The Ohio burgee waving along with the national flag of the United States of America. (Stock photo from Getty Images.)
When Arienne Childrey came to Ohio from Virginia as a teenager, she said she could tell it was the right decision.
“Ohio really felt like home to me,” Childrey said. “It was the first place I lived in because I chose it.”
A coal miner’s daughter, granddaughter and great granddaughter, the Virginia native is now the wife of a union laborer, working for the residents of St. Marys in Auglaize County, and she hopes to represent her fellow Ohioans in the Ohio Statehouse in the future.
As it happens, Childrey is one of only two transgender Ohioans in office in the state, and the only one serving in a city council role. She was appointed to the position with the approval of the retiring city council member she replaced.
(Photo courtesy of Arienne Childrey)
Childrey’s new position on the St. Mary’s City Council comes with issues officials in the Statehouse don’t deal with on a daily basis, things like alleyway maintenance and pothole complaints. It’s those types of issues that Childrey wants to address to make the city more appealing to businesses and residents, especially after the loss of stores like K-Mart, Big Lots and Rite Aid.
“If you’re doing your shopping, I want you to be able to do it in St. Marys, and not have to go to Celina or somewhere else,” Childrey told the Capital Journal.
She said she plans to use her position to champion for residents to live freely, but her identity as a trans woman shouldn’t play into whether or not she can do the job.
“I’m not aware of any trans way of fixing potholes, I’m pretty sure it works the same way no matter what,” Childrey said.
Her role on city council focuses on small-town care, but she knows the measures that come down from the statehouse can have a big impact on how her town runs.
That’s why in the last election, she attempted to unseat Republican state Rep. Angela King in the deep-red 84th House District.
“I looked at my husband and said ‘I think I’m about to do something really stupid,’” Childrey said. “‘I think I’m about to run against Angie.’”
It wasn’t the first time Childrey said she’d pushed back against her representative in the 84th District. After King introduced House Bill 245 — a measure to ban “adult cabaret performances,” including drag shows, in areas other than private businesses — Childrey organized a protest to the bill in Mercer County. The measure received some legislative consideration in the Ohio House Criminal Justice Committee, but never made it past the committee stage, meaning it would have to be reintroduced in the new term of the General Assembly to be considered again.
Childrey also spoke at Democratic Party events in the area about LGBTQ+ rights, leading her to think about running against King.
“I just kind of saw our current representation that was focused on culture war battles and, in my opinion, focused on who they could hurt rather than who they could help,” Childrey said. “If you’re going to put a target on my community’s back, I guess I’m going to be your competitor.”
She said it was an “aggressive” campaign, with tables at county fairs in the area to reach those who didn’t attend typical political fundraising events or weren’t necessarily supporters of hers, and a campaign that was run as if they were going to defeat the incumbent Republican.
But Childrey wasn’t a fool to the political leanings (or full tilt) of her home region. In the 2022 election, King received almost 83% of the vote against her Democratic opponent, similar to the margin her predecessor Susan Manchester had when she defeated her Democratic opponent in 2020 with 85% of the vote.
“We came in expecting to lose, but fighting to win,” she said.
King would go on to receive 83.8% of the vote against Childrey in the 2024 general election.
The campaign was as “hostile” as Childrey expected it to be, but it came with its positive moments.
“The level of hate and vitriol that we experienced was tough, but the level of support we received was inspiring,” she said.
(Photo courtesy of Arienne Childrey)
Through it all, what she really aimed to do was show Ohioans that she wanted the same things they did, to be heard and to see good change come from the Statehouse, rather than a host of “negative bills,” like anti-trans bills to eliminate gender affirming care for minors, that don’t improve Ohio for the majority of residents.
“You’ll never hear me talk about one of the horrible bills that’s being talked about without talking about one of the positive bills that being ignored,” Childrey said, bringing up housing reform and a remedy for the nursing shortage as examples of measures being left behind in the wake of other more controversial bills.
Childrey also hoped to lessen the gaps between Democrats and Republicans even in deep-red districts, and sew the idea of becoming an elected official into the minds of others across the state.
“I fully expect that in 2026, there will not be a single House seat up for election without a Democratic competitor,” she said. “Even if we lose, we need to start working on the margins. The Republican Party didn’t win the rural areas overnight, they played the long game.”
She plans to be one of those candidates, again aiming to be a representative of her district. Until then, the St. Marys City Council member plans to do what she can for her residents as she looks to the future — hers and theirs.
“There are people in our community who always feel like they don’t get listened to and it’s for a variety of reasons,” Childrey said. “It’s about showing them you want to listen to them.”
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