William Michael O'Neill (born May 6, 1947) is an

American lawyer ''The American Lawyer'' is a monthly legal magazine and website published by ALM Media. The periodical and its parent company, ALM (then American Lawyer Media), were founded in 1979 by Steven Brill.judge A judge is a person who presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a panel of judges. A judge hears all the witnesses and any other evidence presented by the barristers or solicitors of the case, assesses the credibility an ...

and

political figure A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking, a ...

. He was elected to the

Ohio Supreme Court The Ohio Supreme Court, Officially known as The Supreme Court of the State of Ohio is the highest court in the U.S. state of Ohio, with final authority over interpretations of Ohio law and the Ohio Constitution. The court has seven members, a ...

in 2012, for a term beginning January 2013. He served as an appellate judge on the

Ohio Eleventh District Court of Appeals The Ohio Eleventh District Court of Appeals is one of twelve appellate courts in Ohio. It is a state court. The Eleventh District is composed of five counties: Ashtabula, Geauga, Lake, Portage, and Trumbull. When a lower court in one of those ...

for 10 years. Twice, O'Neill was the Democratic nominee for

U.S. Representative The United States House of Representatives, often referred to as the House of Representatives, the U.S. House, or simply the House, is the lower chamber of the United States Congress, with the Senate being the upper chamber. Together they c ...

in . He announced on October 29, 2017, as a candidate for Ohio Governor in the 2018 election. On December 8, 2017, he announced he would resign from the Supreme Court on January 26, 2018.

Education and military service

O'Neill graduated from

Cleveland Heights High School Cleveland Heights High School (commonly known as Heights, Heights High or Heights High School) is the senior high school of the Cleveland Heights-University Heights City School District, located in Cleveland Heights, Ohio, United States. History ...

in 1965 and

Ohio University Ohio University is a Public university, public research university in Athens, Ohio. The first university chartered by an Act of Congress and the first to be chartered in Ohio, the university was chartered in 1787 by the Congress of the Confeder ...

in 1969, at which point he joined the

U.S. Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cl ...

. He earned the

Bronze Star The Bronze Star Medal (BSM) is a United States Armed Forces decoration awarded to members of the United States Armed Forces for either heroic achievement, heroic service, meritorious achievement, or meritorious service in a combat zone. Wh ...

in Vietnam and retired from the military in 2001 as a lieutenant colonel in the

Ohio National Guard The Ohio National Guard comprises the Ohio Army National Guard and the Ohio Air National Guard. The commander-in-chief of the Ohio Army National Guard is the governor of the U.S. state of Ohio. If the Ohio Army National Guard is called to fed ...

. With the help of the

G.I. Bill The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, commonly known as the G.I. Bill, was a law that provided a range of benefits for some of the returning World War II veterans (commonly referred to as G.I.s). The original G.I. Bill expired in 1956, bu ...

, O'Neill graduated from

Cleveland–Marshall College of Law Cleveland State University College of Law is the law school of Cleveland State University, a public research university in Cleveland, Ohio. The school traces its origins to Cleveland Law School (founded in 1897), which merged in 1946 with the Jo ...

in 1980.Meet Bill , O Neill '08 for Congress
/ref> He also graduated from Huron School of Nursing as a

registered nurse A registered nurse (RN) is a nurse who has graduated or successfully passed a nursing program from a recognized nursing school and met the requirements outlined by a country, state, province or similar government-authorized licensing body to o ...

Political campaigns

1996 Ohio Court of Appeals campaign

In 1996, O'Neill won a seat on the

with about 50% of the vote. He served from 1997 to 2007, when he resigned to run for Congress.

2004 Ohio Supreme Court campaign

In a 2004 special election to finish the term of an Ohio Supreme Court justice who resigned, O'Neill lost to

Terrence O'Donnell Terrence O'Donnell (born c. 1946) is a former associate justice of the Supreme Court of Ohio. Education He graduated in 1964 from St. Edward High School, an all-boys Catholic high school on Cleveland's west side. He did his undergraduate stud ...

by 21%.

2006 Ohio Supreme Court campaign

In 2006, O'Neill ran against O'Donnell again for a full-term on the Ohio Supreme Court. O'Neill lost again, by over 17%.

2008 Congressional campaign

O'Neill lost in his 2008 bid for Ohio's 14th congressional district seat to incumbent Steve LaTourette by nearly 20%.
Race ranking and details
from

CQ Politics Congressional Quarterly, Inc., or CQ, is part of a privately owned publishing company called CQ Roll Call that produces a number of publications reporting primarily on the United States Congress. CQ was acquired by the Economist Group and combine ...

Campaign contributions
from

OpenSecrets OpenSecrets is a nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C., that tracks data on campaign finance and lobbying. It was created from a merger of the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP) and the National Institute on Money in Politics (NIMP). ...

2010 congressional campaign

On February 6, 2010, O'Neill announced that he would be running again as the Democratic nominee for against LaTourette. O'Neill stated during his campaign his desire to expand the Greater Cleveland Rapid Transit rail system. O'Neill lost the election by over 33%.

2012 Ohio Supreme Court campaign

In 2012, for the third time, O'Neill ran for the Ohio Supreme Court. He won a two-way primary against Fanon Rucker, a judge on the Hamilton County Municipal Court. O'Neill received 72% of the vote and carried all but one of Ohio's 88 counties. In the general election, O'Neill defeated incumbent Robert Cupp by four percent. O'Neill ran on a budget of just $4000 from his personal funds, a campaign he called "no money from nobody" and that was highlighted in a You Tube video with his twin sons.

2018 Ohio gubernatorial campaign

On October 29, 2017, O'Neill announced that he would join the Democratic primary for Ohio governor. During his announcement, he laid out a platform of minimum wage increases, tax incentives for solar power, mental health care expansion and marijuana legalization in Ohio. Less than a week later he announced that he will recuse himself from new Supreme Court cases and will resign by the February 7, filing deadline due to potential ethical conflicts.

Controversy

On November 17, 2017, O'Neill stirred controversy by posting on

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...

regarding allegations of sexual assault against U.S. Senator

Al Franken Alan Stuart Franken (born May 21, 1951) is an American comedian, politician, media personality, and author who served as a United States senator from Minnesota from 2009 to 2018. He gained fame as a writer and performer on the television comed ...

. He referred to those calling for Franken to resign as "dogs of war" and decried a "national feeding frenzy" against age-old sexual indiscretions. O'Neill went on to claim that he had been in sexual relationships with approximately fifty women. In response to these posts, his communications director resigned from his campaign. Multiple state officials, including Ohio Chief Justice

Maureen O'Connor Maureen O'Connor (born August 7, 1951) is an American lawyer and judge serving as the chief justice of the Ohio Supreme Court. She was elected to the court in 2002, becoming chief justice in 2010. Prior to this, O'Connor served as an associate ...

, former state representative and fellow gubernatorial candidate Connie Pillich,

Dayton Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater Da ...

mayor and fellow gubernatorial candidate

Nan Whaley Nannette L. Whaley (; born January 23, 1976) is an American politician who served as the 56th mayor of Dayton, Ohio from 2014 to 2022. A member of the Democratic Party, she was first elected to the mayorship in November 2013, after she served o ...

, and Lieutenant Governor Mary Taylor, criticized O'Neill's comments, with Pillich and Whaley calling for him to resign from his position as associate justice. O'Neill initially called for his critics to "lighten up", saying that he intended to "elevate the discussion" on sexual assault. However, on November 19, he issued an apology for his remarks.

Professional life

O'Neill worked as a

civil rights Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and political life of ...

lawyer, small business owner, and

union organizer A union organizer (or union organiser in Commonwealth spelling) is a specific type of trade union member (often elected) or an appointed union official. A majority of unions appoint rather than elect their organizers. In some unions, the orga ...

. He is a registered nurse in the pediatric emergency department at Hillcrest Hospital in

Mayfield Heights Mayfield Heights is a city in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, United States, and is an east-side suburb of Cleveland. The population was 18,827 at the 2010 census. History Mayfield Heights was initially built up as a streetcar suburb of Cleveland. It wa ...

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

References

External links

Bill O'Neill for Governor 2018Campaign contributions
at

OpenSecrets.org OpenSecrets is a nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C., that tracks data on campaign finance and lobbying. It was created from a merger of the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP) and the National Institute on Money in Politics (NIMP). ...

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Oneill, William 1947 births Activists from Ohio American civil rights lawyers Cleveland–Marshall College of Law alumni Judges of the Ohio District Courts of Appeals Lawyers from Cleveland Living people Ohio Democrats Justices of the Ohio Supreme Court Ohio University alumni Politicians from Cleveland Cleveland Heights High School alumni