Shenanigans, Ohio!

                        

The Republicans are trying to end early voting in the eight urban areas in the state of Ohio.

• Columbus:    785,000 - state capital and largest city
• Cleveland     396,000
• Cincinnati     294,000
• Toledo         269,000
• Akron          199,000
• Dayton         141,000
• Canton         73,000
• Youngstown 67,000

Many in the state will see a change in how they do early voting. Secretary of State Jon Husted and Governor John Kasich are playing dirty bull! They are intending on disfranchising Black, Hispanic and poor voters.

President Barack Obama carried Ohio in 2008. The president is facing a deficit of support in this state and he hopes he can capture the magic of four years ago.

Most independent voters have swung back to the president. But with the state having issues with unemployment, high fuel prices and stalling progress, the voters of Ohio are going to take it out on someone.

Independents are crucial to both the president and Mitt Romney. Ohio is leaning towards President Barack Obama for now. It could change within the next few days.

Ohio governor John Kasich

In 2010, John Kasich beat incumbent Ted Strickland in a narrow race in this crucial swing state. When Strickland was in charge of the state, unemployment had reached about 10.4%. 

Kasich had went forth to winning the election. Under the whims of his former Fox News boss Roger Ailes, the former congressman and talk show host has shaked up the state in a negative way.

The job approval of the governor is in the lower 40s. Governor Kasich tried to dial back the collective bargaining rights of the public sector unions and the issue became a ballot issue. The state overwhelmingly repealed the law and sent a message to the Republican state legislators.

The Republicans ignored this message. They so far tried to pass a strict abortion law, lessen restrictions on having firearms in the public place, voter identification laws, and lease state properties to corporations.

Kasich claims credit for having the state unemployment tick down to 7.4% this year. In a mere year, the Republican governor would never credit the president for his success. Because if Ohio unemployment is down, it gradually affects the national unemployment levels.

Jon Husted, Ohio Secretary of State

The president went to a federal judge to have the court look into the state's new early voting law. They believe this is considered unconstitutional. The Republicans are denying this accusation.

Former governor of Massachusetts and perennial candidate for president Mitt Romney was making the outrageous claim that President Barack Obama wants to deny active duty military from voting. 

That's not true. 

Bloomberg Financial News reports that under Ohio law, U.S. armed forces members and residents living overseas are allowed to cast ballots until the day before the Nov. 6 election, while early voting for all other Ohioans ends four days before, a split the Obama for America campaign, state and national Democratic parties call unconstitutional.

The case was “never about taking away the right of military or anyone else to vote during those three days, it’s about restoring that right to other Ohioans,” campaign attorney Donald McTigue told U.S. District Judge Peter Economus today during oral arguments in Columbus federal court.

As the arguments began, a Pennsylvania state court judge in Harrisburg rejected an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit challenging that state’s voter identification law. The judge ruled the civil rights group failed to prove the measure would disenfranchise voters. The plaintiffs said they would appeal.

President Barack Obama in Cincinnati.

Ohio holds 18 of the 270 electoral college votes needed to win a presidential election and no Republican has won without a victory there. In 2008, Obama won the state with 51.5 percent of the ballots cast. The judge didn’t rule during the 90-minute hearing. Pennsylvania has 20 electoral votes.

Ohio previously had one early voting period that enabled all voters to vote until the day before Election Day, before legislation signed by Republican Governor John Kasich  over the past two years created the division. Obama and Democrats sued Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine and Secretary of State Jon Husted last month, seeking to enjoin the law.

‘Fundamental Right’

“There is no fundamental right to in-person early voting,” Husted and DeWine, who are both Republicans, said in an Aug. 1 filing opposing the injunction request. Ohio has a rational basis for treating military and overseas voters differently from its other eligible residents, they said.

Ohio’s curb on early voting for non-military citizens is needed to allow local election boards to synchronize the early balloting records with those at 9,800 polling places to prevent people from voting twice, said Husted.

Vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan and presidential candidate Mitt Romney in Jackson, Ohio.

“There’s a balance we have to strike between access and accuracy,” he said.

Ohio  attorney William Consovoy told the judge the “state believes that there needs to be time to prep for election day,” adding that “absentee voting is not a fundamental right.”

Obama and the Democrats disagreed, contending there’s no distinction between otherwise-eligible voters that justifies giving more time to one group than to another.

“Because Ohio has made those voting mechanisms available, it cannot then deny them to some of its citizens on an arbitrary basis,” the party and campaign said in a July 17 filing.

Fifteen fraternal military organizations on Aug. 6 won permission from the judge to intervene on the side of the state.