Free Republic

Businessman Tom Ganley, the Republican nominee for Congress in Ohio's 13th District, was instrumental in taking down the Cleveland Mafia through an FBI sting operation in the early 1980s after reporting an extortion scheme against him which included mobster threats to rape his daughter and harm his son, and Matt Lewis recounts the fascinating details for Politics Daily: Once it became known that Ganley was cooperating with the police, the mob put out a $1 million contract on him and his family. * * * Ganley's adventure led to more than 20 Mafia members going to prison. Not all of...

Ganley out of Senate race Republican Tom Ganley is expected to quit his race for the U.S. Senate and will run instead against Democratic U.S. Rep. Betty Sutton of Akron. Sources with knowledge about Ganley's plans said he will make a statement on Thursday. The Ganley campaign declined to comment. Ganley, a millionaire Cleveland-area car dealer, had been expected to file candidacy petitions tomorrow to challenge former U.S. Rep. Rob Portman of Cincinnati. But even though Ganley had vowed to use his personal wealth in a primary, he faced an uphill fight against Portman, who has $6 million on hand...

Cleveland automobile dealer Tom Ganley (R) is airing a statewide television ad to introduce himself to the primary voters who will decide whether he or former Rep. Rob Portman should be the party’s nominee in a key open-seat Senate race next year. The 60-second ad touts Ganley’s business background and takes an anti-Washington tone, with a narrator saying that Ganley’s 47-year career of creating jobs and balancing budgets amounts to “hard work the Washington politicians don’t understand.” Ganley speaks only at the end of the ad, in a required disclaimer approving the commercial. “To help create jobs for Ohio, Tom...

Aside from a pile of money, Tom Ganley has almost nothing in common with the late Howard Metzenbaum. Yet, in his quixotic quest to win the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate next year against favored Rob Portman, Ganley draws inspiration from Metzenbaum. "He showed that it can be done," Ganley said in a recent interview. Ganley, 66, is a conservative Republican from the Cleveland suburb of Brecksville who has never held elective office. Metzenbaum, who died in 2008, was a liberal Democrat from Cleveland who served in the Ohio House and Senate before being elected to the U.S. Senate in...

Car dealer Tom Ganley has announced he’s running for the Republican Party’s nomination for U.S. Senate. Ganley of Brecksville seeks the seat that will be vacated at the end of 2010 by the retiring U.S. Sen. George V. Voinovich, R-Ohio. Starting with a Rambler dealership in Euclid in 1968, Ganley has built the Ganley Auto Group, with 32 dealerships. He is chief executive officer. "I am a businessman, not someone who ever thought about being a professional politician," Ganley said at a news conference in his hometown and subsequent news release to announce his candidacy. "But maybe that’s what’s needed...