{"id":137537,"date":"2026-01-10T19:01:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T19:01:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/?p=137537"},"modified":"2026-01-10T19:01:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T19:01:09","slug":"ohio-utility-corruption-defendants-to-scotus-bribes-are-free-speech","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/ohio-utility-corruption-defendants-to-scotus-bribes-are-free-speech\/","title":{"rendered":"Ohio utility corruption defendants to SCOTUS: Bribes are free speech"},"content":{"rendered":"<header class=\"post-header post-header--conveyor\">\n<div class=\"post-header__text\">\n<header class=\"article-header\">\n<div class=\"post-subheader has-summary\">\n<div class=\"post-subheader__summary\" role=\"region\" aria-label=\"summary\">\n<div class=\"text__text__1FZLe text__dark-grey__3Ml43 text__regular__2N1Xr text__small__1kGq2 body__full_width__ekUdw body__small_body__2vQyf article-body__paragraph__2-BtD\" data-testid=\"paragraph-0\">\n<div class=\"post-subheader has-summary\">\n<div class=\"post-subheader__summary\" role=\"region\" aria-label=\"summary\">\n<div class=\"post-subheader has-summary\">\n<div class=\"post-subheader__summary\" role=\"region\" aria-label=\"summary\">\n<div>\n<div role=\"region\" aria-label=\"summary\">\n<div role=\"region\" aria-label=\"summary\">\n<div class=\"\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The only two individuals who have stood trial for their role in the largest utility corruption scandal in Ohio\u2019s history have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review their cases and reverse their convictions.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\">If the court accepts their case and ultimately rules in favor of the defendants, it would also likely affect\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/usao-sdoh\/pr\/grand-jury-indicts-2-former-firstenergy-executives-racketeering-conspiracy-involving\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">two former FirstEnergy Corp. officials<\/a>\u00a0currently facing criminal charges in federal court as part of the multiyear House Bill\u00a0<span class=\"numbers\">6<\/span>\u00a0bailout scheme.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"su-button-center\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.canarymedia.com\/articles\/utilities\/ohio-utility-corruption-defendants-appeal-scotus\" class=\"su-button su-button-style-default\" style=\"color:#FFFFFF;background-color:#68cf8a;border-color:#54a66f;border-radius:10px\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span style=\"color:#FFFFFF;padding:8px 26px;font-size:20px;line-height:30px;border-color:#96deae;border-radius:10px;text-shadow:none\"><i class=\"sui sui-sign-out\" style=\"font-size:20px;color:#FFFFFF\"><\/i>  <small style=\"padding-bottom:8px;color:#FFFFFF\">Click here for full article at Canary Media<\/small><\/span><\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/header>\n<\/div>\n<\/header>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The only two individuals who have stood trial for their role in the largest utility corruption scandal in Ohio\u2019s history have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review their cases &hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1549,"featured_media":137541,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[60,58,5,47,57],"tags":[453,2810,641,914],"class_list":["post-137537","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-civil-society","category-government","category-news","category-north-america","category-utilities","tag-corruption","tag-legal-action","tag-lobbying","tag-united-states"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137537","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1549"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137537"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137537\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/137541"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137537"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themintmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}