Get a load of Daniel Kalmbach, a carpetbagging fake farmer running for the Ohio House

Daniel Kalmbach is shoveling shit, alright.

I don’t begrudge people born into wealthy families.

It’s not like they had any choice in winning the genetic lottery.

What draws my ire is when those progenies decide to enter politics with an explicit agenda of worsening the material conditions for people who don’t belong to equally affluent families; doubly so when they campaign as salt-of-the-earth yeomen!

Daniel Kalmbach, a Jim-Jordan-endorsed Republican candidate for the 69th Ohio House District, is the perfect example.

Judging by his campaign literature, you might think Kalmbach is a hardscrabble fresh off his family farm.

A piece of Kalmbach propaganda.

But his official campaign narrative hides the truth that Kalmbach is the son of Paul Kalmbach, a massive Republican donor and owner of the renowned Kalmbach Feeds Corporation of Upper Sandusky.

Kalmbach Feeds helps fund the Center for Christian Virtue, with the family’s patriarch moonlighting as its treasurer.

Paul Kalmbach is also an associate member of the right-wing Heritage Foundation, which requires a minimum $10,000 donation.

Paul Kalmbach Jr. (left), Paul Kalmbach Sr. (center), and Daniel Kalmbach (right) at a GOP presidential debate in Cleveland, Ohio, in 2015. [via Ben Becker, Twitter]

Despite his obvious financial advantages, Kalmbach isn’t running for the Ohio House anywhere near his upbringing in Arlington, Ohio, near Upper Sandusky.

No, Kalmbach is attempting to carpetbag a seat in the deliciously gerrymandered 69th District currently occupied by State Rep. Kevin Miller (R-Newark).

The 69th Ohio House District is currently represented by State Rep. Kevin Miller (R-Newark). Kalmbach claims to live in Hebron.

Kalmbach got his start in the Ohio Legislature the old-fashioned way, through nepotism. His father donated $7,5000 to the 2022 election campaign of then-candidate Thaddeus Glaggett, an aptly named fundamentalist Neanderthal from Newark.

The younger Kalmbach started as Claggett’s legislative aide on Dec. 27th, 2022.

Kalmbach is running for the Ohio House despite having no professional experience other than working as Claggett’s aide. Though Kalmbach graduated from Case Western University Law School, he has failed the Ohio bar at least three times.

He moved into the district specifically for the race, and he only voted for the first time in August 2023:

Kalmbach’s voting history in Licking County, per the Secretary of State’s office.

Kalmbach lists his business as “Consulting” in his Licking County Chamber of Commerce membership. There is no online presence for such a consulting business.

Whether Kalmbach actually resides in Hebron, where his business is listed at a one-bedroom apartment, or in Thornville, where he’s currently registered to vote, is up for debate.

But his LinkedIn still lists his residency as Arlington, which is roughly 109 miles outside his district:

Kambach’s LinkedIn page.

In his defense, he wouldn’t be the first candidate in Ohio House history to move to a new area solely intending to represent it in the State Legislature. Some have even succeeded!

Unfortunately for Kalmbach, his deceptions go much deeper than that.

Kalmbach is endorsed by the Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity in its jihad against House Speaker Jason Stephens (R-Kitts Hill). He also has the backing of the Center for Christian Virtue for the same reason.

But Kalmbach’s family-farmer schtick falls apart under 30 seconds of scrutiny. Thanks to Kalmbach’s youth, he’s left a paper trail of his life before presenting this false narrative to the voters of the Ohio House 69th District.

Kambach at the Electric Forest musical festival in 2019 on the left. Kalmbach sporting a $2,200 Luis Vitton backpack and $850 Gucci shoes in 2023 on the right. [Via Ohio Legislative Watch, Twitter]

Kalmbach, according to multiple Ohio House sources, had a reputation for enjoying drinking and party drugs when not on duty for Rep. Claggett.

I can’t say I would begrudge the man for that if he stayed in that lane instead of trying to bamboozle kind voters in rural Ohio with a Holy Farmer schtick.

A review of Kalmbach’s Venmo history (reminder: you’re probably oversharing on Venmo!) shows transactions for “party favors” as well as magical mushroom emojis around the time of EDC, an annual giant rave in Orlando.

Some of Kalmbach’s Venmo history was first unearthed by Ohio Legislative Watch on Twitter.

Kalmbach’s partying ways ran afoul of the law on June 4th, 2022, at 6:00 p.m. ET.

We know the exact date and time because that’s when he rear-ended a woman on the interstate while drunk. According to the police report, Kalmbach became argumentative with the victim and threatened her before the police arrived.

Part of the police report from Kalmbach’s arrest on June 4th, 2022.

Kalmbach told the police he had ingested “one Jack and Coke” around noon on that day. Police, smelling the alcohol and noticing slurred speech, put him through a field sobriety test that Kalmbach failed.

Kalmbach pled guilty to operating a motor vehicle while impaired on March 27th, 2023.

That minor setback set the stage for a major comeback! Kalmbach resigned as Rep. Claggett’s legislative aide in July 2023. A month later, he declared his candidacy for the Ohio House in a post from a swanky steakhouse in Columbus in which he called his opponent “a rhino.”

Daniel Kalmbach and his wife in the Venetian Room at Jeff Ruby’s Steakhouse in Columbus. Kalmbach geotagged the photograph as “Licking County.”

Kalmbach, who married his wife in a destination wedding in Mexico in 2021, might be in the matrimonial dog house as he was without his wedding ring in a post last month announcing he had officially filed his candidacy with the local board of elections.

Oh, well—not my problem!

Kalmbach in October, 2021.

You add it all together, and you almost have to admire Kalmbach’s audacity. Hell, I probably would admire the hustle if he kept his reactionary agenda out of the State Legislature!

Just be rich, brother! Do literally anything else. You clearly don’t have to work for money. But if you must feel productive, get a job in the family business for which you’d be utterly unqualified without your last name. Working a job at which you’re inept and completely overpaid is the American Dream in 2024! Own it.

The Ohio House of Representatives doesn’t need another rich kid cosplaying as a state legislator who takes marching orders from the worst elements of his party.

State Rep. Miller, whom I will see in Hell like the rest of the House Majority Caucus, carries The Rooster’s complete and total endorsement in House District 69. If that seat is going to go to a Republican, it might as well go to one endorsed by the trainmen union.

THOSE WMDs. A reporter’s journey into how the U.S. funded The Bomb… A complete transformation when schools ban smartphones… Why you shouldn’t skip the Dr. Melfi scenes in The Sopranos… Ohio doctors fear DeWine’s draconian rules will block gender-affirming care…. How an Alabama utility wields influence by financing the news.