The Ohio House adjourned on Wednesday without addressing issues that the state’s top election official said would prevent President Biden from voting, escalating partisan clashes that could see the president not appear on the ballot in all 50 states in November.
Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose said he plans to remove Biden from the ballot because he will be formally nominated after the deadline for presidential candidates to be certified on the ballot. This is usually a minor procedural issue, and states have mostly offered quick solutions to keep their leading presidential candidates on the ballot.
According to a person familiar with the deliberations, the Biden campaign is considering suing states to ensure Biden appears on the ballot, but at the same time, it is exploring other ways to resolve the issue without changing the date of the nominating convention.
Legal battles can be costly and difficult. The Supreme Court recently ruled that states cannot bar Trump from running for re-election under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which prohibits insurrectionists from holding public office. However, it took six months of legal battle before the Supreme Court decided the case.
Ohio isn’t considered a battleground state — Trump won it by 8 points in 2020 — but the Biden campaign is trying to ensure the president is on the ballot in all 50 states. , could be embroiled in a months-long legal battle.
A legislative amendment to extend the certification deadline in time for the delayed Democratic National Convention stalled this month after Republicans in the Ohio Senate added a partisan measure banning foreign donations to state ballot initiatives. LaRose previously said passing the ban was the price Democrats must pay to get Biden on the ballot and that they would otherwise enforce the law to the letter.
“Joe Biden will be on the ballot in all 50 states,” Biden campaign spokesman Charles Luttwak said.
“As elections have continued, states across the country have acted in bipartisan agreement to take the necessary steps to ensure that presidential candidates from both parties appear on the ballot, and this election will be no exception,” Luttwak said in a statement.
Ohio, a state that has increasingly leaned Republican, passed temporary certification extensions in 2012 for Presidents Barack Obama and Mitt Romney and in 2020 for President Donald J. Trump.
A similar problem with this year’s certification deadline was resolved when Democrats proposed provisionally certifying Biden’s nomination in Washington state. But LaRose rejected that solution in a letter to the Ohio Democratic Party on Tuesday, citing a legal opinion from the attorney general, who is also a Republican.
LaRose said that unless Democrats offer a “legally permissible remedy” for the issue, he will “instruct the Board of Elections to begin producing ballots that do not include Democratic candidates.” wrote.
The Ohio Democratic Party denounced the lack of a legislative solution, with the state party chairman claiming in a statement Tuesday that Republicans are trying to remove Biden from the ballot.
“Republican politicians in the state Legislature have made it clear they are trying to take away the ability of Ohioans to choose who they want to be president,” party chairwoman Elizabeth Walters said in a statement to the Ohio Capital Journal. ” he said. “Throughout this process, corrupt politicians in Columbus politicized the process and used it for political maneuvering.”
