Ohio House candidate Zach Stepp: Gayle Manning behind 'disturbing' phone survey; she denies it

AVON LAKE — Allegations of dirty polling tactics have been leveled in the 55th Ohio House District race that will pit veteran Republican officeholder Gayle Manning against Democratic challenger Zach Stepp in November. The two candidates talked tough Monday after Stepp's campaign called out a phone survey it said was "negative campaign tactics" linked to Manning. The Stepp campaign said the phone survey appeared "to support Manning's campaign featuring lies and misleading statements about his candidacy for (the) Ohio House." Stepp said Monday he was certain it was Manning's campaign that had something to do with the phone call he said three residents of the district reported to his campaign. "I've written polls before. I know what a poll looks like. I've put them in the field before," he said. Stepp said he's not surprised the phone survey was done, with what he said is his grassroots campaign doing significant fundraising and attracting many volunteers. "I'd be more concerned if they weren't doing anything" negative, he said. Manning, who is looking for a second term, said her campaign did not authorize "anything like this or pay for anything like this." "This time of year, there's probably polling going on by both sides," she said Monday. "To me this is a nonissue." Stepp, a Sheffield native and now Avon Lake resident, will face Manning, who is serving her first term in the Ohio House after eight years in the Ohio Senate. What the Stepp campaign called "disturbing, negative phone surveys being conducted in an effort to sow disinformation about his campaign" allegedly included false statements about Stepp's stances on border security, the removal of historic statues and "misleading statements" about Stepp personally. It is unclear who sponsored the survey, but the Stepp campaign said it is a suspected "push poll" — a tactic that is intended to persuade voters rather than gather data. The Chronicle-Telegram did not have access to a recording of the call, only to a call made to the Stepp campaign by what it said was a district resident who made the campaign aware of the call and who did not want to be named. "I decided to run for the Ohio House to make a change in my community and to bring fresh ideas to Columbus. Negative personal attacks never created one job. It's time to have a debate on the issues," Stepp said in the campaign's statement. "Whether or not my opponent is personally behind the 'survey,' I call on her to condemn this type of false attack and adopt a 'No Lie' policy in her paid advertising and that of her supporters." Stepp's campaign chairman, Lorain County Commissioner and former state Rep. Matt Lundy, also called on Manning to denounce the calls. Manning said she never received a call from pollsters and no one had called her to bring her up to date on polls asking questions about her district and the race. "I didn't pay for anything and no one called me to say 'These are the kinds of questions we're going to ask,'" she said. Manning said she is "more than willing" to run a clean campaign. "We'll see if the people who support (Stepp) are up to that," she said. "Polling will go on for the next few weeks; it will be for us and against us," Manning said. "Unfortunately it's the name of the game." Contact Dave O'Brien at (440) 329-7129 or dobrien@chroniclet.com. Follow him at @daveobrienCT on Twitter.