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.”
Earlier in the day, Husted asked the high court to reject the eleventh-hour attempt to relax Ohio voting laws. “The time has long since passed for Ohio to transition from election litigation to election administration,” state Solicitor Eric E. Murphy said in a 47-page brief on behalf of Husted.
Ordering a “last-minute” change “would threaten the ability of Ohio’s 88 boards of elections to process the many ballots that are now being cast by voters and reviewed by officials.”
The Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless, Columbus Coalition for the Homeless and the Ohio Democratic Party asked Kagan late last week to halt enforcement of two 2014 state laws adding restrictions to the absentee and provisional voting process. The groups said the statutes — upheld by a federal appeals court — apply only to eligibility rules for counting ballots, so it wasn’t too late for a change even though Ohioans have been casting early votes for more than two weeks.
Full Article: U.S. Supreme Court rejects final challenge to Ohio voting laws | The Columbus Dispatch.