The Governor of Ohio has begun moves to mount pressure on state lawmakers to avoid a partisan clash threatening to bar the President of the United States, Joe Biden from the key swing state’s presidential ballot in November.
Africa Today News, New York reports that the state’s top election official had earlier this week said that Democrats are nominating their candidate too late to comply with Ohio’s ballot access laws.
These disputes have previously been discreetly settled, but the Biden campaign could have to file a lawsuit in order to be included on the ballot.
In order to enact a statute permitting Mr. Biden to stand on the ballot, the governor announced on Thursday that he would be bringing the Legislature into an unusual special session.
Political parties nominated for president and vice president in Ohio must formally affirm them to the elections chief ninety-days or more prior to the general election.
This implies that by August 7th, Mr. Biden and his vice president, Kamala Harris, must be officially recognized as Democratic contenders.
Though Mr Biden has secured the votes necessary for the Democratic nomination, he will not be named formally as the party’s candidate until the nominating convention.
But the Democratic National Convention is from 19 to 22 August.
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“The conflict between the August 7, 2024 certification deadline and the date of your party’s nominating convention is well established,” Ohio elections chief, Secretary of State Frank LaRose, wrote in a Tuesday letter to Ohio Democratic Party leadership.
“Unless your party plans to comply with the statutory deadline, I am duty-bound to instruct boards of elections to begin preparing ballots that do not include the Democratic Party’s nominees for president and vice president of the United States,” the Republican said.
Former President Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican candidate, will not face the same issue. His party’s national convention is 15 to 18 July, well in advance of the Ohio deadline.
Governor Mike DeWine, a moderate Republican who has distanced himself from the party’s Trump-friendly wing, on Thursday said he was recalling state lawmakers to fix the “ridiculous… absurd situation”.
“Ohio is running out of time to get Joe Biden, the sitting President of the United States, on the ballot this fall,” he told reporters.
“Failing to do so is simply unacceptable.”
Party conventions, both Democrat and Republican, typically are held in the summer before a presidential contest – and similar issues with certification deadlines are rectified with little drama.
Earlier this year, Democrats in Washington state and Republicans in Alabama made provisional changes necessary to exempt Mr Biden from ballot deadlines.
Ohio itself has done the same in the past, with its Legislature making exceptions for Mitt Romney, the Republican presidential nominee in 2012, and Mr Trump in 2020.
But the state’s Republican House speaker said the body would not make a legislative fix to the issue.
“There’s just not the will do that from the Legislature,” Speaker Jason Stephens told reporters on Tuesday.
The Biden campaign is continuing to express confidence the issue will be resolved without drama.