Rob Nichols Clarifies Kasich’s Position on Public Employees (Hint: He Hates Them)

Rob Nichols is John Kasich’s Press Secretary.

Prior to working for Kasich, Nichols spent years and years and years working for Representative Deb Pryce. 18 years to be exact. Nearly two decades as a government employee. 100% paid by the taxpayers.

You may also remember Rob from a post we did last week about his salary (compared to Governor Strickland’s press Secretary) going up $20k.

I searched through the Plunderbund archives but was unable to come up with a stock photo of Mr. Nichols. I’ll keep looking, but until I find one I’m going to use this one*.

For a guy who has spent nearly two decades working for taxpayers, and a guy who got a really big pay increase this month in his new taxpayer-funded job, Rob Nichols has had some really nasty things to say this week about public employees and the salaries they earn.

When President Joe Rugola of the Ohio AFL-CIO called the Kasich administration “part of a national ideological effort to undermine organized labor and diminish the voice of working families”, Rob Nichols replied:

“It’s overwhelmingly clear that the balance of power between Ohio’s taxpayers and the people who are their employees needs to be rebalanced to give taxpayers some relief.”

i.e. State employees are paid too much.

And in a WSJ article from this morning Nichols was quoted talking about how Kasich wants to “eliminate collective-bargaining rights for thousands of home health-care workers”, how he’s “considering changes to union rights and benefits” and how Kasich “supports banning strikes by public school teachers”.

“There are going to be concessions in many facets of government,” Mr. Nichols said. “Everyone needs to be contributing.”

Everyone, it seems, except Nichols himself. Also exempt from concessions are Governor Kasich’s friends who will be serving on his staff and getting big raises.

Now I fully understand that, as a press secretary, Nichols’ job is to deliver the message of his boss whether he completely agrees with the message or not. But it’s really difficult for me to get past the hypocrisy.

Rob Nichols has worked in government for 18 years. And he will most likely be working in government for the next four. And he just got a big raise. And John Kasich has him out there telling state employees that they need to make concessions?

* Note: Photo of Rob Nichols has not been verified.