Ohio Constitutional Amendment Proponents Sue Ohio Attorney General Over His Actions to Stop Initiative Petition for Citizens’ Rights from Moving Forward

On Wednesday, March 27, 2024, three Ohio activists who are part of a group attempting to place a citizens’ initiative constitutional amendment on the ballot in Ohio, sued the Attorney General of Ohio in federal court.  Brown v Yost, s.d., 2:24cv-1401.  The case is assigned to U.S. District Court Judge James L. Graham, a Reagan appointee.

As part of the Ohio constitutional amendment process, the Attorney General of Ohio must judge whether the Summary of the actual text of an amendment to the Ohio Constitution is fair in its description of the actual amendment text.

David Yost, who is the current Ohio Attorney General, rejected a Summary of a proposed amendment, which is called “The Protecting Ohioans’ Constitutional Rights Amendment.” Among the amendment’s provisions is “Qualified immunity, sovereign immunity, prosecutorial immunity, and any immunity provided to the State, political subdivision, or public employee by statute are eliminated.” The entire Summary that was rejected is Page 19 of the Complaint, the link to which is below.

The rejection of the Summary has stopped the signature collection process before it could even start. And, over 400,000 signatures of Ohio registered voters must be gathered by July 3, 2024, for this constitutional amendment to be placed on the November 5, 2024 ballot. If passed on that date, this would become effective on January 1, 2025.

An appeal to the Ohio Supreme Court for expedited review of the Attorney General’s rejection of the Summary was denied, effectively ending any chance of this issue making the November 2024 ballot, but for this litigation in federal court.

Here is the US District Court Complaint.

Here is the Motion for Temporary Restraining Order and Preliminary Injunction and Attached Memorandum of Law in Support.

Thanks to Mark Brown for letting me know about this.

Arizona Green Party, Which Must Nominate by Primary, is Plagued with Insincere U.S. Senate Candidates

The Arizona Green Party is ballot-qualified, and state law requires it to nominate by primary. There are three individuals seeking the Green Party nomination for U.S. Senate whom the Green Party believes are not sincere supporters of the party. One is believed to be sympathetic to the Republican Party. He is believed to be motivated by a desire to injure the eventual Democratic nominee.

Another sham candidate is believed to be sympathetic to the Democratic Party, and if he gets the Green nomination, he will withdraw.

A third sham candidate is running on a platform that completely contradicts the Green Party’s core values.

The party sent out a message to its members on March 27, asking them not to sign primary petitions for any of the three. There is a bona fide Green also seeking the nomination.

Minor parties in the U.S. are better off when states allow them to nominate by convention, as this example illustrates.

Third Circuit Rules 2-1 that Pennsylvania May Require Outer Envelope of Postal Ballots to Include the Date

On March 27, the Third Circuit ruled 2-1 that Pennsylvania may invalidate postal ballots if the voter forgot to fill in the date on the outer envelope, or to put the wrong date or year. Pennsylvania State Conference of the NAACP Branches v Secretary, 23-3166.

The majority opinion is by Judge Thomas L. Ambro, a Clinton appointee. It is also signed by Judge Cindy K. Chung, a Biden appointee. The dissent, which is as long as the majority opinion, is by Judge Patty Shwartz, an Obama appointee. Here is the Opinion.

The 1964 federal Civil Rights Law has a provision relating to elections. It says no state may prevent someone from voting if he or she makes an error that is not material to whether he or she should be able to cast a ballot. This is known as the “materiality” law. The majority construed that law to only regulates who is allowed to vote, but not to whether the ballot should be counted.

The majority acknowledges that the Pennsylvania requirement is not needed. When ballots are received by the elections office, they are date-stamped, so whether the voter also dated the envelope doesn’t have any practical significance.