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Will Ohio lawmakers propose their own redistricting amendment for November ballot?
By: Jo Ingles | Statehouse News Bureau
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COLUMBUS, Ohio (Statehouse News Bureau) – Many state Republican leaders have spoken out against the proposed redistricting amendment appearing on the ballot this November, but not Gov. Mike DeWine.
DeWine’s silence on the issue has fed into talk among GOP leaders on how to fight the proposal. Of the ideas, the Republican-dominated legislature could be called back to put its own competing redistricting amendment on the fall ballot.
Rep. Sara Carruthers (R-Hamilton) said she’s heard about it from other lawmakers, but said it’s been “nothing that I would take to the bank.”
The Ohio Legislature is on summer break and its next session isn’t scheduled until after the November election. If there’s a proposal out there somewhere, she’d like to see it.
“I think it would be important to have some time going over it and grasping all of the details and maybe tweaking it if we wanted to,” Carruthers said.
Rep. Jay Edwards (R-Nelsonville) said he’s also heard from other lawmakers that there is a plan, but he hasn’t seen it. Sixty House lawmakers would have to vote for a resolution to put it on the November ballot. That’s a tall order with the legislature on summer break.
“I would certainly think that you’d need to contact the members of the legislature to make sure you are going to get 60 people there to even have a chance,” Edwards said.
Edwards said many members are on vacation or are at conferences so it would be hard to come back for a vote on this. His family, he said, intends to be on vacation out of state during the next few weeks.
It’s a tight timeline—the deadline to do it is August 7 in order to make it on the November ballot.
DeWine has been critical of Ohio’s current redistricting process in the past and has said he doesn’t think the governor or the legislature should be involved in it.
But more recently, when DeWine has been asked for his thoughts on the Citizens Not Politicians redistricting proposal, he’s only said he’d make a statement on it soon. DeWine has not talked to reporters about the possibility of another special session this summer for a competing proposal.
A spokesperson for Citizens Not Politicians declined to comment on the current story.