COLUMBUS — Third parties will have to gather tens of thousands of signatures to get on Ohio’s ballot in 2014 now that Gov. John Kasich has signed a bill hours after it passed the General Assembly on Wednesday despite Libertarians’ complaints that the bill unfairly sets them up for “perpetual petitioning.”
Ohio’s rules for so-called minor parties were declared unconstitutional in 2006. Since then, Ohio’s secretary of state has simply allowed third parties to be on the ballot. Opponents say Republicans are pushing through the new rules in an attempt to protect Kasich from losing conservative votes to third parties in his 2014 re-election bid.
The bill was set to pass both chambers last week, after reluctance from some GOP House members led leaders to water down the proposed rules. But an inadvertent mistake in the bill’s drafting derailed that effort. On Wednesday, when a committee of six lawmakers met to reconcile House and Senate versions of the bill, they agreed to stricter requirements for minor parties, voting 4-2 on party lines. The Senate and House then passed the bill, with Democrats and a handful of Republicans dissenting.
Under the new law, minority parties wanting to register for the 2014 election would have to get signatures equal to 0.5 percent of the total votes cast in the most recent gubernatorial or presidential election — about 28,000 signatures for 2014. They’d then have to earn 2 percent of the vote in the 2014 gubernatorial election to continue to be a party for the next four years. Otherwise, they’d have to start the initial signature effort again.
Starting in 2015, parties would have to get signatures equal to 1 percent of the votes in the most recent gubernatorial or presidential election. They’d have to get 3 percent of the vote in the next election to remain a party.
Because Kasich signed the bill Wednesday, it will take effect in time for the filing deadline for the 2014 primary. Democrats on Wednesday called on Kasich to delay the signing, saying that would show the bill wasn’t a partisan effort to help with his re-election campaign. The governor announced his signing of the bill in a brief news release without further comment.
Regardless, Libertarians say they plan to sue this week to challenge the new law.....(more)
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