Joy Padgett

Joy Padgett
Member of the Ohio Senate from the 20th district
In office January 6, 2004-December 31, 2008
Preceded by	James E. Carnes
Succeeded by	Jimmy Stewart
Member of the Ohio House of Representatives from the 95th district
In office January 3, 1993-June 30, 1999
Preceded by	Mike McCullough
Succeeded by	Jim Aslanides
Personal details
Political party	Republican

Joy Padgett (born 1947, Coshocton, Ohio) is a former Republican member of the Ohio Senate, representing the 20th district until the end of 2008. In 2006, dogged by personal scandals, she ran unsuccessfully for Lieutenant Governor of Ohio and for Congress in Ohio's 18th congressional district. Her run for Congress was the result of the decision of Bob Ney to bow out of the race and plead guilty to corruption charges.

Padgett was first appointed to the Ohio Senate in January 2004 and elected that following November. Prior to her election, she was the Director of the Office of Appalachia in Governor Bob Taft's administration. Before that, she served from 1993 to 1999 in the Ohio House of Representatives and, prior to that, had been a school teacher.

In her 2004 bid for her first full term in the Ohio Senate, Padgett was challenged by Democrat Terry Anderson of Athens, Ohio, who in the 1980s had been held hostage by Islamic radicals in Lebanon when working on a story for the Associated Press. Much of her campaign centered on social issues, namely that of same sex marriage. They stated that if Anderson were elected he would allow gays to get married. These ads were typically played with the theme song from Twilight Zone saying "...men marrying men, women marrying women... What kind of world does Terry Anderson want?" Many of these commercials were considered homophobic, and drew attention and condemnation. Other ads attempted to smear Terry Anderson as a terrorist sympathizer, often ignoring the truth about his imprisonment.

The match-up was the only seriously contested Ohio Senate race in 2004. Padgett won re-election with 54 percent of the vote.

Padgett and her husband Donald were owners of the Main Office Supply Co. Her husband ran the business for three decades; she was the company's treasurer. The Coshocton business began experiencing financial troubles in 1999; it went from 40 employees to about eight when it closed in 2006.

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