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0000017a-3b40-d913-abfe-bf44a4f90000Howard Wilkinson joined the WVXU news team as the politics reporter and columnist in April 2012 , after 30 years of covering local, state and national politics for The Cincinnati Enquirer. On this page, you will find his weekly column, Politically Speaking; the Monday morning political chats with News Director Maryanne Zeleznik and other news coverage by Wilkinson. A native of Dayton, Ohio, Wilkinson has covered every Ohio gubernatorial race since 1974, as well as 16 presidential nominating conventions. Along with politics, Wilkinson also covered the 2001 Cincinnati race riots, the Lucasville prison riot in 1993, the Air Canada plane crash at Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport in 1983, and the 1997 Ohio River flooding. And, given his passion for baseball, you might even find some stories about the Cincinnati Reds here from time to time.

Portman's son Will writes about his coming-out

U.S. Sen Rob Portman's son, Will, wrote a column in today's Yale Daily News, explaining in great detail how he decided to "come out of the closet" about being gay; and how his father reacted.

The junior senator from Ohio learned his son was gay two years ago. Earlier this month, Portman came out in favor of gay marriage, the only Republican senator who has done so.

Will Portman, a junior at Yale University's Trumbull College and one of three children of Rob and Jane Portman, said he wrote a letter to his parents in 2011, his freshman year at Yale.

"They were surprised to learn I was gay, and full of questions,'' Will Portman wrote, "but they were rock-solid supportive. This was the beginning of the end of feeling ashamed of who I was."

In the summer of 2012, Sen. Portman was up for consideration as Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney's running mate.

"My dad told the Romney campaign that I was gay; that he and my mom were supportive and proud of their son and that we would be open about it on the campaign trail,'' Will Portman wrote.

Howard Wilkinson is in his 50th year of covering politics on the local, state and national levels.