On June 25, the Sixth Circuit expedited O’Toole v O’Connor, 15-3614. The case had been filed by Colleen O’Toole, who is running for Ohio State Supreme Court Justice in the March 2016 Republican primary. Ohio elects State Supreme Court Justices with partisan elections, although party labels are not printed on the general election ballot. Ohio law does not let candidates for this office raise campaign contributions until four months before the primary.
On June 3, the U.S. District Court had refused to enjoin that restriction. O’Toole has almost no money in her campaign treasury and the incumbents she will be running against have hundreds of thousands of dollars in their campaign treasuries, mostly money that was raised in past campaigns and not spent. The U.S. District Court Judge had refused to enjoin the law because he believes the state has an interest in restricting judges and their campaign committees from raising money during most time periods because it seems unseemly for judges to be raising money.