Let’s Talk About Ohio Issue One for 2024

All right, let’s talk about politics: but this time, I need to take a minute to talk about Ohio politics.

We can go back to the presidential race shenanigans soon enough, but I live in Ohio, so I’m going to address Ohio right now.

Ohio’s politics are invariably a bigger mess than the nation’s in general, and the 2024 election will not be the exception. This year, we’ve got an exciting constitutional amendment proposal on the ballot for all Ohioans to vote on. For those of you lucky enough to live elsewhere: Ohio’s state constitution can be changed if a proposal wins a simple majority of 50% plus one vote in a general election. We’ve got a doozy of an amendment on the ballot in November, and the people who currently run Ohio are trying to do everything they can to confuse voters about what that amendment will do.

The amendment proposal will show up on our ballots in November as Ohio Issue One. If you recall, last year in the summer we had a special election for an Issue One that would make it much harder for citizens to pass a constitutional amendment, and I was against that one. Then in November of 2023 we had the amendment that would make null any laws forbidding abortion, and my only public opinion on that one was that my heart was broken at how corrupt the pro-life movement has proven to be. This is a new Issue One, and it’s to do with how we vote.

Ohio’s Issue One this year is called the “Ohio Citizens Not Politicians Amendment.”

The amendment is an attempt to fix Ohio’s notoriously crooked congressional districts so that we can get the representation that Ohio’s citizens actually want. This is important, because Ohio’s current districting isn’t letting the voices of Ohio be heard. According to the Pew Research center, Ohio is a demographically purple state with a close to even split between Republicans and Democrats– 42% of Ohio’s adults identify as Republicans, 40% are Democrats, and a hefty 18% are officially unaffiliated and might vote either way in a given election. That’s 58% of us who aren’t reliable Republican voters. If only avowed Democrats and Republicans show up to an election, the GOP will have a tiny majority, but if any of that 18% vote it will be a mixed bag. And that’s just how people SAY they identify. If you want to know how voters are registered, that’s a very different story. Because of the way Ohio registers people to vote, all voters are officially unaffiliated unless they’ve voted in a primary election in the past two years. When you show up at a primary election in March, you can ask for either a Republican or a Democratic ballot to vote on, but you can’t choose both. If you ask for a Democratic ballot, you’re legally considered a Democrat for two years and then you can choose a different party. If you choose a Republican ballot you become a registered Republican. And then everybody votes on the same single ballot in November. That means if, like most registered voters in Ohio, you don’t vote in the Primary elections but only vote in November, you’re officially a registered unaffiliated voter. Legally speaking, according to Ohio’s secretary of state, 71% of Ohioans are unaffiliated, neither Republicans nor Democrats. Republicans are not the majority of Ohioans no matter how you slice it.

However, as far as the people we inevitably send to Washington, Ohio is a solid red state. Thanks to Project REDMAP, for the last ten years or so, it has been extremely difficult for anyone who isn’t a Republican to get into office. Our districts are squiggles purposely designed to throw the elections in Republicans’ favor. And no one is asking to settle the score by letting Democrats have unlimited power for an equal amount of the time or anything like that. The Citizens Not Politicians amendment will only seek to even things out so that every citizen gets an equal say.

Currently, lobbyists and politicians draw Ohio’s maps, and the vast majority of Ohioans are helpless to influence the process. You and I have zero say in what district we vote in. The amendment seeks to determine that future redistricting for Ohio is done fairly, by the will of Ohio’s citizens. If it’s passed, Ohio will seek to establish an Ohio Citizens’ Redistricting Commission to re-draw the districts in 2025. This commission will consist of fifteen people: five registered Republicans, five registered Democrats, and five unaffiliated. And there are all kinds of safeguards written into the proposal to make sure that these people don’t have a conflict of interest. There will be a bipartisan screening panel to vet anybody who applies to be one of the fifteen commissioners. You can read the entire text of the proposal here.

There was a petition drive to put the Citizens not Politicians amendment on the ballot, and an enormous number of Ohioans signed. This wasn’t some shady cabal working to get an obscure proposal under the radar, it’s a proposal that had immense support from Ohio’s voters. The petition’s signatures were delivered to the Ohio Statehouse by truck, on reams and reams of paper. It was a joyful day in Columbus.

Ohio’s Secretary of State, the Republican Frank LaRose, had no choice but to put the proposal on November’s ballot. But he and his buddies at the Ballot Board got to decide the wording that will appear on the ballot.

And the wording is horse hooey.

He calls the Citizens Not Politicians Amendment an amendment “To create an appointed redistricting commission not elected by or subject to removal by the voters of the state,” even though the provisions for how members of the Commission will be removed is right there in the proposal. He claims the proposal would “repeal constitutional protections against gerrymandering” when it would in fact CORRECT the gerrymandering we’re famous for. He says that under the amendment “counties, townships and cities throughout Ohio can be split and divided across multiple districts” when that’s already happening in the current arrangement. He uses the word “partisan” everywhere, which is rich considering that everything happening in Ohio politics is partisan already. And it just goes on from there. What’s being printed on the ballot for citizens to vote on, is  nearly the opposite of the proposal that may or may not be adopted. You just have to read the ballot language and the language of the actual petition to see that this isn’t merely slanted wording. Slanted wording is to be expected. But in this case, he’s lying, plain and simple.

Supporters of the amendment have sued, and I certainly hope they get their way.

This isn’t about whether you’re a Republican, a Democrat, or an independent– either by actual preference or by what ballot you happened to pick up at the Primary election last March. It’s about democracy. It’s about government of the people, by the people, and for the people. Do you want to live in a state where politicians have to work to win your vote by doing the things you want? Or do you want to live in a state where politicians get to choose their constituents whether the constituents like them or not? Do the people get to choose or not? If we send a Republican to the United States’ Congress, will it be because the Republican is the candidate we like best, who worked the hardest to please us? Or is it going to be because nobody’s voices mattered in Ohio except the voice of Frank LaRose and his cronies?

Right now, I have no idea what the wording will be for Issue One on the ballot in November. So you’re just going to have to remember: Issue One is the Citizens Not Politicians Amendment. If you vote “yes,” you’ll be casting a vote towards fixing Ohio’s severe gerrymandering and making it possible for the people’s voice to be heard. If you vote “no,” you’ll be voting for things to stay the way they are. It doesn’t really matter what wording the Ballot Board adopts. If the ballot you get in November says “Issue One: a constitutional amendment to put toothpaste in your orange juice,” it doesn’t make a difference because the amendment hasn’t changed. The actual wording of the amendment is the amendment I’ve shown you. “Yes” adopts the redistricting commission. “No” means the politicians who already have Ohio under their control get to control it forever.

All you have to remember is “yes on Issue One.”

Yes on Issue One lets the people decide.

That’s the way it’s supposed to be.