Cincinnati City Council Election May 2025 Update

The Cincinnati Council Election is slowly taking shape. We are seeing the Democratic candidates vying for an endorsement get closer to getting on the ballot. We are seeing more candidates take out petitions to get on the ballot. There are not any new candidates entering the race with significant following or campaign capacity. There are still no public signs that more candidates are fundraising, beyond those looking for a Dem endorsement. At this point we have nine candidates who have had their signatures validated, with two more in process. One additional candidate is set to turn their petitions in next week. That will cover all of the incumbent Democrats running and 4 new candidates. The Democratic Party has stated they plan on making their endorsements by the end of June and having your petitions submitted and approved is believed to be a requirement for consideration. At this point there are two candidates with indications that they would be seeking the Democratic endorsement: Sol Kersey and Raffel Prophett.  There is no guarantee that all eight current members of City Council will get the endorsement.

We are not seeing any sign of the Charter Committee doing anything directly for the City Council Election. The Republicans who are now running Charter Committee have picked Hyde Park as a pet project. They are the likely funders and facilitators of the effort to get the Hyde Park initiative on the ballot. 18K signatures are not collected without having either money to pay for workers or having a large organization with big reach. Charter does not have any type of large group of supporters to tap into. That leaves paying for workers. Charter is no longer a group that supports transparency, they are just lead by a yet another Republican who is running them like the Republican Party. Charter of the past would never have gotten this involved with this type of effort. The Charter of the past would have been transparent. Charter is Dead. What is left over is a rump of Republicans.

It is astonishing to me how much effort is going in to manufacture political conflict in the City. Whether it is an unserious nepo mayoral candidate being fielded by the Republicans or local news media making a mountain out of few squeaky wheels in Hyde Park, Drama is what we are fed. I continue to write this blog as a way to do two things: provide information and voice my opinion. I don't push drama. The Hyde Park development issue is way overblown. There is no high stakes on this. This is ONLY about a privileged segment of a wealthy neighborhood (not even most of the neighborhood) that have the ear of local news media and the Charter Committee and Republican Party. No other neighborhood in the city could get this type of attention for a minor issue that will overall not affect many. It is a sad state that the Charter Committee is using this to gain relevance. When they fail, the organization should dissolve. Either the Republican Party should do something or local conservatives should just form some type of party.

Incumbants
Anna Albi (D*)‡
Jeff Cramerding (D*)
Mark Jeffreys (D*)
Scotty Johnson (D*)‡
Jan-Michele Lemon Kearney (D*)‡
Evan Nolan (D*)‡
Meeka Owens (D*)‡
Seth Walsh (D*)‡


Challengers With Something
Sol Kersey (D)
Raffel Prophett (D)‡
Laketa Cole (D)
Ozie Davis III (D)
Gary Favors (R)
Dale Mallory (D)

Other Candidates
Audricia Brooks (D)
Thomas Chandler (R)
Jerry Corbett (I)‡
LeTecia Cunningham (I)
Kevin Farmer (R)
Autumn Hall (I)
Ryan Holbrook (I)
Ryan James (I)‡
John Maher (I)
Ned Measel (I)
Linda Matthews (R)
William Moore (I)
Brandon Nixon (R)
Michael Patton (R)
Stephan Pryor (D)
Tyrone Roberson (I)
Bart Rosenberg (D)
Gwen Summers (I)
Quentin Taylor (I)
Aaron Weiner (I)

Sharetha Collier (I) is also listed as having taken out petitions, but the address listed is in Woodlawn, outside of the City Limits. Additionally the person who has been registered to vote with the same name/address is no longer listed under that name on Hamilton County's voter registration list I have as May 23, 2025. I will monitor the lists to see if anything changes.

As always:  If anyone has any other names please send them my way (editor@cincyblog.com) or if anyone named above wants to confirm they are not running, I'll remove them future postings of this list. If there are other social media or full websites I don't list, send them along as well.

The party designations at this time are what I've seen reported or what I've determined based on my observations. These notations do not mean the candidate is endorsed by any political party or group. Once official endorsements are made, these references will be updated to reflect the endorsements. 

Key
* = Incumbent
‡ = On Ballot (Peititions Sufficient)
D= Democratic Party
R= Republican Party
C= Charter Committee (aka Charter Party)
G= Green Party
DSA= Democratic Socialists of America
I= Independent
?= I am speculating based on my reading of the information and observations available to me or unsure.