Tag Archives: ohio

Ohio’s Direct Democracy Survives and Thrives

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Ohio defeated a proposed amendment meant to make ballot initiatives impossible, despite the state government using every possible trick to help it pass, including placing the question on the ballot for August.

Apparently, the turnout exceeded most primary votes in the last several election cycles since 2016. The result also largely broke down by population density, with Democratic-heavy counties joined by voting No. The result largely bucked the trend of past presidential and statewide elections, with substantial crossover voting from Republicans who opposed the ballot question.

Winners:

  • Both November 7 ballot initiatives:
    • Right to Make Reproductive Decisions Including Abortion Initiative, on the ballot November 7 (passed)
    • Marijuana Legalization Initiative, on the ballot November 7 (passed)
  • At least 3 potential ballot initiatives working for the 2024 ballot:
    • Citizens Redistricting Commission Amendment
    • Minimum Wage Increase Initiative (for $15)
    • Constitutional and Legal Rights Relating to Public Safety, Including Prohibiting Qualified Immunity Initiative
  • former Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor, who is leading the effort for the Citizens Redistricting Commission Amendment and was infamously snubbed by the Ohio Republican-supermajority legislature

Losers:

  • Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose (R)
  • Governor Mike DeWine (R)
  • Attorney General David Yost (R)
  • The Ohio Republican Legislative Supermajority
  • Ohio Chamber of Commerce
  • Anti-choice reactionaries

Third Time’s the Charm for Citizen Redistricting Initiatives in Ohio

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What will be the difference between 2005, 2012 and 2024 for citizen redistricting in Ohio?

Let’s look at the 2012 proposal.

The Voters First Ohio campaign went to court against the Ohio Ballot Board over the language of the measure. The Ohio Supreme Court ruled for the campaign, but when the Ballot Board met again, the ballot language was doubled in length. 

The opponents of the 2012 measure, including both big business lobbies and the boards of at least two major newspapers, decried the alleged “lack of [electoral] accountability” of a citizen redistricting commission, as well as the mandated funding for the commission’s work. 

Both newspapers instead extolled the idea of requiring a bipartisan supermajority from a politician-majority commission for passage of a map, and the proposal went down in defeat.

This was said before Ohio, in two legislatively-referred amendments in 2015 and 2018, replaced the Ohio Apportionment Board with the Ohio Redistricting Commission, which did no better in 2021-2023 at drawing fairer maps despite requiring bipartisan supermajority approval. Wonder if they changed their tune?

The CNP initiative seems to keep most of the 2012 proposal. Differences:

  • The CNP proposal would involve a bipartisan panel of only retired judges to screen potential candidates for the commission. The 2012 plan would have involved sitting appellate court judges in the selection of commissioners.
  • CNP’s plan bans prison gerrymandering. 

The use of retired judges effectively sidesteps one of the sticking points of the 2012 plan, which drew the opposition of both the Ohio Judicial Conference and the Ohio State Bar Association for this reason. This amendment, certainly, needs as many supporters, or as few opponents, as possible.

There is no telling whether the big business lobbies have changed their tune. The Ohio Farm Bureau Association and Ohio Chamber of Commerce, both of which publicly opposed Issue 2 in 2012, both backed August 2023 Issue 1, which would have seriously hobbled direct democracy in the state. The failure of that amendment may not say too much about the fate of CNP’s initiative, but it does show the deep entrenchment of the political elite in Ohio that such a blatantly anti-democratic proposal as August 2023 Ohio Issue 1 would see the light of day.

But the repeated failures of citizen redistricting proposals at the ballot box, or at least the failures of their campaigns, need to be considered as teaching moments for those who assume that it will win this round in 2024. In addition, the chicanery of oppositional officeholders like the Secretary of State, who changed the ballot summary language of November 2023 Ohio Issue 1 to reflect Christian right-wing beliefs about abortion, should not be ignored (even if his actions failed to stop the measure from victory at the polls). Victory is not certain, and what those past campaigns endured should help this campaign improvise, adapt and overcome in 2024.

Let’s also see if the CNP proposal makes it to the ballot at all. After being approved by the Attorney General (who accepted it after previously rejecting it twice) and Ohio Ballot Board, the campaign recently voluntarily reset the clock after discovering a typo, then rewrote the petition and sent it back to the Attorney General, who approved it a second time. It now awaits the Ohio Ballot Board’s decision before it is finally set to begin collecting signatures.

Things are moving quickly in Ohio

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On the third try, the bipartisan Citizens Not Politicians Ohio campaign got their proposed ballot language approved by Republican Attorney General David Yost. This happened just days after the state’s partisan redistricting commission approved gerrymandered maps, with Democratic members voting in favor in order to protect their remaining seats.

Next step for the campaign: approval by the Ohio Ballot Board, which also has a Republican majority. If approved by the board, the campaign will begin to collect nearly 500,000 signatures from 44 counties across the state to place the question on the November 2024 ballot. If approved by the voters, the commission will be appointed and tasked with redrawing congressional, legislative and other state maps for the 2026 elections.

In related news, the campaign also hired the former director of the Missouri nonpartisan redistricting campaign which was passed in 2018, then infamously repealed in 2020, by the voters (thanks to Republican fuckery).

Good to see!

Looking forward

Obviously, this bipartisan campaign is the best bet for Ohio Democrats to end the GOP supermajority in legislative and congressional maps. In the last round of redistricting, the Democrats unsuccessfully proposed congressional maps that would end up 8R-7D.

At the very least, this would also prevent one party from unilaterally ramming ballot questions onto the ballot without buy-in from the minority party in either legislative chamber.

Also, the 2015 and 2018 ballot measures which established more elaborate regulations of redistricting failed to curb the GOP’s legislative veto of any unfavorable maps. CNPO’s ballot measure would finally end this legislative veto, as well as:

  • Ensure an equal balance of Democrats, Republicans and non-affiliated citizens, all of whom are removed as much as possible from the political process as possible;
  • End prison gerrymandering;
  • Make the Ohio Supreme Court the final arbiter on constitutionality of maps adopted by the commission

I look forward to Ohio passing this amendment next year.

More on SCOTUS redistricting rulings

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  • Alabama’s legislature will approve a new congressional map with a second VRA district by July 21. The plaintiffs’ remedial map, which goes for a least-change approach, might be adopted, but several submissions have been sent.
  • SCOTUS rejecting Louisiana’s appeal defending their congressional maps is only a partial victory for fairer maps. The case was sent back to the 5th Circuit to decide whether to continue hearing Louisiana’s appeal or to send it back to the Middle District of Louisiana which already ruled against the map. We shall see, but either Louisiana or the 5th Circuit can draw this one out.
  • The denial of cert to Ohio’s case defending their shit maps is not a victory for fair maps at all. Unless Ohio defeats Issue 1, most other attempts at redistricting reform in that state are f**ked.
  • Still nothing regarding Rose v. Raffensperger from the 11th Circuit, beyond both plaintiffs and the state sparring in dueling letters to the court asserting Milligan and Gingles‘ applicability to the case immediately following the Milligan decision.
  • I tried redrawing a map with a second majority-Black district for Louisiana’s PSC. I don’t think it worked.