In a 4-3 decision on Wednesday, justices gave state officials 10 days to draft new Ohio House and Senate maps, directing them to design them so Republicans and Democrats would be favored to win a number of seats that closely corresponds with each party’s share of the recent statewide vote – 54% for Republicans and 46% for Democrats.
But Ohio’s new redistricting process, which is being used for the first time after voters approved it as a state constitutional amendment in 2015, is totally untested.
That means there are a lot of open questions about where things go from here. But one thing is clear: the process must move fast.
“This is going to happen at warp speed,” said Steven Steinglass, a retired Cleveland State University professor and state constitutional expert.
State officials said they spent Thursday huddling over some of the key issues. Here are some of them:
The deadlines
First, there’s the court’s 10-day deadline, which falls on Saturday, Jan. 22. But it likely will be extended to the following Monday, Jan. 24 since Ohio Supreme Court rules say deadlines can’t toll on the weekend or a legal holiday.
If the court approves a map on Jan. 24 – that’s a big if – it would leave legislative candidates just nine days to collect 50 valid signatures from voters from their political party who live within the districts where they want to run.
“I don’t see any reasonable way that the General Assembly members or candidates can be ready to file by Feb. 2. We don’t know what the districts are,” Senate President Matt Huffman said in a Thursday interview with the WIMA radio station in Lima, his hometown.
One solution lawmakers may coalesce around involves a one-time loosening of the signature-gathering rules. State Rep. Bill Seitz, the number-two Republican in the House, said he’s developing legislation that would allow candidates who gathered signatures from qualified voters within the old districts to not be disqualified from the ballot.
“We’re not trying to punish people if they in good faith collected the requisite 50 signatures … and that’s the best way around it to prevent a last-minute, panicky attempt to collect signatures from whatever maps might be in effect on Feb. 2,” Seitz said.
The process
Under the state constitution, the Ohio Redistricting Commission automatically dissolves four weeks after the passage of a congressional map plan, which Gov. Mike DeWine signed into law in November.
That means the commission will have to reconvene, which will include picking new representatives.
Three members are set in stone – DeWine, Secretary of State Frank LaRose and state Auditor Keith Faber. The other four members each are appointed by Republican and Democratic legislative leaders in the House and Senate.
Until those members are officially chosen, the reconvened commission can’t meet, said Ohio Senate Democrats’ spokeswoman Giulia Cambieri.
Cambieri said the Senate Democrats’ pick for the commission will again be state Sen. Vernon Sykes, an Akron Democrat who co-chaired the first iteration of the Ohio Redistricting Commission.
Other caucuses haven’t announced their picks, although Huffman and House Speaker Bob Cupp, both Lima Republicans, in the last round of redistricting picked themselves, as did former House Minority leader Emilia Sykes, who gave up her leadership position last month.
Officials will have to decide how to relaunch the process, which in earlier stages required the commission to introduce a map for public comment before approving it.
Steinglass, the retired Cleveland State University professor, said public hearings don’t appear to be required.
“It might make some sense to get input, but it would have to be with a very, very tight timeline,” he said. “But under the circumstances, it’s a constitution, not a straight-jacket, and it’s got to work to try to accomplish the goal, which is a properly apportioned General Assembly.”
Steinglass also said the constitution allows for the commission to approve either a four-year map, which only requires Republican votes, or a 10-year map, which requires votes from both commission Democrats.
The standards
Ohio’s constitution directs mapmakers to not favor either political party, and to draw lines that favor each party to win a proportionate share of state legislative seats, as measured by statewide voter preferences.
Republicans tried to argue the rules were optional, since they say mapmakers “shall attempt” to follow them. They also tried to argue that rather than the GOP’s 54% share of the statewide vote, “voter preferences” might refer to the 81% share of statewide elections that Republicans have won.
Nope, the majority decision from the Ohio Supreme Court said on Wednesday.
Justices said the rules are mandatory, and that percentage of districts must correspond closely with each party’s share of the statewide vote.
Once the commission approves a map, parties in the case, including the voter-rights, Democratic-aligned and advocacy groups that sued the state in the first place, would have three days to note their objections. The court then would decide whether the new map is constitutional.
Republican lawmakers may try to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. A lawyer suggested as much during oral arguments on Dec. 8, although a landmark 2019 U.S. Supreme Court decision said that political gerrymandering claims were state, not federal issues.
The worst-case scenario
What if the Ohio Redistricting Commission can’t meet its deadline? What if it fails to produce a map the court finds to be constitutional in time for the primary election in May?
Steinglass said that could cause major problems since the constitution says the court isn’t allowed to draw maps. He said it eventually could invite federal litigation if Ohio is unable to conduct state elections.
Steinglass said lawmakers should focus on meeting the deadline.
“I think any of those options would be a constitutional crisis. And so, I think the prudent thing for everyone to do would be to come up with a conforming, bipartisan plan,” he said.
Reporter Jeremy Pelzer contributed to this story
©2022 Advance Local Media LLC. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
