Pip: J News Network, where the local and the federal have a way of colliding in the most unexpected places — like a glove factory inside a former paper mill that's also becoming a data center.
Mara: Today's episode comes from the Investigative Team, and we're looking at a story that runs from a Chillicothe city council meeting all the way up to questions about federal procurement, domestic manufacturing, and national security. Let's start with the glove contracts.
Chillicothe Councilman Alleges Federal Contracts Are Being Withheld
Pip: The setup here is layered: a former paper mill, a surprise data center announcement, a glove manufacturer losing money, and a city councilman who came out of a meeting with a lot of questions for Washington.
Mara: Councilman Richard McQuirt says that when city officials met with John Todoroki — principal owner of U.S. Paper Mill and U.S. Glove Co. — Todoroki told them he is currently losing five million dollars a month on the site.
Pip: Five million a month is not a rounding error. That's a company that built out real infrastructure — Todoroki reportedly designed and built his own manufacturing equipment from scratch — and is now sitting on production lines with almost nothing to run through them.
Mara: McQuirt traces the origin back to the pandemic. When China and Malaysia couldn't fill American PPE orders, the federal government pushed to build domestic supply. Todoroki moved quickly to position his company for nitrile glove contracts. Senator Bernie Moreno's team later helped bring U.S. Medical Glove to the mill site specifically to keep it from becoming a vacant brownfield.
Pip: So the federal government essentially said "we need domestic gloves," someone built the capacity to make them, and now the orders aren't showing up. That's a gap worth explaining.
Mara: McQuirt says the company has several production lines ready but only two federal contracts in hand — one with the TSA and one with the Army — which he says fall well short of what Todoroki was promised. The more serious allegation is that unnamed officials in Washington are declining to shift contracts away from foreign suppliers because domestic gloves cost more, and that U.S.-made gloves are being mixed with foreign-made ones and labeled as "USA Made."
Pip: That last part — mislabeling — is where this stops being a procurement dispute and becomes something else entirely.
Mara: McQuirt raised the claims with staff for Senators Husted and Moreno. Moreno's staff, he said, confirmed that what Todoroki described checked out. He put it directly: "This is a matter not only of salvation and jobs for the paper mill site but a matter of national security and a matter of how we hold the people governing us to their word."
Pip: J News Network has not independently confirmed the contract-withholding or mislabeling allegations, and no on-the-record statements have come from Todoroki's office, the senators, or federal procurement officials — so these remain McQuirt's account of a meeting, relayed publicly.
Mara: McQuirt is urging residents to contact their federal representatives, and the story is flagged for updates as more information becomes available.
Pip: A glove factory, a data center, a paper mill over a century old, and a national security argument — Chillicothe is carrying a lot right now.
Mara: The federal procurement question is the one to watch. If documents or on-the-record responses surface, this story has a lot further to go.
