As part of my Lenten practice this year, I’m doing a little bit of writing every day. I’m starting off with a letter to my Governor, John Kasich.

Governor Kasich—

Hello from Cleveland Heights! Congratulations on your strong showing in New Hampshire yesterday. I’ve been following both of the primary contests pretty closely, but I have to say I didn’t see that coming. This primary season’s been pretty wild, especially on the Republican side, but in retrospect, I think it shouldn’t have been surprising that your type of conservativism would resonate with likely GOP primary voters in the northeast. Well done!

Context is funny, right? Under normal circumstances, here in Ohio, you’re viewed as pretty conservative. Not off on the deep end, certainly, but nobody would be confused about describing you as consistently conservative. And yet, up on the national stage, you might be the only guy left standing who isn’t uniformly pandering to the crazy wing of your party. It’s hard to predict what’s going to happen in that race—the front-runner is such a train wreck most people haven’t noticed how terrible most of the field is—but you certainly have my attention again.

I think it’s fair to say that you and I would find significant points of disagreement on most policy issues. Overall, though, I think we could have interesting conversations about most of them. You seem like the type of politician who’s interested in finding the best compromise available. The cynic in me can’t help but wonder how much of that is just playing to polls, but who really knows. You certainly shouldn’t take that personally, either—it’s just an artifact of your chosen profession. Whatever your reasons, on most topics you end up with positions I’d describe as moderately conservative, or center-right, and I appreciate the fact that you seem willing to at least entertain positions other than the hard right, with a handful of exceptions.

I want to talk to you today about one of those exceptions: abortion rights. On this topic you are, frankly, really terrible. Ohio’s got a pretty bad record here, as a sort of testing ground for all sorts of attacks on abortion rights, but that doesn’t let you off the hook. Your actions have had a hugely negative impact on the lives of lots of people here in Ohio. These aren’t even the sort of run-of-the-mill attacks that abortion rights advocates are used to dealing with, but include some really terrible, morally reprehensible things like gag orders on rape crisis counselors, and that disgusting ultrasound requirement. I mean, Jesus—haven’t those women been through enough? The last thing they need is some dude making sure they get worse advice and worse care. Overall, your actions have contributed to reducing the number of abortion providers in Ohio from 16 to just 8. That’s really bad. That’s to say nothing of the attacks on Planned Parenthood, which treat all other women’s health issues as collateral damage.

I really hope you come around. Honestly, though, I’m not hopeful, especially in the middle of this campaign. Having committed so much political energy to fighting against the rights of women, I understand it would be politically difficult to now start acting as though you trust them to be competent adults, making medical decisions with only the help of medical professionals, and family planning decisions with their family (whatever that looks like). I know that right now, you’re in a primary fight with folks who are mostly way to your right on most issues, with a party base that often simply looks insane.

There’s only so much you can do. There’s only so much any of us can do, really. But here’s something I can do.

For each delegate you earn in this primary race, I’m going to donate $10 to abortion access and women’s health charities. So far, you’ve helped me donate $50 to Preterm’s Access Fund. This is a fund run by Preterm, a clinic here in Cleveland, to help provide equitable access to these medical procedures. This is incredibly important since, in addition to the direct attacks on abortion rights you’ve been a part of, the various state and federal restrictions on allowing Medicaid programs to cover abortion mean that some of the most vulnerable members of our society are being doubly-victimized. Preterm helps to offset this by making this money available to women most in need of it.

I know $10 isn’t a lot of cash, but there’s a lot of delegates, and I don’t have the same financial backing you do. At some point, if you do well at all, this is going to start to hurt. I mean, any Republican needs at least 1,237 delegates to secure your party’s nomination. Super Tuesday alone puts 565 delegates in play. And, given what the rest of the GOP field looks like, I really am rooting for you to do well.

I hope you reconsider your position on this topic, and start treating women with the dignity and respect they deserve. What you’re doing hurts people, in a very real way. Lacking that, though, good luck in the rest of your race. Help me give until it hurts.

Anthony Sorace, OH-11