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Our verdict

LiberalMind endorses Keith Faber

Election Day is November 3. All four of Ohio's down-ballot statewide executive seats are open because every incumbent is term-limited, and officeholders are running for each other's jobs — Auditor Keith Faber for attorney general, Secretary of State Frank LaRose for auditor, Treasurer Robert Sprague for secretary of state. The attorney general's seat carries an extra wrinkle: Dave Yost resigned effective June 7, 2026, and Andy Wilson was appointed to fill the vacancy, so neither man on this ballot is the incumbent. No poll or rating for this race was located. LiberalMind endorses Keith Faber. Read the research, and see why.

How Ohio got here

The primaries were held May 5, 2026. Faber (R) won his primary unopposed. John J. Kulewicz (D) won his with 63.2% (442,799 votes) over former State Rep. Elliot Forhan, 36.8% (258,289). No Libertarian or independent candidate for attorney general appears on any general-election roster located. The roster is confirmed by an Auglaize County ballot listing in The Evening Leader, corroborated by the Vorys/JD Supra and Columbus Chamber primary recaps.

On the vacancy: two-term Attorney General Dave Yost was term-limited and did not seek re-election. He resigned early, effective June 7, 2026, to join the Alliance Defending Freedom. Governor DeWine appointed Andy Wilson, the state public safety director, to fill the vacancy — passing over Faber and saying that appointing Faber would have triggered "a chain of further appointments" through the Auditor/Secretary of State/Treasurer carousel "six months before a general election" (Wikipedia, Keith Faber). The Akron Beacon Journal's voter guide independently treats the seat as one that will be open when current Attorney General Andy Wilson leaves office in January. Yost is not the sitting attorney general, and this article does not describe him as one.

The money, printed by compiler and scope, never blended — the two compilations conflict by scope, not by error. Signal Ohio (October 7, 2026, from campaign-finance reports filed that Monday): Faber raised nearly $2.7 million in 2025 and 2026, with more than $3.7 million on hand; Kulewicz raised $1.7 million this cycle, with $1.2 million on hand. Signal also notes the Vorys PAC wrote maximum $16,600 checks to both candidates. Transparency USA (cycle compilation, accessed October 2026): Faber total contributions $3,075,369.88, expenditures $2,628,372.35; Kulewicz contributions $1,914,945.83, expenditures $1,366,876.87. Transparency USA's cycle totals exceed Signal's raised figures because they count differently.

Competitiveness: no public competitiveness evidence was located — no poll or rating for this race was found. Signal Ohio frames Faber as a favored figure with far more money; that is reporting color, not a rating, and we print it as such.

On enforcement, our standing framing applies to this office: LiberalMind always backs ICE the agency and its job. Enforcement is the law being enforced — never, by itself, a candidate's stain. No sourced enforcement record for either nominee was located in this research, and we invent none.

Keith Faber (Republican) — the proven statewide auditor

Background and service: Three decades in and around state office — state representative, then President of the Ohio Senate, then Auditor of State since 2019 (he has served two terms as Auditor, 2019–present; one primary guide's "three terms" description is incorrect). He announced for attorney general on January 27, 2025.

Record: His Auditor's office is his campaign's core exhibit, printed as one set, named and dated because the counts move by date: his office's Special Investigations Unit had, as of August 2026, secured 165 convictions on 376 criminal charges, with 284 findings for recovery totaling $28,667,204 (the Auditor's office, via Wikipedia). A supporter's October letter using slightly later, different counts also circulates; we print only the Auditor's-office set above. His office was among the first state auditors to examine pandemic unemployment fraud, estimating more than $5 billion in improper unemployment payments overall. On ECOT: as a legislator, Faber benefited from campaign donations linked to Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow founder Bill Lager and associates; when state attendance audits concluded ECOT owed tens of millions, Faber was among Republicans who donated the ECOT money to other causes; as Auditor he concluded in 2022 that ECOT owed Ohio $117 million and pledges as attorney general to pursue the debt vigorously (Columbus Dispatch). As Auditor he sits on the Ohio Redistricting Commission; he was among the Republican members who opposed the 2024 independent-commission amendment (voters rejected it), and in October 2025 joined the commission's unanimous adoption of the new congressional map for 2026. His stated priorities: support law enforcement (more Bureau of Criminal Investigation resources for counties without crime labs), continue anti-corruption and anti-fraud work, and consumer protection including help with denied health-insurance claims. In the October 19, 2026 Youngstown debate he declined to commit to continuing the FirstEnergy/HB 6 trial — the point Kulewicz pressed hardest (Ohio Democratic Party debate release, a partisan source for that characterization).

Pros: Proven at statewide scale in an investigative, law-adjacent office — the Auditor's conviction, charge, and recovery numbers above are documented results, not promises. A legislative record capped by the Senate presidency. On ECOT, the documented sequence runs both ways and ends with his office fixing the debt figure at $117 million.

Cons: The money item, printed exactly as sourced: Signal Ohio reports longtime Republican donor Les Wexner — who "has faced public criticism over his personal and financial relationship with Jeffrey Epstein" — gave $15,000 to Faber's campaign last year, which Faber later promised to give to charity. Wexner is a donor who has faced public criticism over that relationship; he is not a convicted person, and Faber's documented act is accepting, then pledging away, the contribution. The STRS item, labeled: a pension-transparency activist's pro-Kulewicz site calls Faber's December 2022 special audit of the State Teachers Retirement System "a whitewash in its practical effect" — a single partisan-advocacy source. The audit's own finding is the documented half: it found no fraud or illegal acts within its limited review.

The flaw, plainly: No proven flaw in service on this record. The Wexner contribution does not meet the proven pedophile-association standard — a criticized donor relationship is not knowing association with a convicted person — and it is priced as a donation he pledged to charity, nothing more. The "whitewash" line is advocacy characterization of an audit whose documented finding was no fraud in a limited review. His refusal, in one debate, to commit on the FirstEnergy trial is a stated position his opponent attacks; it is not proven misconduct.

John J. Kulewicz (Democratic) — an experienced civil lawyer, unproven as a prosecutor

Background and service: Upper Arlington city council member and retired Vorys, Sater, Seymour and Pease attorney with 44 years of legal practice, including, per his campaign, winning a prescription-drug-cost case at the U.S. Supreme Court. He was endorsed by the Ohio Democratic Party before the primary. He is unproven in prosecutorial office: he has never prosecuted a criminal case — the Faber camp's central attack, stated in a Canton Repository supporter's letter ("he has never prosecuted a criminal case. Not one."). We print that as the opposing camp's stated attack, consistent with his documented civil-practice background.

Record and case: His counter-case is anti-corruption: continue the FirstEnergy trial "to the distance," root out Medicaid fraud, and keep an open door on government-corruption evidence (Ohio Democratic Party debate release, quoting the debate).

The Manchin-test fact, stated plainly: No in-service break by Kulewicz with his party on Constitution, free-market, or freedom values was located in this research — no vote, filing, or documented act is sourced. A city-council and civil-practice record does not supply one.

Pros: Forty-four years of legal practice is real depth, and a Supreme Court win, as his campaign states it, is a serious credential. His anti-corruption program is office-specific and concrete.

Cons: He has never held prosecutorial or statewide office, and on the Faber camp's sourced account, never prosecuted a criminal case — for the state's chief law-enforcement office, that gap is the race. He trails badly in both money compilations. No Manchin-test break is sourced.

The flaw, plainly: No proven flaw in service was located — and no proven exception case either. Kulewicz is not priced as an extremist; he is a party-endorsed Democrat with no sourced break from his party on our values, which is the standing reason the exception is not earned. His prosecutorial inexperience is unproven status, not a demerit — it simply leaves nothing in service to weigh against a proven statewide record on the other side.

The minor candidates, briefly

There are none on any general-election roster located for this office. A standing check found no pedophile-association material meeting the proven standard for either candidate — absence noted, nothing implied. The Wexner item in Faber's section above is printed exactly as sourced and does not meet that standard.

OUR CALL

LiberalMind endorses Keith Faber.

Faber is proven in statewide office, with documented investigative results as Auditor — 165 convictions, 376 charges, and $28,667,204 in findings for recovery as of August 2026 — and a record that survives its own hard items when they are printed exactly as sourced. Kulewicz is a capable civil lawyer running an anti-corruption argument, unproven as a prosecutor and with no Manchin-test break in the record. Endorse the proven in-service conservative.

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

Vote early. Research your candidates. Choose the best moderates, whatever their party — no extremism from either side. And encourage your friends and family to do the same.

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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