News
Ohio Democratic Party Considers Legal Challenge To Election Changes
By: Andy Chow | Statehouse News Bureau
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State Democratic leaders are pushing back hard against several pieces of legislation that change the landscape of voting in Ohio.
One bill makes changes to provisional ballot laws; another cuts a week off of absentee voting; and a third makes it so only the Secretary of State can decide if voters will receive unsolicited absentee ballot applications, taking that power away from local officials.
Now Democratic Senators and Representatives are campaigning against these pending laws by appearing on national political talk shows and holding rallies outside the Statehouse.
Ohio Democratic Party Chairman and state Representative Chris Redfern says the Party is taking a look at its options for a possible legal challenge.
"So we have filed a lawsuit in the past — we’ve filed actually four over the past few years — we’ve won every one in federal court and we will file a lawsuit in this case in the coming several weeks that will challenge the constitutional authority and the constitutionality of several of the pieces of legislation that have passed over the course of the last two weeks,” Redfern said.
Republican supporters have said these provisions were made in order to standardize more election measures and comply with rulings from federal court cases.