Ohio Republican Governor Mike DeWine called an emergency legislative session to put Joe Biden‘s on the presidential ballot after what he called an “absurd” threat from the state’s top election official to remove the president for missing the deadline.
For weeks, OhioUS Secretary of State Frank LaRose has been at odds with Democrats over how to get Biden and his vice president, Kamala Harris, on the ballot, given that their official nomination comes after the state of 90 days before the November elections.
The Biden-Harris ticket is scheduled to be certified after its official coronation on the final day of the Democratic National Convention on August 22 in Chicago, 15 days after the August 7 deadline in Ohio.
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LaRose, also a Republican, warned this week that current rules would force him to exclude Biden’s name from ballots, denying the state’s voters a full choice of presidential candidates.
He wrote to Ohio Democratic Party Chairwoman Elizabeth Walters that the onus is on the party to change its nominating agreements because the state legislature has ruled out changing Ohio law to accommodate Biden.
At a press conference, DeWine ignored this decision, calling the situation “simply unacceptable.”
“Ohio is running out of time to get Joe Biden, the sitting president of the United States, on the ballot this fall,” he said. “Not doing so is simply unacceptable. This is ridiculous – this is an absurd situation.”
Posting on X, LaRose — who first raised the issue last month — had previously said he had “a duty to follow the law as Ohio’s elections chief.”
I’ve said from here to Colorado that it’s in voters’ best interest to have a choice in the race for president. I also have a duty to follow the law as Ohio’s elections director.
As it stands today, the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate will not be in Ohio… pic.twitter.com/Y5AkZBoow2
-Frank LaRose (@FrankLaRose) May 21, 2024
“As it stands today, the Democratic Party nomination will not be on the Ohio ballot,” he wrote. “That’s not my choice. It is due to a conflict in law created by the party, and the party has so far offered no legally acceptable solution.”
Democrats had previously suggested resolving the issue by offering an “interim nomination” of Biden and Harris, a solution that LaRose said fell short of the state’s legal standard. Democrats responded that this view was contradicted by the experience of the 2020 elections, when, they argued, several other states accepted a similar resolution with deadlines that were incompatible for both parties.
DeWine’s decision potentially saves the Democratic Party from taking legal action to force Biden’s name onto the ballot.
A similar possible impasse situation arose in Alabama, but state lawmakers resolved it by delaying the certification date, with the governor quickly signing it into law.
The imbroglio arose in a context of distrust between Democrats and Republicans regarding the elections, fueled by Donald Trump’s tireless selling of a lie that Biden’s presidential victory in 2020 was “stolen”.
Ohio was once seen as a swing state, but has recently trended solidly Republican, with Trump triumphing over Biden by eight percentage points four years ago, and defeating Hillary Clinton by a similar margin in 2016.
