COLUMBUS, Ohio — Attorney General Dave Yost's surprise decision to resign from public office shook the Ohio political world. On Wednesday, he spoke about his decision for the first time — addressing his next steps, while also giving a sharp message to his opponents.
With only a few more weeks on the job, Yost gave us a 20-minute sit-down interview. We went more in-depth on several other issues, which will come in future reporting.
While sitting across from each other in his downtown Columbus office, Yost reflected on his years of public service, with me covering him for about half a decade.
"I'm not aware that you like anything, Morgan," Yost said, to my laughter. "You're a resident critic."
"Hey, hey, just doing my job, just like you," I replied.
Throughout the years, Yost has made headlines, but his most recent: resigning half a year before the end of his term.
"What told you that it was time to leave now?" I asked him.
"Well, I got an unexpected offer that I literally couldn't refuse," he responded.
He is joining the conservative and Christian nonprofit law firm Alliance Defending Freedom. He will be the firm's new vice president of Strategic Research and Innovation.
"They've prevailed at the United States Supreme Court 18 times in the last 15 years, so the opportunity to go work with them is just exciting," he said.
"You couldn't have waited eight months?" I asked him.
"Well, part of the job is going to be standing up some new functions internally and I, candidly, didn't want to have other people doing that and showing up to find out how it had been done," Yost replied. "It was time, it was just time."
One of the aspects of the job that Yost is most proud of is his efforts in fighting public corruption, including the FirstEnergy House Bill 6 bribery scheme. His latest case against the utility company's former executives ended in a 10-2 hung jury.
RELATED: FirstEnergy corruption case ends with hung jury
"Are you confident that your team will be able to successfully, without you, get convictions?" I asked.
"Oh, yeah," he said.
Because the jury was so heavily leaning towards guilty, Yost feels certain the prosecution will succeed.
"We've got a fresh team coming on board with fresh eyes. We will take the excellent work that was done by the first team. We will refine that," Yost said. "We will simplify some of the narrative to make it a little more accessible, and I am very confident that this case is just and that it will result in conviction."
"With this new team, are you at all worried that you won't be there to oversee it?" I asked.
"Well, I'm disappointed to be leaving a whole bunch of things, but that's the nature. There will always be things that you don't get to finish if you're a decent public official," he said. "If all you do is the things that you can finish while you're there and take credit for — you're a pretty lousy public official."
While wishing he could have prosecuted the FirstEnergy trial, he is proud to have gotten his way on the retired teachers’ pension fund case.
"You've dug deep," he said, referencing years of work exposing the corruption scheme inside the more than $100 billion pension fund.
Franklin County Court of Common Pleas Judge Karen Held Phipps decided that State Teachers Retirement System (STRS) board chair Rudy Fichtenbaum should be immediately removed from his position. He and former board member Wade Steen, whose attorney called him a 'hero' to retirees, will never be allowed to be on the board again, the decision states.
The scandal centered on Steen and Fichtenbaum and their relationship with startup investment firm QED Technologies, run by former Ohio Deputy Treasurer Seth Metcalf and Jonathan (JD) Tremmel.
In short, the two leaders "acted as agents" of a startup investment firm in order to provide them $65 billion of the fund, the judge said.
"That'll be a landmark case," Yost said. "I don't know if that statute has been used before, and what it showed is that if you violate the duty that you owe to your retirees, this statute stands for the proposition that you can lose your seat."
Luckily, the money didn't change hands, he said. WEWS' reporting was cited as causing another possibly corrupt deal to fall through, as well as numerous resignations.
"People are gonna think twice before they pick up a call and start conspiring with some buddy about how they're gonna move some money around for investments," he said.
"Do you worry that another attorney general may not focus as much on public corruption in a time when it's very politically divided?" I asked Yost, noting that he had gone after Republican officials.
"Well, a little bit, because the Supreme Court of the United States has shown a distaste for the use of some statutes that the federal government used to use to police the public space, and the current Justice Department has other priorities," he responded. "I think that means it's more important to have robust enforcement at the state level."
He said that of his views on the candidates for AG, and his appointed successor, Andy Wilson, he doesn't think that anyone is going to ignore corruption in the short term, he said.
RELATED: Gov. Mike DeWine announces his pick for attorney general
Several days after Yost announced his resignation, DeWine appointed Public Safety Director Andy Wilson to fill the seat until January.
While Yost garnered the support of Democrats while fighting corruption, he got their ire during high-profile cases involving abortion and education. His team has been fighting in court to allow for some provisions of the state's blocked six-week abortion ban, as well as trying to appeal a trial court's ruling that deemed the EdChoice private school voucher system unconstitutional.
One of Yost's largest public controversies includes his denying the existence of a 10-year-old rape victim in Ohio who needed to go out of state to get an abortion. This was promptly fact-checked by the Columbus Police Department, which arrested the alleged perpetrator. In an interview with me in 2025, he said that his comments were made early into the investigation, and said the case was a "terrible tragedy."
Local prosecutors also went toe-to-toe with Yost and Sec. of State Frank LaRose, who helped indict a dead man for voter fraud.
Like with trials, Yost has had his fair share of wins and losses.
His political dreams of being governor evaporated in 2025, when the GOP endorsed Vivek Ramaswamy over him, which he told us in December was the wrong choice.
"Do you worry about the future of Ohio politics?" I asked him on Wednesday.
"Is there a future for Ohio politics?" he responded, smirking.
"Well, we're here, aren't we?" I replied, noting that both he and Gov. Mike DeWine, leaders from before the MAGA era, aren't seeking another office in state politics. "Do you think that Ohio is moving in the right direction right now?"
"That's a tough question," he responded.
He noted his concerns about the public education system and kids falling behind in literacy. He also brought up concerns about Ohio's energy policy, with data centers hurting regular consumers.
"There are things that we need to be seriously thinking about where we don't have direction, and we need direction," he said. "But overall, Ohio is a good place to live. It's going in the right direction. Our communities are largely thriving."
But what Ohio does need is more understanding, he said.
"The most important thing about you is not your political opinions or your political identity. Those things have consequences, and they are important, but they're not remotely the most important thing about a human being," Yost said. "Our ability to live together needs to start with the realization that our value as human beings transcends politics."
He will miss his staff and being able to fight for the law, he said.
"I'm an optimist about what the future holds," Yost said.
But what is for sure — the future of Ohio politics doesn’t include him.
"What would you say to some of your colleagues who say that you're giving up?" I asked him.
"Gee," he replied, after a pause.
He went through a list of all the work he has done for years, including fighting for consumers.
"I've been in the fight, and the fact that I got an offer to do something else with half a year left on my term — yeah, they can go pound sand," the attorney general said, with a smile.
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