"You're an embarrassment to our party:" Everyone hated Josh Williams' flag-planting bill
One angry American proposed exhuming the corpse of Woody Hayes to make a point.
The Ohio Lame Duck Session is a biannual horror story. It’s where our Republican overlords circumvent the normal legislative process to enact their largely unpopular and reactionary agenda.
Late last year, the State Legislature attacked trans university students, forced education professionals from teachers to janitors to out LGBTQ students, and allowed police departments to charge citizens up to $750 to fulfill public records requests for body camera footage—just to name a few of their bright ideas.
Of all the horrible ideas, none captured the wrath of America like the so-called O-H-I-O Sportsmanship Act from State Representative Josh Williams (R-Sylvania).
The legislation, which debuted days after Ohio State’s fourth consecutive loss to Michigan, would have made planting a flag at midfield after a college football game a felony.
In the immediate aftermath, Williams told me that he “didn’t give a shit” if social media was putting him in the blender:
As of this writing, that video has over 500,000 views on my TikTok, which you should follow if you’re on Xi Jinping’s favorite video slop app.
Williams claimed that, despite the pushback, he would reintroduce the legislation in the 136th General Assembly. Well, we got our initial burst of legislation of the newest legislature last week, including a bill that would put ten percent of Ohio’s general fund into Bitcoin, the fake internet nerd money.
A new version of the O-H-I-O Act has yet to be introduced. And after a records request seeking all responses that Williams got to the proposal, it’s easy to see why.
According to records obtained by The Rooster, Williams received over 200 emails to his legislative email about his proposal. A handful of those emails were from reporters trying to juice the controversy by getting Williams on a Zoom call.
All but two of the remaining emails were basically telling him to go fuck himself, sometimes in those exact words. What’s remarkable about the documents dump is that the vitriol that flooded his inbox came from across the country, from voters of almost every political stripe.
Some were poorly written, typo-ridden screeds (not that I would know anything about those), and others were a professional dissection of the proposed legislation.
With that said and obvious warning for explicit language, here are some of the best responses (with some pertinent information redacted as needed).
From Richard in Charleston, South Carolina:
From Patrick in Prospect:
From David in Perry:
From Daryl in Perrysburg:
From Andrew in Toledo:
From “Josh is a Pussy” in South Carolina:
From Tom in Chillicothe:
From James in Galloway:
From Darla in Germantown:
From Mic in Sylvania:
From Joe in Willoughby:
From Ian in Niceville, Florida:
From Michael in Cincinnati:
From Justin in Sylvania:
From Sam in Columbus:
From Bill in New Hampshire:
From Chris in Syracuse, Utah:
From Francie in Grove City:
From Kent in Eaton:
From Bradley in Lima:
From Karen in Sylvania:
From Melissa in Columbus:
From Sharron in Gahanna:
From Jason in Toledo:
From Wolverine Fan in Toledo:
From Aaron in Conneaut:
From Peter in Plain City:
From Peter in Castle Rock, Colorado:
From Michael in Akron:
From Matthew in Toledo:
… But it wasn’t all bad!
It must be said that at least two people thought that Williams trying to criminalize flag-planting was sound public policy.
From Chris in Eau Claire, Wisconsin:
From Ralph in Modesto, California:
I don’t want to discriminate, but I’m fairly sure I can picture what “Chris” and “Ralph” looked like when they logged into the internet—probably via an AOL disc—to send an email praising an attention-seeking politician for an idea that went straight into the trashcan.
Please, Jesus, I don’t ask for much…
Notorious conman Vivek Ramaswamy could declare for the 2026 gubernatorial race as early as today.
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