BY SUSAN TEBBEN
The Ohio Ballot Board passed controversial language written by Secretary of State Frank LaRose on Friday as the ballot summary that will explain to voters November’s anti-gerrymandering amendment. Supporters of the amendment have called the language deceptive and unconstitutional and have said they would challenge it in court.
The board met on Friday morning to determine the summary that will appear on individual ballots, the final words Ohioans will see before they choose to accept or deny the measure.
The proposed amendment would remove Ohio politicians from the process of drawing Statehouse and congressional district maps, and instead create a citizen commission to draw maps made up of Republicans, Democrats, and independents.
The board was led by LaRose in passing his preferred ballot language for the amendment 3 to 2, with both Democratic members of the board, state Sen. Paula Hicks-Hudson and state Rep. Terrence Upchurch, voting against the approval. (Ed. Note: State Rep. Theresa Gavarone, R-Bowling Green voted in favor of LaRose’s language.)
LaRose is one of the politicians who sits on the current Ohio Redistricting Commission, and one of the Republican members who repeatedly voted for maps that were declared to be unconstitutionally gerrymandered by a bipartisan majority on the Ohio Supreme Court before they were nevertheless forced on voters by a federal court in 2022 after time to draw constitutional maps had run out.
One amendment was made to the LaRose language Friday, brought by board member and Republican state Rep. Theresa Gavarone. That change takes a paragraph that says the commission will be “required to manipulate the boundaries of state legislative and congressional districts…” and changes it to say the commission will be “required to gerrymander” those districts, a change that elicited shocked scoffs from the crowd gathered at the board meeting.
The ballot measure seeks to create a 15-citizen redistricting commission to decide Statehouse and congressional voting districts throughout the state, which authors of the proposed amendment from the group Citizens Not Politicians say will be done in public meetings and include opportunities for public input as the process goes on.
Citizens Not Politicians submitted its own proposed summary for ballot board consideration, and it said commission members would be non-elected citizens who “who have demonstrated the absence of any disqualifying conflicts of interest and who have shown an ability to conduct the redistricting process with impartiality, integrity and fairness.”
Democrats attempted to approve the language provided by Citizens Not Politicians, but the motion was voted down 3 to 2, supported only by the Democratic members of the board.
Hicks-Hudson also tried to amend the LaRose-written language to replace it with the Citizens Not Politicians language, but that motion was also struck down.
“This is a dangerous proposal that threatens the integrity of the vote on Issue 1,” Hicks-Hudson said of the Secretary of State language.
With the title that says the amendment would “create an appointed redistricting commission not elected by or subject to removal by the voters of the state,” the language approved by the board speaks of the elimination of “the longstanding ability of Ohio citizens to hold their representatives accountable for establishing fair state legislative and congressional districts,” and the purpose to “repeal constitutional protections against gerrymandering approved by nearly three-quarters of Ohio electors participating in the statewide elections of 2015 and 2018.”
Attorney Don McTigue made the point that it’s impossible for citizens to hold their elected lawmakers responsible by voting in gerrymandered districts — which are by definition guaranteed to ensure the gerrymandered lawmakers’ victory.
“The problem is that the whole accountability argument only works when you have fair districts, not when you have the severely gerrymandered districts that you have in this state,” McTigue said during the public comment portion of the board meeting.
McTigue, who represents the creators and supporters of the ballot initiative, requested the use of the language Citizens Not Politicians submitted rather than the Secretary of State language, citing Ohio law dictating ballot language and title.
“The (SOS) language is stunning in it being false and misleading, and it is unabashed in terms of its prejudicial language,” McTigue said. “There’s no reasonable person who … after reading that language could conclude that it is an honest attempt to provide fair ballot language that allows voters to make an independent decision about the issue.”
He cited the 2015 and 2018 redistricting measures, in which the ballot board “distilled the most important aspects of the proposed redistricting changes to the Ohio Constitution.”
The language, which LaRose said in the ballot board meeting was written by him “with the input of my team,” was harshly criticized by the measure’s leaders and supporters leading up to the meeting as misleading and biased language that violated constitutional rules.
LaRose defended the language in his summary that said the amendment would “limit the right of Ohio citizens to freely express their opinions to members of the commission or to commission staff regarding the redistricting process or proposed redistricting plans,” saying the language might unduly shield members of the new commission from public scrutiny.
McTigue pushed back, saying context is important in reading the summary, which is why he didn’t support the Secretary of State language.
“I think that something can be misleading or deceptive if you don’t have the full context,” McTigue said.
The Secretary of State’s language was released Thursday, giving board members and McTigue little time to read through it, something that was discussed in the meeting.
“I think the record should be really clear that 24 hours isn’t necessarily a lot of time to deal with 900-some words that really, I’m not sure fit in to the confines of what the law requires and … making a really thoughtful evaluation of the language,” said Hicks-Hudson.
Gavarone said the 900 words in the LaRose language “accurately explain what this is,” and noted the details on the process of redistricting were not included in the Citizens Not Politicians proposed summary language.
LaRose also touched on the selection process for commission members in the amendment, saying the longest part of his summary language was explaining that process.
“The way that you end up on the current commission (the Ohio Redistricting Commission) is pretty straightforward,” LaRose said. “(The proposed process) is a bit of a Rube Goldberg device that involves a lot of twists and turns … it’s a complex process.”
He called the five-bullet summary proposed by the CNP “wholly inadequate” and said it could not “identify the substance” of the lengthy amendment.
Noted opponents of the ballot measure include Senate President Matt Huffman and Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, both of whom made public cases against the measure. Huffman said the effort would bring about an onslaught of legal trouble for the state, and DeWine said the focus on proportionality in the rules of the redistricting process would cause more problems than supporters claim it would fix, and “Ohio would actually end up with a system that mandates, that compels map-drawers to produce gerrymandered districts,” he said at a recent press conference.
Supporters of the amendment have said they will appeal the decision of the Ohio Ballot Board in court, just as the supporters of the ballot measure on reproductive rights did to the Ohio Supreme Court after ballot board approval.
Indeed, immediately after the board meeting adjourned, Citizens Not Politicians pledged to “seek remedy” from the Ohio Supreme Court by filing a brief next week on the language, according to Jen Miller of the League of Women Voters of Ohio.
LaRose did not speak to reporters after the meeting.
