COLUMBUS, Ohio – A new law prohibiting foreign citizens and green card holders from contributing to state election campaigns in Ohio restricts constitutionally protected rights to free speech and association, according to a lawsuit filed Thursday in federal court.
Republican Governor Mike DeWine signed the measure June 2, after lawmakers combined it with a higher profile bill adjusting Ohio’s election calendar to ensure Democratic President Joe Biden appeared on the November ballot.
Lawyers from Elias Law Group, a prominent Democratic law firm, and Cooper Elliott told the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio that HB 1 would “unconstitutionally impede public debate by enforcing broad and sweeping new prohibitions” on spending. with electoral issues.
“Because of HB 1, all noncitizens are now threatened with investigation, criminal prosecution, and mandatory fines if they indicate that they intend to engage in any election-related expenditures or contributions — including supporting or opposing election issues in virtually any capacity,” according to the lawsuit.
The litigation argues that the law, which takes effect on September 1, violates the First and 14th Amendments of the U.S. Constitution.
It was presented on behalf of OPAWL – Building AAPI Feminist Leadership, the Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless, a German citizen and her husband who live in Cleveland, and a Canadian citizen who lives in Silver Lake, a suburb of Kent. OPAWL is a grassroots organization of Asian, Asian American, and Pacific Islander women and non-binary people living in the state.
State Republicans defended a ban on donations from foreign nationals to run campaigns after a series of ballot measures were unsuccessful. Voters came out against the prevailing positions of GOP leaders by wide margins on three separate ballot measures last year, including protecting access to abortion in the state Constitution, rejecting a proposal to make it harder to pass such constitutional amendments in the future, and legalizing recreational marijuana.
The political committees involved in the first two efforts received money from entities that received donations during the last decade of Swiss billionaire Hansjorg Wyss, although any direct path from it to Ohio campaigns would be undetectable under campaign finance laws that were not addressed in Ohio law. Wyss lives in Wyoming.
John Fortney, spokesman for Republican Ohio Senate President Matt Huffman, argued that the lawsuit proves that Democrats depend on donations from wealthy foreign citizens.
“The Ohio Constitution is not for sale, despite the progressive left’s anti-American sellout to foreign influence,” he said in a statement.
The decision to include green card holders in the ban was made on the House floor, against the advice of the chamber’s No. 3 Republican, state Rep. Bill Seitz, a Cincinnati lawyer, who voted against the amendment.
Seitz cited a U.S. Supreme Court opinion that suggested that extending such bans to green card holders would “raise substantial questions” of constitutionality.
