Ohio Election Law Veto Referendum (2012)

Election Law Veto
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Type:	Veto Referendum
State code:	(Targeted law) House Bill 194
Topic:	Elections
Status:	On the ballot

The Ohio Election Law Veto Referendum will appear on the November 6, 2012 ballot in the state of Ohio as a veto referendum.

The measure would repeal an elections law that was passed in the state of Ohio. The law would move future primary election dates from March to May, among other provisions.

Additionally, the measure would shorten the period of mail-in absentee voting from 35 days before the election to 21. The number of days residents can vote early would be limited to 14 days before the election. Currently, the number of days residents can vote early is also 35 days.

On December 9, 2011 the Ohio Secretary of State certified that referendum supporters had collected sufficient signatures to qualify the measure for the statewide ballot. As a result of sufficient signatures, the new law will be put on hold until the November election, keeping the 2012 primary in March. The law that the repeal targets is House Bill 194. According to reports, the law has been hold since referendum supporters filed the initial batch of signatures in September 2011.

Former Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner is part of the group that is spearheading the initiative effort. That group is called Fair Elections Ohio.

Background

HB 194 provisions

The following are key provisions of House Bill 194, the law that this referendum is targeting to overturn:

• Reduce by mail absentee voting to 3 weeks. Current mail absentee voting window is 5 weeks.
• Reduce in person absentee voting to 2 weeks.
• Ban in person absentee voting on Sundays as well as Saturday after 12 noon.
• Ban in person early voting during the last weekend before an election takes place.

Support

Supporters

The following is information obtained from the supporting side of the veto referendum:

• Reportedly, the Barack Obama re-election campaign is supporting the referendum efforts, e-mailing supporters to direct them to petitions.
• President Obama's re-election campaign also helped activists in the days leading up to the deadline. According to reports on September 27, 2011, Jeremy Bird, Obama's national field director wrote in an e-mail: "At a time when we should be expanding the number of people voting, there are some in Ohio trying to shrink it. It's pure politics."
• Greg Schultz, Ohio director for the Obama campaign, wrote in an e-mail: "We're mobilizing on the ground all month to get to 231,000 signatures because nothing is more fundamental to our democracy than the right to vote."
• According to national talk show host Jerry Springer, when commenting on the law, and his support to overturn it, stated: “There is something filthy about the notion that in the United States of America that we can have politicians that come up with a strategy to make sure or make it more difficult for certain people to vote. That is such disrespect ... the one thing about being an American is that the vote is sacred.”
• Commenting on legislation to repeal parts of the targeted bill by HB 194 supporters, Carrie Davis, executive director of the League of Women Voters of Ohio, stated that the legislation would confuse voters who were decide on the veto referendum on the state ballot. Davis stated: "Enough already. In the last 12 months, the Legislature has considered but not passed a bill on voter ID. They passed a comprehensive voting bill, HB 194. Two weeks later, they went back and fixed things that they missed and mistakes they had made...There was then a referendum effort on HB 194 to stop it from going into effect. And now, they are planning to pass a repeal of HB 194...We’ve been told...that they plan to introduce and pass yet another election bill before they adjourn for the summer. All of this in 12 months. It’s too much.”

Opposition

The following is information obtained from the opposing side of the veto referendum:

• According to Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, commenting on the the veto referendum effort: "One of the problems that we've had is we've had some counties voting by one set of standards and others by different and that undermines the confidence in the system."

Legislation

It was reported on February 1, 2012 that a proposal was introduced to repeal the new election law, therefore aiming to do the same as the citizen-initiated veto referendum. This, according to reports, was done to avoid a referendum election that could cost the state money.

The bill being considered in the state legislature is Senate Bill 295. According to reports, the bill was to be voted on by the Senate Oversight and Reform Committee in order to have it considered by the full chamber.

Some critics state that the proposal violates the rights of referendum by citizens and could discourage future referendum efforts. Others state that repealing the election law would violate the voters' right to decide on the law. Norman Robbins, a voting rights advocate, stated: "This is an outright violation of Ohio citizen's rights to ask for a referendum, and would discourage any future campaigns on other issues because the ruling majority could simply repeal the referendum issue before the election."

During the week of March 28, 2012, the bill was approved by the Ohio State Senate, therefore only needing approval from the Ohio House of Representatives to repeal the election law.

Polls

See also: Polls, 2012 ballot measures

• A poll was released by Lake Research Partners showing a slight opposition to the election law that the referendum is trying to repeal. It was concluded that 54% of respondents were opposed to the law, therefore favored repealing it. The margin of error of the poll was +/- 3.7 percentage points.

Date of Poll	Pollster	In favor	Opposed	Undecided	Number polled
January 22-25, 2012	Lake Research Partners	54%	31%	15%	705

Path to the ballot

Supporters of the repeal need to gather 231,184 valid signatures from registered voters by September 30, 2011 in order to place the measure on the ballot. The measure was given clearance to circulate petitions for signature collection on August 18, 2011. Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine stated that the measure had collected the initial 1,000 required for the measure to move forward.

On September 29, 2011, petition drive leaders submitted more than 318,000 signatures to the Ohio Secretary of State's office, a third more than the required signature amount, 231,147. Signatures will now be reviewed for validation, with a deadline to verify signatures likely after the November 2011 elections, according to the secretary's office. Meanwhile, House Bill 194 will be "suspended from taking effect", according to Matt McClellan, a spokesman for the secretary's office.

Signatures fall short

It was found on November 14, 2011 that the effort to place the measure on the ballot had fallen short of the signature requirement by 9,578 signatures. Since they fell short, the effort had 10 days to submit more signatures to the Ohio Secretary of State's office after that date.

On November 22, 2011, supporters filed an additional 166,481 signatures to the Ohio Secretary of State's office. The high number of additional signatures is due to the constant petition circulation by supporters while their original filings were being verified.

Certified for the ballot

On December 9, 2011 the Ohio Secretary of State certified that referendum supporters had collected sufficient signatures to qualify the measure for the November 2012 ballot. A grand total of 307,358 signatures were collected and submitted to the secretary of state's office.

See also

Suggest a link

• 2012 ballot measures
• Ohio 2012 ballot measures
• List of Ohio ballot measures
• Laws governing the initiative process in Ohio

Additional reading

• Push for petition signatures uses scare tactics
• Absentee ballots: House Bill 194 must be repealed