The recent revelation that Ted Strickland’s Development Office violated his order not to ship jobs out of the United States has just begun to cause grief for the Strickland campaign. But the Rob Portman campaign’s communications director, Jeff Sadosky, tells Battle ‘10 that the scandal also has implications for the Senate campaign of Strickland’s former lieutenant Lee Fisher.

Their basic argument is Republican policies have put us into this mess, but the stimulus is going to get us out. It turns out that Strickland and Fisher and the Ohio Department of Development which Fisher used to run took stimulus dollars and put them in El Salvador…[Fisher] left development, but his hand-picked people are staffing it.

According to the Ohio Governor’s website, Fisher ran the Ohio Department of Development from 2007-2008, coinciding with the first two years of the Strickland administration. Sadosky says this connection to the scandal proves that Fisher can actually be accused of responsibility for sending Ohio jobs out of the country, whereas Portman’s connection to Ohio job losses is part of a tenuous “Blame Bush” strategy.

“Fisher’s line is that 40 years of job loss all come down to [Rob Portman’s] 11 months as trade Trade Representative,” Sadosky said. “The issue that’s the top of everyone’s mind is not trade; it’s jobs, [and] the stimulus is outsourcing jobs.”