Ohio: Court Won’t Reconsider Ohio Online Ballot Tool Ruling | Bloomberg BNA

A federal district court Nov. 14 declined to reconsider a decision that implementing an online ballot-marking tool in Ohio is an unreasonable request under federal law ( Hindel v. Husted , S.D. Ohio, No. 2:15-cv-3061, 11/14/16 ). The National Federation of the Blind and three blind, registered voters alleged that Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by failing to provide an alternative to paper absentee ballots. The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio ruled in May that the technology would fundamentally alter the state’s voting system because it hadn’t been used in a prior Ohio election nor certified in accordance with state law.

Ohio: Democrats ask Supreme Court to restore order barring voter intimidation in Ohio | Politico

Democrats made a last-ditch plea to the Supreme Court Sunday night, urging the justices to restore an injunction barring Donald Trump's campaign and its allies from Election Day actions that could intimidate voters looking to cast their ballots in the battleground state of Ohio. The Ohio Democratic Party's emergency application to the high court asked the justices to reimpose the restraining order a federal appeals court lifted earlier in the day, arguing the 6th Circuit had issued a finding “with no basis in law.” The application seems likely to face an uphill battle at the shorthanded Supreme Court. Five justices are typically needed to grant such relief and the court is currently split 4-4 between Democratic and Republican appointees. Partisan considerations aside, the justices are also often wary of making last-minute changes to election rules or procedures.

Ohio: U.S. Supreme Court rejects final challenge to Ohio voting laws | The Columbus Dispatch

The last pending legal challenge to Ohio's voting laws died a quick death Monday when it was rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court. And thousands of Ohio voters could have their ballots thrown out as a result, the attorney who filed the lawsuit says. Justice Elena Kagan dismissed the matter after consulting with the other seven members of the high court, her one-sentence decision indicated. “This case has been ongoing in Ohio, taking many forms, under the administration of three secretaries of state, both Democratic and Republican, and it is time for the chaos and waste of taxpayer money to come to an end," said Secretary of State Jon Husted in a statement Monday night. The attorney pushing the challenge, Subodh Chandra of Cleveland, said, "Unfortunately, Secretary of State Husted is now free in this election to disenfranchise voters who he and the elections boards know are eligible, over 'errors' as trivial as writing a name legibly in cursive on a form rather than in print. And Husted is free to continue his scheme to have boards in the big, urban counties disfranchise voters when smaller, white rural counties count ballots involving identical errors — and he looks the other way."

Ohio: Spelling Error Could Nullify Your Vote in Ohio | VoA News

Voting is no easy task for Roland Gilbert. The retired Ohio lawyer, 86, who is legally blind, completes his absentee ballot with help from a machine that magnifies the print. So the registered Democrat was not completely surprised to learn he had made an error in filling out his 2014 ballot, entering that day's date in the birthdate field. What surprised him was that it cost him his vote. Local election officials rejected it because it did not perfectly match his registration information on file. "It didn't seem right," Gilbert said. "I felt foolish for making a silly mistake." Laws passed by the Republican-led Ohio state legislature in 2014 require voters to accurately fill out their personal information on absentee or provisional ballots or they will be rejected — even if the votes are otherwise valid. The laws are being applied in a presidential election for the first time this year.

Ohio: Trump campaign, Ohio GOP ask federal judge not to limit poll watchers | Cleveland Plain Dealer

A lawyer for Donald Trump's campaign wrote in a brief filed Wednesday that the Republican candidate's statements encouraging supporters to watch the polls for Democratic voter fraud are protected speech and that preventing supporters from espousing those same views near polling places on Election Day would trample on their free-speech rights. Chad Readler, an attorney for the Jones Day law firm, wrote that a lawsuit filed in federal court in Cleveland Sunday by the Ohio Democratic Party is based on "miscellaneous long-ago statements, vague innuendo, rank speculation, and a heavy dose of rhetoric." The suit says Republicans are engaging in voter intimidation. He wrote that Trump and other candidates "are perfectly within their rights to encourage their supporters to serve as poll watchers" and that an order preventing supporters from harassing or intimidating voters outside of polling places would violate the First Amendment.

Ohio: Husted blames postal service for absentee ballot problem | 13ABC

Hundreds of voters in northwest Ohio say they have not received their absentee ballots in the mail. The problem starts seems to start at the mail sorting center in Pontiac, Michigan. The ballots were sent from Lucas, Wood and five other counties October 12. But twenty days later, many still have not been delivered. Tuesday, Ohio Secretary of State, Jon Husted, visited the board of elections office in Wood County. He says voting has gone smoothly in Ohio except for this absentee ballot problem. Husted puts the blame squarely on the postal system, saying, "It's completely unacceptable. The post office needs to do a better job." Husted has been in touch with the post office but, so far, no explanation for what happened.

Ohio: Federal judge orders Ohio Republicans, Trump’s campaign to respond to voter-intimidation lawsuit | Cleveland Plain Dealer

A federal judge has given the Ohio Republican Party, Donald Trump's campaign and a longtime adviser until the end of Wednesday to respond to a lawsuit state Democrats filed that said the Republicans are engaging in voter intimidation. The order entered Tuesday by U.S. District Judge James Gwin in Cleveland says the defendants' response must include any objections to an order "limiting voter intimidation" or "limiting people at polling locations who are not authorized poll watchers or outside the polling stations." The speed in which Gwin ordered the response, while not necessarily signaling how he feels about the case, shows that the judge is taking the accusations of voter intimidation seriously before Nov. 8 Election Day.

Ohio: Hundreds march to Board of Elections to cast ballots, protest dearth of early-voting locations | Cleveland Plain Dealer

Several hundred voters marched to the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections on Sunday to cast ballots and protest the limited number of in-house early voting locations in Ohio. The marchers departed at 2:30 p.m. from the Trinity Episcopal Cathedral and traveled a half-mile to the Board of Elections headquarters on Euclid Avenue. Greater Cleveland Congregations and the Amalgamated Transit Union organized the event to encourage Cuyahoga County residents to vote early before the general election on Nov. 8.

Ohio: Trump backers walking shaky legal line in monitoring voters | The Columbus Dispatch

Leon Neisius is ready to follow Donald Trump’s call to sign up as a polling place monitor. But not in his home, mostly rural Fairfield County. He wants to watch over voting in urban Franklin County. “Fraud’s more likely up there,” said the 73-year-old retired Air Force technician who lives near Pickerington. Josh Parks, 20, also wants to get trained as a poll-watcher so he can ferret out suspicious behavior. The construction worker from Westfield in Delaware County is looking forward to casting his first presidential vote — for Trump — but suspects it may not count because of fraud. “I wouldn’t doubt it,” said Parks, who, like Neisius, was attending a Trump rally last week in Delaware. While presidential elections are always high-stakes endeavors in Ohio, Trump’s insistence that this year’s vote might be rigged, and his call for supporters to keep watch at polling places, has raised the prospect of possible voter intimidation. “It’s disheartening. At some point you say, 'When will this end?'” said Alicia Reece, head of the Ohio Legislative Black Caucus.

Ohio: Voters improperly removed from rolls can vote in November election, court rules | Cleveland Plain Dealer

Ohio voters who were improperly removed from the rolls after not casting a ballot for several years will be allowed to vote in the November general election. A federal appellate court ruled last month that Ohio's practice of occasionally canceling voter registrations after six years of inactivity was illegal. A U.S. District Court decision issued Wednesday night mandates that voters purged since Jan. 1, 2011 be allowed to cast provisional ballots. Ballots will count if the voter lives in the same county as they were registered in. Secretary of State Jon Husted had asked the court to allow provisional voting for voters pulled from the rolls in 2015. Voter rights advocates who had filed the lawsuit asked for ballots to be counted for voters removed in 2011, 2013 and 2015. Husted said Wednesday that his office will fully comply with the judge's order and continue focusing on administering a smooth election. "Our main concern was to protect the integrity of the election by not having to reinstate deceased voters, those who moved out of state, or are otherwise ineligible," Husted said in a statement.

Ohio: Judge restores voting rights for thousands of Ohioans | The Columbus Dispatch

Thousands of Ohioans got their voting rights restored for the 2016 election Wednesday night through a federal judge’s ruling. But Judge George C. Smith of U.S. District Court in Columbus acknowledged that his attempt to remedy what he said was Secretary of State Jon Husted’s illegal purging of many Ohioans from the state’s roll of eligible voters still will leave some eligible voters on the sidelines. “There is no dispute that the remedy ordered by this court will not involve the reinstatement of all voters who have been removed from the voter registration rolls,” Smith wrote in a 22-page decision on a lawsuit brought by the A. Phillip Randolph Institute, ACLU and Ohio Democratic Party against Husted. The two sides differed on how many Ohioans would be impacted by the ruling. A spokeswoman for the Democratic Party said potentially tens of thousands could be affected. A Husted spokesman said he doubted it would be that high.

Ohio: Kasich: Fear of election rigging ‘a big fat joke’ | The Columbus Dispatch

The state’s governor and top election official both took to morning TV today to sharply dispute GOP nominee Donald Trump’s claim that the 2016 presidential election is “rigged,” with both saying that the system of collecting and counting ballots is better than it’s ever been. “To say that the elections are rigged and all these votes are stolen -- that’s like saying we never landed on the moon,” Ohio Gov. John Kasich, a Republican, said on CBS “This Morning." He added that such accusations are “silly,” and “I don’t think it’s good for our democracy.” Speaking on “Morning Joe” on MSNBC, Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, also a Republican, said the system in America and in Ohio “is more secure than it’s ever been.” He said he was worried that people will lose faith in democracy because of these accusations.

Ohio: Jon Husted says voting is safe in Ohio despite talk of rigged election | The Columbus Dispatch

Even as Republican Donald Trump warns of “large-scale voter fraud,” analysts say it would be nearly impossible in Ohio for one political party to steal the outcome election from another. The elections and the vote counting in Ohio are conducted by bipartisan boards of elections in the state’s 88 counties, meaning only an improbable alliance and virtually impossible to keep secret between Democrats and Republicans in all 88 counties could change the election. Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, a Republican, said the system of elections in place is “ actually more secure than it’s ever been in our nation’s history.” He said Ohio’s system is transparent, includes extensive checks and balances and has a verified voter paper trail for every vote. At the same time, the election rolls are “cleaner and more up to date than they’ve ever been.”

Ohio: Secretary of State proposes that voters culled from voting rolls in 2015 be allowed to vote in November’s general election | Cleveland Plain Dealer

Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted has proposed that voters who were purged from the state's voter rolls in 2015 be allowed to vote in the 2016 election using provisional ballots. Husted's proposal, part of a motion filed with U.S. District Court in Columbus, is in response to a recent U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that the system Ohio was using to clear some inactive voters off the voting lists violated federal laws. In its ruling Sept. 23, the appellate court said the system, which was triggered when an inactive voter missed two years of elections, violated federal provisions which barred the culling of voter rolls solely because a person had not voted regularly. The proposal from the state Thursday would not resolve the entire case. But it would resolve how to handle voters for this November's election. The plaintiffs in the case, A. Philip Randolph Institute, American Civil Liberties Union Ohio and the Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless, will have a chance to respond to the proposal.

Ohio: Secretary of State Jon Husted slams voter fraud conspiracy article | Cleveland Plain Dealer

Move over, Snopes, there's a new conspiracy theory debunker on the case. Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted issued a press release Tuesday refuting an online article claiming "tens of thousands" of Hillary Clinton ballots were found in a Franklin County warehouse. The article, published Sept. 30 by Christian Times Newspaper, featured a photo of boxes allegedly full of Clinton ballots. Actually,the photo was taken in 2015 during the U.K. election. The article stated the "likely goal was to slip the fake ballot boxes in with the real ballot boxes when they went to official election judges on November 8th."

Ohio: A million Ohio voters didn’t get absentee ballot mailing | The Columbus Dispatch

The news release said, “Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted today announced his office will begin mailing absentee ballot applications to voters statewide this weekend.” What it didn’t say was that more than a million of Ohio’s 7.7 million registered voters wouldn’t get the mailing, because Husted’s office had pared the list beforehand. The 1,035,795 voters left out fall into two categories:

• 650,730 who have changed their address. This includes 568,456 who moved within Ohio; they were sent cards asking them to update their address. The 82,274 who moved out of state were mailed information on how to cancel their Ohio registration.

• 385,065 who did not vote in either the 2012 or 2014 elections and have not responded to queries about their address from their county board of elections.

“We’re working extremely hard to encourage participation this November and to help people make sure they have the information they need to cast a ballot with ease,” said Husted spokesman Joshua Eck.

Ohio: State may spend up to $150 million replacing aging voting machines | Journal News

Imagine using a computer that’s more than a decade old. That’s what Butler and Warren county voters are doing, which is why there’s a statewide push to replace the older machines before the 2020 presidential election. Some of these are simple paper ballot scanners, such as Warren County’s 184 machines. Butler County has 1,600 electronic voting machines that record a voter’s ballot to a unique card inserted into the machine. To help solve this issue of aging voting equipment, the state is looking at providing upwards of $115 million to $150 million in funding to the county boards of elections, which likely would pay for at least half of their costs, said Aaron Ockerman, the executive director for the Ohio Association of Election Officials. “It’s a real opportunity for the state and the local governments to solve a problem,” Ockerman said.

Ohio: Judges’ decision upholding Ohio absentee-ballot rules is appealed | The Columbus Dispatch

The battle over voting rights in Ohio rages on with a new federal appeal challenging state laws enacted by the GOP-dominated legislature in 2014 and signed by Republican Gov. John Kasich. A group that includes the Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless and Ohio Democratic Party wants the full 15-judge 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to consider a decision earlier this by month by a three-judge panel of the appellate court. The case “involves a question of exceptional importance that will impact the upcoming presidential election,” the group told the appeals court. The panel’s ruling also conflicts with other court rulings, including the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Bush v. Gore that settled the 2000 presidential election. The three-judge panel that largely left the GOP laws intact divided along party and racial lines, with two whites appointed by Republican presidents in the majority and a black picked by a Democrat issuing a withering dissent.

Ohio: Secretary of State Jon Husted wants feds to butt out on running state elections | Cleveland Plain Dealer

Secretary of State Jon Husted said cyber attackers would have a hard time disrupting Ohio's elections but expressed concern about what the federal government could do if it took over the state's election computer systems. Husted, the state's chief elections officer, wrote to congressional leaders Thursday asking that the House and Senate make clear that federal agencies cannot involve themselves in the election process. The letter was prompted by comments from Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson that his department would review whether state election systems should be considered as "critical infrastructure" under the Homeland Security Act of 2002. Such a designation would give the federal government ability to step in to protect those systems.

Ohio: Homeless advocates, Democrats ask full appellate court to review Ohio voter disenfranchisement case | Cleveland Plain Dealer

Advocates for the homeless who challenged the fairness of how Ohio counts some votes have asked the full 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to hear their case in the wake of a three-judge panel's decision that reversed their lower-court victory. In a court filing Tuesday, lawyers for the Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless, the Columbus Coalition for the Homeless and the Ohio Democratic Party argue that panel's decision conflicts with previous Supreme Court and 6th Circuit rulings. That decision Sept. 13 overturned a lower court's ruling that said Ohio was disenfranchising otherwise undisputedly eligible voters solely because of technical errors and omissions on voter ballot forms for absentee and provisional ballots. … Lawyers for the homeless coalitions asked for a review of the panel's ruling by the full 6th Circuit bench, which has more than a dozen active judges.

Ohio: Voting rolls may not be restored despite court ruling | Dayton Daily News

The voting status of 1.2 million infrequent voters in Ohio remains in doubt despite a federal court ruling last week that says Ohio’s practice of purging the names from registration rolls violates the National Voter Registration Act of 1993. Voting rights advocates on Tuesday launched a campaign to get voters to verify their registrations ahead of the Oct. 11 deadline. They also continued to press Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted to reverse course on a practice of purging infrequent voters from registration rolls if they haven’t cast ballots in years. Husted indicated he may appeal last week’s ruling from the federal Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. “The decision was tremendous,” state Rep. Kathleen Clyde, D-Kent, said at a press conference in Columbus Tuesday. “More than 1.2 million voters will be able to vote again.” But the 1.2 million dropped voters won’t necessarily be automatically added back to the registration rolls. The appeals court left it up to the district court to decide what should happen.

Ohio: Federal appeals court rules against Ohio voter-roll purges | The Washington Post

A federal appeals court ruled Friday against Ohio’s procedure for removing voters from state rolls, dealing a blow to Republican Secretary of State Jon Husted and handing a victory to voting rights advocates in a key presidential swing state. A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit overruled a U.S. district court judge’s decision that Husted was not violating any laws with the process he was using to take inactive voters off the rolls if they did not confirm their status. By a ­2-to-1 vote, the court of appeals sent the case back to the district court. The dispute centers on Ohio’s removal of possibly tens of thousands of voters from registration lists because they did not respond to letters seeking to confirm their addresses and have not cast a ballot since 2008, in what is being criticized as a “use it or lose it” rule for voting.

Ohio: Court rules Ohio’s process for removing voters from rolls is illegal | The Columbus Dispatch

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled today against Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted in a case involving removal of names from voter registration rolls. A 2-1 decision by the Cincinnati-based appeals court overturned a decision by a federal district court earlier this year, which found Husted was not illegally deleting voters. The case will now go back to the U.S. District Court for reconsideration."The secretary’s newly issued form does nothing to correct the fact that Ohio has, for years, been removing voters from the rolls because they failed to respond to forms that are blatantly non-compliant," the court said. Read the full decision here.

Ohio: How many were removed from Ohio’s voter rolls? It’s a mess | Cincinnati Enquirer

Ohio has a controversial practice of removing voters from the rolls who have not cast ballots in years. But just how many are deleted remains a mystery, raising questions about the care taken with the swing-state’s voter rolls. The practice itself has attracted scrutiny – it's the subject of one of several federal lawsuits over voting in the battleground state. But the way officials delete and track voter registrations raises other concerns. Depending on where you live, county election officials might diligently remove thousands of voter registrations each year, documented by detailed records. Or they might insist they haven't followed through with the state-ordered process in some years, or apologize for tossing those files years ago, according to an Enquirer / USA Today Network investigation, in which Ohio reporters contacted all 88 county board of elections.

Ohio: Supreme Court Won’t Restore ‘Golden Week’ Voting in Ohio | The New York Times

The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to restore a period of early voting in Ohio during which people could register and vote on the same day. The court’s brief order came in response to an emergency application from Democratic groups. There were no noted dissents. The case, Ohio Democratic Party v. Husted, No. 16A223, has its roots in the 2004 general election, when Ohio voters faced exceptionally long lines, leaving them, in the words of one court, “effectively disenfranchised.” In response, the state adopted a measure allowing in-person early voting in the 35 days before Election Day. As registration in the state closes 30 days before Election Day, the measure introduced a brief period, known as the Golden Week, in which voters could register and vote at the same time.

Ohio: What the End of Ohio’s Golden Week Means for Minority Voters | Pacific Standard

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court decided not to reinstate Ohio’s “Golden Week,” a period in which Ohio residents could register to vote and cast their ballots on the same day. It’s just the latest in a string of contentious voting rights issues in the Buckeye State. The Golden Week came into effect after the 2004 presidential election, when excessively long lines on Election Day disenfranchised Ohio voters. As Mother Jones explained in 2005:

It turns out the Franklin County Board of Elections had reduced the number of voting machines in urban precincts — which held more African American voters and were likely to favor John Kerry — and increased the number of machines in white suburban precincts, which tended to favor the president. As a result, as many as 15,000 voters in Franklin County left without casting ballots, the Washington Post estimated.

In response, the state instituted, among other reforms, a 35-day early voting period. Since the last day to register to vote in Ohio came 30 days before the elections, voters had a five-day window where they could simultaneously register and vote before the general registration deadline.<

Ohio: Courts uphold trimming of Ohioans’ voting rights | The Columbus Dispatch

In a pair of court decisions that could help Donald Trump, Ohioans' voting rights were pared back Tuesday for the 2016 presidential election. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to review an appeals court panel's 2-1 ruling throwing out Golden Week, the period in which Ohioans could both register to vote and cast an early ballot. Several hours later a separate but equally divided panel of that same Cincinnati-based appellate court largely upheld restrictions enacted by the GOP-dominated legislature in 2014 and signed by Republican Gov. John Kasich. All that reshaped the Ohio electoral landscape to one less favorable to minority and Democratic voters — and thus presumably more to Trump's liking.

Ohio: Officials say elections under close security | Toledo Blade

Reports that a foreign government is suspected of attempting to hack into American election systems have generated interest and cautious concern, at most, among Ohio elections officials. And the person at the top of the state’s election bureaucracy warned that it should not become a justification for a federal takeover. State and local elections officials said the elections process is already under close security scrutiny, is kept unconnected to the Internet, and — most importantly — maintains a paper database. “You don’t have to worry about our server being hacked because our server is not hooked up to the Internet and it can’t be by law,” said Gina Kaczala, the Republican director of the Lucas County Board of Elections. “The secretary of state is taking everything seriously and they do take tight control.”

Ohio: Ohio is home to 3 disputes over voting issues | Associated Press

One of the most critical battleground states in the presidential election is home to three disputes over voting issues that could affect when voters can start casting ballots and how ballots will get counted this fall. Groups have challenged Ohio's cut to early voting, its ballot procedures, and its process for removing voters from its registration rolls. Here's a look at the lawsuits in Ohio: A dispute over a law that trims a week of early voting is headed to the U.S. Supreme Court. The state's Democratic Party asked the court on Sept. 1. to suspend a ruling that would trim early voting opportunities. That lower court decision from last month upheld a law eliminating days in which people could register and vote at the same time, a period known as "golden week."

Ohio: Voters still waiting to learn voting rules this year | The Columbus Dispatch

Here’s the bottom line to the seeming never-ending fuss over Ohio’s voting laws: Democrats like looser voting restrictions because that generally means more Democratic votes. Republicans are just the opposite. That’s not to say each side doesn’t have honest concerns about issues ranging from voter fraud to access to the ballot box. But the shape of partisan battle lines over proposed changes to voting laws is one of the easiest to predict, both in Ohio and nationwide. What that means for voters is an ever-shifting set of rules as lawmakers enact changes followed by inevitable legal challenges, resulting in months of uncertainty that sometimes is not resolved until shortly before the election. For example: The GOP-run legislature and Republican Gov. John Kasich passed legislation to ban the so-called Golden Week, a period of five days before Election Day during which Ohioans could register to vote and cast an early ballot at the same time. A lower federal court threw out the change. An appeals court panel restored it. Now that decision has been appealed.