatives
- Ohio's 7th Congressional District election, 2018
- Ohio's 7th Congressional District
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
- ↑ Ken Harbaugh's 2018 campaign website, "Issues," accessed September 24, 2018
