SOUTH POINT — Each spring, the Lawrence County Republican Party hosts its Lincoln Day dinner at South Point High School.

Recent years have seen the party reveling in successes, as it swept countywide races, to the point that, 

last year, the party’s candidates ran unopposed in the general election. 

But this year, they had a new set of bragging rights.

The dinner was the first for the party since its chair, State Rep. Jason Stephens, was elected as Ohio’s speaker of the House in January and it served as a homecoming for him.

“It’s great to be home, where people talk normal,” Stephens said of his return from Columbus.

Stephens joked that, on Columbus TV, the weather map usually cuts off the southern tip of Ohio, which includes Lawrence County.

“I tell people, it’s the part of Ohio you don’t see on the map,” he said.

The keynote speaker of the evening was U.S. Rep. Brad Wenstrup, R-Ohio, who is in his first year serving Lawrence County, since it was shifted away from Rep. Bill Johnson due to redistricting.

He was introduced By Lawrence County Commissioner DeAnna Holliday.

“He has been no stranger to Lawrence County,” she said of Wenstrup’s visits and meeting to orient himself with local leaders. “He has hit the ground running.”

Wenstrup introduced himself to the room by retelling his biography, which includes time serving in Iraq and a career as a medical doctor.

He said it was important for politicians to have a background outside of government before serving.

He said he is often asked by young people what they should do to get into politics.

“I tell them, ‘Do something else…. first,’” he said.

Stephens noted that the party has hosted the dinner at South Point High School each year since the school was built and thanked students there who volunteered their time to help out.