Karen Kasler
Bureau ChiefContact Karen at 614-578-6375 or at kkasler@statehousenews.org.
Karen Kasler grew up in Lancaster, attended Otterbein College in Westerville, and found her professional break at WCBE-FM in Columbus. Karen was selected as a Fellow in the Kiplinger Master's Degree Program for Mid-Career Journalists at Ohio State University in 1994. She worked at WTVN-AM and WBNS-TV, both in Columbus, then for eight years was the afternoon drive anchor and assignment editor for WTAM-AM, Cleveland.
Since returning to Columbus in 2004, Karen has covered major elections and the controversies surrounding them. She served as moderator for the Ohio Debate Commission's Republican US Senate debate in 2022, its Supreme Court debate in 2020 and its gubernatorial debate in 2018. In addition to other election-related debates, she's led forums on statewide issues including redistricting, tax policy, drug sentencing, marijuana legalization and the collective bargaining law known as Senate Bill 5.
She's produced features for NPR and "Marketplace", and has been interviewed by NPR, the BBC, CBS, NBC, Radio New Zealand and stations around the country. She's a regular panelist on ideastream's "The Sound of Ideas" and a frequent guest on WOSU-TV’s “Columbus on the Record”, WOSU-FM's "All Sides with Anna Staver" and WVXU's "Cincinnati Edition".
Karen has been honored by the Cleveland Press Club, the Society of Professional Journalists and the Association of Capitol Editors and Reporters, and holds a National Headliner Award. She's won several awards from the Ohio AP, and is a four-time winner of the AP's Best Broadcast Writing award. She's a three-time Emmy nominee for "The State of Ohio". She's a past president of the Ohio Associated Press and has served on the Board of Directors for the Central Ohio Society of Professional Journalists. Karen is also a former adjunct professor at Capital University in Columbus.
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State lawmakers have sent to Gov. Mike DeWine a bill that removes short-barreled rifles and short-barreled shotguns from a list of weapons that are heavily restricted in Ohio and require special licenses. -
As he prepares to leave office, Gov. Mike DeWine is in the process of considering commutations of multiple death sentences. -
Data centers contributed more than $9 billion to Ohio’s gross domestic product last year, according to a report announced by the state’s largest business organization. -
As the lame duck session gets underway, four of Ohio’s leading law enforcement organizations say they want guardrails on Flock cameras and other automated license plate readers. -
Ohio’s GOP Gov. Mike DeWine was in an interesting spot with this year’s race for his successor, as he had connections to both Democratic Gov.-elect Amy Acton and Republican Vivek Ramaswamy. -
Ohio got its first woman elected governor with Amy Acton, who defeated Republican Vivek Ramaswamy by nearly eight points in a state that President Trump won by 11 points just two years earlier. -
Democrats not only won the governor’s office in Ohio for the first time in 20 years on Tuesday. They also made big gains in the state legislature. -
A constitutional amendment to require photo identification for in-person voting in Ohio passed easily on Tuesday. -
Husted was appointed to that post in 2025 after former Sen. JD Vance was chosen to be President Trump's vice president. -
The secretary of state's office is monitoring voting and election-related activity at the 3,042 polling locations in Ohio.
