Savannah — At least one Ashland County Democratic Party member disagreed with how his colleagues handled last weekend’s button controversy at the county fair.
Andrew Kinney of Savannah resigned from his position as a party committee member on September 19, the day after the incident.
“By walking away, I hope to inspire others to seek higher and less isolated ground. “We must learn to resist the politics of rage and retribution, reject purely opposing goals, and recognize our shared humanity more frequently,” he wrote.
Kinney told Ashland Source that he had been thinking about resigning for quite some time.
The button incident was the last straw. He became involved in the local party around 2007, during President Obama’s campaign. Previously, he was involved in the county’s Republican party, he said.
In 2015, he ran unsuccessfully for an open seat on the Ashland City Schools Board of Education while working as an English lecturer at OSU-Mansfield.
He will now focus his civic engagement as chair of the Ashland County Mental Health and Recovery Board.
“My current focus is on passing the board’s levy. After that, I am not sure. “I’m definitely not running for anything,” he stated.
Kinney stated in his resignation announcement that he believes in the Democratic Party’s values, including “economic policy that raises us all up; social policy that brings everyone along.”
“Unfortunately, both major parties have become engaged in mutual destruction,” the politician wrote. “Neither party seems aware of how co-dependent they have become on the other’s bad behavior.”
Incident still under investigation
The “offensive buttons” incident is still being investigated by the Ashland County Sheriff’s Office. Sheriff Kurt Schneider said he also notified the US Secret Service, which will investigate “any crimes that may be associated with (President Trump’s) safety.”
Heather Sample, chair of the Ashland County Democratic Party, expressed regret for the incident and stated that the party does not and will never endorse political violence. Overall, she described the incident as censorship.
“The use of law enforcement to suppress political speech at the local level represents a grave threat to our democracy and the foundational principle that government officials cannot use their power to punish dissent,” Sample told the crowd.
The incident prompted the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), a national nonprofit that advocates for free speech, to call on the sheriff to drop the investigation.
In a letter to the Ashland County Sheriff’s Office, the Fair Board, and the Ashland County Prosecutor’s Office, FIRE claimed that “officials silenced speech solely because of its viewpoint.”
The organization also urged the fair board to “refrain from restricting speech based on viewpoint at future events” and promised to use “all the resources at our disposal to vindicate (the right to be free from government investigation or punishment based on one’s political views) and see this matter through to a just conclusion.”
Marty Wesner, President of the Ashland County Agricultural Society, stated that the fair board’s actions were consistent. About three years ago, an organization called the Conservative Coalition displayed some inappropriate “propaganda” at the fair.
Wesner stated that the fair board asked the group to remove the material, which it did. They’ve also requested that vendors remove items from shelves that are considered inappropriate for young children, such as toy guns.
A request for comment was made to the sheriff’s office and the fair board, but neither responded. The Ashland County Democratic Party did not respond to a request for comment.
Ashland County Prosecutor Chris Tunnell said his office does not represent the fair board and has not communicated with them. Furthermore, the sheriff’s office has not sent anything to his office for review.
“I support the fair board and the ACSO’s actions in removing offensive materials from the county fair. I am an advocate of civil discourse. Tunnell said, “I am opposed to those who use violence to silence opposing views.”
