Josh Mandel

Early life, education, and military service

Mandel was born on September 27, 1977 in Cleveland, Ohio, the son of Rita (née Friedman) and Bruce Mandel. He has a sister, Rachel. He attended Beachwood High School where he was the quarterback of the football team. Mandel attended The Ohio State University where he earned a BA in communications. At Ohio State, he served two terms as the undergraduate student government president. While there he was also a member of the Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity. After graduating in 2000, he earned a JD from the Case Western Reserve University School of Law.

Mandel enlisted in the United States Marine Corps Reserve, where he served eight years as an intelligence specialist. His first tour was from February to November 2004, during which he was attached to a light armored reconnaissance battalion. He left for his second tour in September 2007. Attached to an infantry battalion, Mandel served in the city of Haditha.

Lyndhurst councilman

Mandel's experience as an elected official began as a Lyndhurst, Ohio city councilman, where he was elected in 2003. He served three years on the council's finance committee.

On January 24, 2005, Mandel sent a letter to Lyndhurst residents, proposing a one time tax rebate of $400, paying the postage for the letters from his campaign fund. Faced with opposition from fellow council members, Mandel introduced and advocated for a 2 mill property tax rollback, which would have saved the average homeowner $100 a year on a home valued at $160,000. What passed council, on April 4, 2005, was a 1.5 mill rollback, which saved the average homeowner $75 a year.

Elections

Mandel was first elected to the Ohio House of Representatives in November 2006. He represented Ohio's 17th House district, consisting of 17 communities of various sizes in southeastern Cuyahoga County. Mandel was re-elected to a second term in 2008.

Tenure

Mandel's first piece of legislation as a State Representative, H.B. 151, was an initiative to force the multibillion-dollar Ohio pension funds to divest from companies doing business in Iran. He joined State Representative Shannon Jones (R) in an attempt to make Ohio the first state in the nation to divest from Iran, but the legislation was never signed into law due to a compromise between state pension executives and Ohio House leadership, agreed to by Mandel. Then Speaker of the Ohio House Jon Husted brokered a deal to drop half of the state's investments in Iran and Sudan with the eventual goal of removing all investment from the two countries. In April 2010, Mandel appeared on CNBC's "Squawk on the Street" to discuss his leadership on Iran divestment in Ohio.

In the 127th Assembly, Mandel, along with other members of the Ohio House who served in Iraq, were excused from voting on HB649 in December 2008, which provided payments to military veterans of the Middle East wars and compensation to families who had lost loved ones in the conflicts.

In the 128th Assembly, Mandel was one of 19 house members to vote against HB108, a bill to make cockfighting a felony. Mandel said that the legislation was not a pressing priority for the state and that the General Assembly should spent its time in other ways.

Also in the 128th Assembly, Mandel voted against the Ohio House Bill 176, the Equal Housing and Employment Act which "[p]rohibits discriminatory practices on the basis of "sexual orientation" and "gender identity" under many of the Ohio Civil Rights Commission (OCRC) Law's existing prohibitions against various unlawful discriminatory practices.". The bill passed the Ohio House by a vote of 56 to 39.

State Treasurer

In May 2009, Mandel announced his candidacy for Ohio Treasurer of State via web video. Mandel's campaign generated controversy in late September 2010 when it ran a TV commercial falsely suggesting that Mandel's opponent, African-American Kevin Boyce, was a Muslim. The commercial was criticized for playing on anti-Muslim bias, and was ultimately withdrawn by the Mandel campaign. However, voters subsequently received a campaign mailing with similar themes. The Mandel campaign said that the Ohio Republican Party was responsible for the mailers, which had already been sent bulk rate, up to a week prior.

In October 2010, in response to an Ohio Democratic Party complaint, the Ohio Elections Commission found that Mandel had deceptively depicted Boyce (an African Methodist Episcopal) as a Muslim in the ads. On November 2, 2010, Mandel was elected Ohio State Treasurer, defeating Boyce by 14 percentage points to become chief investment officer of state funds.

During Mandel's time as treasurer, Ohio retained the highest possible rating from Standard & Poor’s for the state's $4 billion government investment fund. On March 19, 2012, Mandel severed contracts with two major banks that handled $41 billion in Ohio pension investments, amid government investigations into whether the banks overcharged clients for currency trading accusing them of “systematically exploiting public pension funds and taxpayers.”

Mandel was reelected to a second term as state treasurer in 2014, defeating Democratic State Representative Connie Pillich.

Advertising controversy

In 2016 and 2017, the Ohio Treasurer's Office under Mandel spent almost $1.7 million in taxpayer-funded television ads, featuring himself and Urban Meyer, the head coach for the Ohio State Buckeyes football team. Mandel's office made each payment for the ads to individual television statements in an amount less than $50,000 per fiscal year, thus circumventing the need for approval by the state Controlling Board, which must sign-off on state payments over this amount. Thirteen ad buys were within $1,000 of the $50,000 threshold. Mandel defended the ads, saying they helped increase awareness of an investment program for disabled Ohioans. Critics questioned the airing of self-promotional ads at a time when Mandel was running for U.S. Senate, and said that Mandel's office was trying to avoid scrutiny by structuring the ad buys to avoid Controlling Board approval.

In response to the controversy, the Ohio House introduced an amendment to the state's 2017 budget. The amendment would require approval by the Controlling Board for ad buys that in aggregate exceed $50,000. This rule would have prevented Mandel from avoiding oversight by distributing the advertising campaign among individual ad buys. Mandel did not attend an Ohio Senate hearing on the matter. He sent a deputy instead.

2012 U.S. Senate election

Mandel was the Republican nominee to challenge Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown in the 2012 General Election. Josh Mandel officially announced his candidacy for U.S. Senate March 1, 2012, in a speech to the Akron Press Club. He won the March 6, 2012 Republican primary with 63% of the vote in a five candidate race. In March, Mandel stated his reason for running: "I am running for the United States Senate because no longer can I stomach the gridlock and partisanship in Washington that has bankrupted Social Security, bankrupted Medicare, and caused one-half million jobs to leave Ohio in the past decade."

Mandel earned the endorsement of several prominent conservative politicians including: New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, and Sen. John McCain. Mandel received the endorsement of the Club for Growth, Jim DeMint's Senate Conservatives Fund, Senator Rob Portman, Congressman Jim Jordan and conservative commentators Hugh Hewitt and Mark Levin.

Mandel's campaign was singled out by the independent fact-checking group Politifact for its "casual relationship with the truth" and its tendency to "double down" after inaccuracies were pointed out. The fact-checking group wrote: "For all the gifts Mandel has, from his compelling personal narrative as an Iraq war veteran to a well-oiled fundraising machine, whoppers are fast becoming a calling card of his candidacy."

Mandel had raised $7.2 million through the first quarter of 2012; his $5.3 million cash on hand trailed Brown's $6.3 million. Mandel benefited from massive support from conservative out-of-state superPACs, which raise unlimited amounts of money from anonymous donors. These outside groups, including Crossroads GPS, aired $10 million in TV advertising supporting Mandel and attacking Brown as of July 2012, outspending Democratically-aligned outside groups by more than five-to-one. Mandel's campaign was aided by over $1 million spent primarily on attack ads by a 501(c)(4) organization called the "Government Integrity Fund".

Mandel failed to unseat Sherrod Brown in the November 6, 2012 General Election, losing 45% to 51%.

On August 27, 2013, Mandel was accused of violating both federal and state campaign laws by using a vehicle owned by his U.S. Senate campaign for private use and/or business unrelated to the campaign. No charges were brought and there was no case made against him. Mandel was involved in a traffic accident with the vehicle on March 5, 2013 near Toledo, Ohio, nearly four months after the campaign.

2018 U.S. Senate election

In December 2016, Mandel announced he is seeking election to the United States Senate in the 2018 election.

In April 2017, the Associated Press and the Columbus Dispatch reported that a SuperPAC created to support Mandel's 2018 Senate bid received more than 95% of its funding from dark money. Ohio Freedom Fund was created in November 2016 is overwhelming funded by the 501c(4) organization called 'Citizens for a Working America'. The organization is not required to disclose the sources of its funding. Ohio Freedom Fund was created at the time Mandel was defending his appearance in taxpayer funded advertising by arguing that he had not yet declared his candidacy. Both organizations are located in the Washington D.C. area.

In July 2017, Mandel became a focus of controversy by publicly stating his support for Internet celebrities Mike Cernovich and Jack Posobiec after the two were listed by the Anti-Defamation League as prominent figures of the alt-right, a political movement most often associated with white nationalism. Referring to the ADL's move, Mandel tweeted the following on July 20, 2017: "“Sad to see @ADL_National become a partisan witchhunt group targeting people for political beliefs. I stand with @Cernovich & @JackPosobiec”. Cernovich and Posobiec gained notoriety for their promulgation of the Pizzagate conspiracy theory, which inspired a shooting at Comet Ping Pong, a Washington, D.C. restaurant, on December 4, 2016.

Health care reform

Mandel has called for the repeal of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. In a campaign advertisement during his 2012 Senatorial run, Mandel claimed opponent Sherrod Brown "cast the deciding vote on the government takeover of health care". Politifact has labeled as false the claim that Brown cast the deciding vote for the act. The description of the act as a government takeover of health care, by Mandel, has been labeled by Politifact as "nonsensical" and a "myth".

Climate change and energy

Mandel has been an outspoken critic of scientific opinion on climate change. He has referred to climate change research as "riddled with fraud" and has vowed to fight attempts to advance clean-air standards.

Mandel has called for what he terms as "aggressive and responsible" energy exploration that protects "the air we breathe and water we drink" while reducing environmental regulation. He supports the approval of the Keystone XL pipeline. Mandel is a supporter of expanded coal plants and has criticized environmental groups for a so-called "war on coal."

Mandel appeared on CNBC's Mad Money with Jim Cramer to discuss energy exploration. Mandel stated, "We call it the win-win-win. This is new job creation for the state of Ohio, this is affordable energy, bringing costs down for families throughout the state, senior citizens throughout the state, and its national security."

Iraq and Afghanistan

In October 2009, he appeared on the show Fox & Friends stating his support for listening to the military generals on the ground in Afghanistan.

Israel

Mandel was a member of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee at The Ohio State University. He spoke at the 2008 AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington, D.C, where he said, "Israel is our best friend and ally in the Middle East and it’s important that we maintain a strong and lasting relationship with them." In the same speech, Mandel stated Iran was a threat, and discussed his divestment initiatives as a legislator in Ohio.

Foreign policy

In 2012, Mandel broke with Mitt Romney on foreign policy concerning the status of U.S. military forces in Europe, advocating for their withdrawal.

Family and personal life

Mandel and his wife Ilana reside in Beachwood, Ohio with their three children, Rosie, Judah, and Gideon. They were married August 28, 2008, in Jerusalem.

Mandel said in a speech that his maternal grandfather, Joe, is originally from Poland and is a Holocaust survivor, while his maternal grandmother, Fernanda, is originally from Italy and was hidden from the Nazis by a Catholic family during World War II. In a speech to the Republican Jewish Coalition, he said the tribulations of his grandparents and family inspired him to public service.