POLITICO says Kasich met privately with billionaire Sheldon Adelson at the Venetian Resort Hotel Casino during last month’s Republican Governors Association winter meeting. A call to Kasich spokesman Rob Nichols to confirm the meeting and inquire as to what was discussed was not immediately returned.

POLITICO, which often deals in political gossip, postulates that Kasich could run for president in 2016. The newspaper reports that Adelson also met with Govs. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana and Bob McDonnell of Virginia — also rumored 2016 GOP candidates.

Adelson and his family have donated $84 million to Republican groups. Those donations include $20 million each to super PACs supporting Romney and Gingrich.

“After shadowy outside groups spent more than $40 million to support Josh Mandel’s losing campaign for Senate, Governor Kasich is actively positioning to be the next Ohio darling of the special interests,” Ohio Democratic Party spokesman Jerid Kurtz said in an emailed statement.

“Ohio voters should be deeply disturbed that over two years away from his re-election campaign, Kasich is already showing signs he’s willing to serve the special interests and take the same path as Josh Mandel.”

Adelson is under federal investigation by the Justice Department for allegations of bribery and money laundering. A majority of his casino empire is based in Asia.

A Cincinnati-area state representative is decrying billboards throughout Ohio whose aim, she says, is voter intimidation.

Democratic Rep. Alicia Reece held a news conference Monday morning in front of a billboard that read, “Voter Fraud is a Felony!”

The billboards were paid for “by a private family foundation,” but Reece claims in a news release that the sponsors are essentially anonymous and the billboards are being strategically placed in low-income and black neighborhoods.

“We are asking the Outdoor Advertising Association of Ohio to work with the anonymous sponsors of the billboards to have them removed immediately,” Reece wrote in a statement.

“It’s obvious that the billboards are designed to intimidate voters and leave some wondering if merely voting is now a crime.”

Mike Norton with Norton Outdoor Advertising — the company on whose billboards the ads appear — said there are 30 such signs in the Greater Cincinnati area. 

He said the sponsor didn’t ask for any demographic targeting and the ads are appearing in all neighborhoods wherever there was open space.

Norton said the sponsor wished to remain anonymous and he isn’t at liberty to give out its name.

As for the anonymity of the ads sponsor, “Our company’s stand on political advertising is we do our very best to make sure it’s accurate and it’s not an attack ad,” Norton said. “This seemed to fall well within the bounds of reason on both of those benchmarks.”

The billboards are not illegal, and they are considered Constitutionally protected speech.

The Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University Law School issued a policy paper finding that cases of fraud by individual voters are extremely rare.

The center found that in the 2004 presidential election saw a voter fraud rate of 0.00004 percent. 

Cincinnati isn’t the only city to see such billboards. They have also made appearances in Cleveland and Columbus, as well as southeast Wisconsin.

According to the Plain Dealer newspaper in Cleveland, the billboards there are owned by Clear Channel Outdoor. A company spokesman told the newspaper that Clear Channel’s policy is usually to identify who sponsors a political ad, but in this case a salesperson made a mistake.

The Ohio Democratic Party is asking both state and federal prosecutors to look into allegations that a major coal company is coercing its employees to donate to political causes against their will.

The ODP on Monday sent letters to U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio Steven Dettelbach and Acting Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy McGinty asking them to launch a criminal investigation into Ohio-based Murray Energy Corporation.

The letters allege that Murray Energy “may have engaged in a pattern of illegal activity, extorting millions in financial contributions from employees and vendors for Republican candidates running for public office.”

Murray Energy fired back in a Monday statement, saying the allegations “are simply an attempt to silence Murray Energy and its owners from supporting their coal mining employees and families by speaking out against President Barack Obama’s well known and documented War on Coal.”

The allegations stem from an Oct. 4 investigation by left-leaning magazine The New Republic.

The article is based on the accounts of two anonymous former Murray managers and a review of letters and memos to Murray employees. It suggests that employees are pressured into making donations to Republican candidates and contributing to the company’s Political Action Committee. 

“There’s a lot of coercion,” one of the sources told the magazine. “I just want to work, but you feel this constant pressure that, if you don’t contribute, your job’s at stake.”

ODP Chairman Chris Redfern told reporters during a conference call that party research found that Ohio political candidates — including all current statewide officeholders — had received almost $750,000 from Murray Energy, its subsidiaries and employees.

Neither Dettelbach or McGinty returned CityBeat calls for comment on any pending investigations.

Murray Energy in its statement called The New Republic biased and radically liberal. The company’s characterization in the article is incorrect and untruthful, according to the statement. 

Murray had previously come under fire when Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney held a campaign event at one of its mines. Some workers claim they were pulled out of the mine early when it closed for the event and forced to attend without pay.

Even though he has criticized super PACs in the past, President Obama has decided he will allow a pro-Democratic one to assist him in his reelection bid. Priorities USA Action, a super PAC founded by two former White House aides, will help Obama counter the deluge of money being raised by GOP groups during the 2012 election cycle.

Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney told a conservative radio talk show host on Monday that he doesn’t support funding for Planned Parenthood and believes Susan G. Komen for the Cure should have stuck by its original decision to pull grants from the organization.

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Now that the Jan. 31 filing deadline with the Federal Election Commission has come and gone, media outlets have had time to pour over the paperwork and discover how large a role “super PACs” are playing in this year’s presidential race. The short answer: Pretty large.

The New York Times reports about 60 corporations and wealthy individuals gave checks of $100,000 or more to a super PAC supporting Mitt Romney in the months leading up to the Iowa caucuses, underwriting a $17 million blitz of advertising in the early primary states.

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In an effort to promote greater transparency about who makes campaign contributions, outgoing Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner today unveiled a new set of election rules.

The rules, which were approved by the Ohio Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review, is aimed at offsetting some of the impact of the Citizens United ruling issued by the U.S. Supreme Court in January. In the landmark 5-4 decision, the court overturned a lower court’s ruling and removed existing restraints on corporations, allowing them to spend unlimited amounts of money in political campaigns.

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A prominent local anti-gay, right wing group sent a mass e-mail to supporters today seeking money to avoid a $150,000 deficit next year, which is close to what the group's president makes in salary.

The e-mail distributed by Sharonville-based Citizens for Community Values (CCV) states it's ready to “jump into 2011 with both feet!”

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A nonpartisan investigative journalism group uses Rob Portman as an example in a new report detailing how politicians use money donated to political action committees (PACs) for purposes other than those outlined in their mission.

The report, entitled “Political Inaction Committees,” by the Center for Public Integrity concludes PACs have wide discretion about how they can use money, despite promises to donors.

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(UPDATE AT BOTTOM) Fox News commentator Sean Hannity’s participation in a Cincinnati Tea Party event today is drawing sharp criticism from experts on journalism ethics.

Hannity will be taping his TV show tonight during the local Tea Party’s second annual Tax Day rally, which is being held at the University of Cincinnati’s Fifth Third Arena.

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