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Endorses Fountain

The race

One seat on Ohio's Fourth District Court of Appeals — the 14-county southern Ohio district (Adams, Athens, Gallia, Highland, Hocking, Jackson, Lawrence, Meigs, Pickaway, Pike, Ross, Scioto, Vinton, and Washington) — for a six-year term beginning February 2027. Roster correction to the skeleton's framing, documented here: neither candidate is an incumbent and neither won a normal primary for this seat. The seat was held by Judge Peter B. Abele, on the appellate bench since 1991, who was running unopposed and died September 25, 2026, at 69. Under Ohio law each party's district committee named a replacement: Republicans selected Jayme Hartley Fountain (R) after five rounds of voting, and Democrats selected Todd L. Grace (D) at a special meeting of party leaders from the district's 14 counties. The Ross County Board of Elections certified the pairing. The names match the CSV roster; the vacancy-by-death history is the correction.

Jayme Hartley Fountain — Challenger (replacement nominee). Pickaway County Prosecutor, elected in 2024 after 18 years as an assistant county prosecutor. A Logan Elm High School graduate, she earned her undergraduate degree at the University of Kentucky and her law degree at Capital University in 2006. Credits: nearly two decades of continuous prosecution service in the district she now seeks to serve as an appellate judge, and a contested internal selection — she "came out on top after five rounds of voting" for the nomination, per the county party secretary, who called her "a fighter… she knows how to make her case." Dirt search: no ethics file, no reversed-signature-case scandal, and no broken-promise record surfaced. The honest limit: she has never been a judge. Her appellate judging is unproven — a watch posture, never a demerit — and her stated judicial philosophy beyond her prosecution record was thin in every source retrieved, including the Athens Independent's direct candidate interviews.

Todd L. Grace — Challenger (replacement nominee). Athens Municipal Court judge, in his 11th year on that bench after 13 years as a magistrate in Athens County Juvenile Court — 24 years of judicial experience in total, by his own announcement. He chairs the Board of Trustees of the Ohio Judicial College and has served on Ohio Supreme Court task forces on bail and bond reform. Credits: the deepest bench résumé in this race by far, and the confidence of the district's Democratic chairs, whose Ross County chair said his "decades on the bench make him ready on day one for the appellate court" — an assessment of readiness the record supports. Dirt search: no discipline, scandal, or activist signature ruling surfaced in the deep pass. The limit under our doctrine is different: nothing retrieved documents Grace ruling in a restrained, break-with-his-side pattern, and his service on bail-and-bond-reform task forces is a policy-adjacent credential voters should weigh for what it is — participation in reform work, stated as fact, not priced as activism, because no ruling proving activism was found.

Pros and cons

Fountain: Pros: Eighteen years prosecuting plus election as county prosecutor — due-process law-and-order in daily service inside this district; won a genuinely contested five-round party selection on short notice. Cons: Zero time on any bench; no published judicial philosophy of depth; a one-month general-election runway means voters have the thinnest file on her of any candidate in this batch. Grace: Pros: Twenty-four years judging, including 11 as a municipal court judge; chairs the Ohio Judicial College's board — the institution that trains Ohio judges; Supreme Court task-force service. Cons: A Democratic nominee with no documented restrained break record; his experience advantage is real but it is experience without a philosophy record voters can test against the Constitution-first standard.

Record gaps

OUR CALL

Our call: endorse Jayme Hartley Fountain. The evidentiary basis, stated plainly because this is the closest experience call in the batch: Grace is the more experienced judge, and we credit that without hedging. But experience is a credential, not a doctrine. Fountain brings 18-plus years of enforcing the law as written — prosecution is the executive function of due process — an elected prosecutor's accountability to the same voters, and the Republican line in a race where the Democratic nominee's long record contains no documented restraint break for us to endorse under our rules. Fountain's never having judged is unproven, and we flag it as the watch item it is; unproven is not a demerit, and it does not outweigh a career spent on the law-and-order side of the courtroom. Vote Fountain.

For the complete Election 2026 breakdown — every race, claim by claim — see the full coverage on our website.

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Sources

Election result — November 4, 2026

Result pending. No verified call (Associated Press or official) as of November 4, 2026. This page will be updated when the race is called or certified. The original article above is unchanged.

AI-assisted article — but the sources are human, and the facts are very real.

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