Mike Turner has represented Ohio's 10th District since 2003. That's 23 years in Washington — more than enough time to judge whose side he's really on. Here are 3 things voters in the Dayton area should know.
A watchdog group put him in its most-corrupt reports — twice
We should be able to trust that our leaders are working for us, not using their power to get rich. Turner has a problem on that front.
The watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) put Mike Turner in its Most Corrupt Members of Congress reports twice — as a "dishonorable mention" in 2008, and in 2010 as one of the 26 "shady politicians" left on its list.
When Turner arrived in Congress in 2002, he reported between $153,026 and $695,000 in assets. By 2016, that had ballooned to somewhere between $2.8 million and $10.3 million — though the Dayton Daily News, which ran those numbers, explained the jump: "Turner married an energy lobbyist in 2015, and her assets as well as his were listed on his 2016 financial disclosure form." Turner also spent years pushing bills to make it easier for U.S. companies to export liquefied natural gas — while his then-fiancée, Majida Mourad, worked as a lobbyist for Cheniere Energy, one of the companies that stood to gain (though experts told the paper the bill would help Cheniere's competitors more). Cheniere's own reports to investors listed two bills Turner authored or co-authored among the legislation it was watching, the Dayton Daily News found. Turner said he had been working on the issue before he met Mourad in September 2013, and that his office "has not taken action nor will it take any to benefit my fianceé's employer." The watchdog group Public Citizen said it raises red flags anyway: "You'd think the lawmaker would want to avoid the appearance of undue influence."
He works for defense contractors, not for Dayton
Turner sits on the powerful House Armed Services Committee, which oversees billions of dollars in defense contracts. So who fills his campaign coffers? Four of his top seven donors are defense contractors:
- Sierra Nevada Corp
- Honeywell International
- L3Harris Technologies
- Lockheed Martin
These are the very companies he's supposed to be holding accountable. Instead, they're paying his bills. When a member of Congress is funded by the industry he regulates, it's not hard to guess whose interests come first — and it isn't the families back home struggling with rent and grocery bills.
One of the worst environmental records in Congress
We all deserve clean air and clean water. Mike Turner has spent his career voting against both.
The League of Conservation Voters tracks how every member votes on the environment. Turner's score? A dismal 6% for 2025, and just 10% over his entire career. That means he votes with polluters and against clean air and water more than 9 times out of 10.
That fits the pattern of a Congress that has worked to gut the EPA and let the government stop counting lives saved when it sets air pollution rules. The price for that gets paid by all of us — in higher rates of asthma, cancer, and early death.
One pattern, three examples
These aren't three separate stories. They're three versions of the same one: when Mike Turner has to choose between the people of Ohio's 10th and the powerful interests that enrich him, he picks the interests. The defense contractors who fund him, the gas company tied to his own household, the polluters he keeps voting to protect — they all come first. After 23 years, that's not a stumble. That's the whole career. In 2026, Dayton gets to decide whether it's still the career it wants representing it.
