Michael Wager is a corporate attorney and former chairman of the Cleveland-Cuyahoga Port Authority. He also served as finance chairman for Sen. Sherrod Brown’s 2012 campaign. So far he has no primary challenger.
When Wager announced his campaign last December, he was living in Shaker Heights -- outside of the district he was seeking to represent. County records show that this summer, he bought a home in the district in Moreland Hills.
In what may be one of his first press availabilities as a congressional candidate, Wager implored his Republican rival David Joyce to back a bill renewing funding for the government without conditions.
“What I’m asking for is for the incumbent to do the right thing, and to vote for funding the federal government without tying it to dismantling the healthcare law, which has already been passed, signed by the president, and litigated before the Supreme Court," Wager said.
Joyce spokeswoman Christyn Keyes responded in an email to Wagar’s statements.
“The last thing Ohioans want is another partisan press conference playing the blame game," she wrote. "We have enough of that going on and people are sick of it. There will be plenty of time to debate the issues with whoever wins the Democratic primary, but right now, Dave is busy working in a bipartisan, common-sense manner to end this shutdown.”
Joyce voted with Republicans in favor of the House funding bill that included defunding the Affordable Care Act -- a bill opposed by the president and Senate Democrats, and whose failure precipitated the government shutdown.
Now Joyce is part of a group of Republicans and Democrats supporting a bill that would tie reopening the government to the repeal of a 2.3 percent sales tax on medical devices included in the Affordable Care Act.
