The GOP war on voting: Ohio to appeal early voting decision to SCOTUS

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Last week the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the state of Ohio must make its early voting available to all voters of the state on an equal basis, and reinstitute early voting on the final weekend before election day. Equal protection . . . fairness . . . who would have a problem with that?

Tea-Publican Secretrary of State Jon Husted, who wants to suppress the African-American vote in Ohio on the final weekend before the election, that's who. Ohio appealing to Supreme Court on decision reinstating 3 early voting days:

Ohio’s election chief said Tuesday he will appeal a ruling that
reinstates the final three early voting days in the battleground state,
calling a decision last week by a federal appeals court “an
unprecedented intrusion” into how states run elections.

Secretary of State Jon Husted said he will ask the U.S. Supreme
Court to decide whether the state Legislature or federal courts should
set Ohio election laws.

* * *

The appeals court in Cincinnati affirmed a lower court ruling and
returned discretion to set hours on the final three days to local boards
of elections.

[Husted] said it opened up the chance for Ohio’s 88 county boards of elections
to set different rules, while at the same time ordering that all voters
be treated the same. Husted said he will be consulting with those
boards to craft a directive that sets uniform hours on the three
disputed days in the event his appeal isn’t successful.

* * *

The decision the 6th Circuit affirmed Friday came from U.S. District
Judge Peter Economus in August. He said he expected Husted to direct all
county elections boards to maintain a specific, consistent schedule on
the three final days before Election Day.

Attorneys for the state
said many laws already grant military personnel special voting
accommodations, such as requirements for states to send absentee ballots
to them 45 days before the election. And they contend local boards also
need those three days to prepare for the election.

But Economus
said the voters’ right to cast ballots in person on those days outweighs
the state’s reasons for limiting that opportunity.

The judge issued a preliminary injunction on Aug. 31, concluding that
the state’s law was unconstitutional in changing the in-person early
voting deadline and that the state was wrongly valuing certain votes
above others.

Husted’s announcement that he would go to the U.S.
Supreme Court came on a day when Obama was campaigning in the state,
timing a rally at the Ohio State University campus to the final day of
voter registration.

Usually I would say that I would be surprised if the U.S. Supreme Court would take up an expedited appeal on an election matter, but that's what I thought before they took up Bush v. Gore. Early voting is already underway in Ohio. There is no reason why African-American churches cannot get their "souls to the polls" this weekend — do it now, do not wait until the final weekend.