Antonio Calls on DNC for Biden Ballot Fix

This week, Ohio Senate Democratic Leader Nickie J. Antonio (D-Lakewood) condemned Ohio Senate Republicans for again including unrelated and controversial language in a bill to fix the Biden ballot situation.

“There are a variety of tools in the toolbox that we could use to accomplish this simple task, but instead, we are dealing with Republican infighting,” said Antonio. “This infighting serves no one but is especially damaging to the people of Ohio. It’s unfortunate that the Republican supermajority couldn’t handle this issue in the simplest way possible as almost every other state has and as Ohio legislative bodies have done multiple times in the past.”

On Tuesday, the Democratic National Committee, at the request of Senate Minority Leader Antonio and other Ohio Democratic Leaders, announced their plan to get President Biden on the ballot via a virtual roll call ahead of Ohio's August 7 deadline.  Ohio Senate Democrats have also introduced legislation that would permanently address the Ohio law that has repeatedly created problems in past presidential elections– for both Democrats and Republicans– and solve the issue once and for all. 

House Bill 271 was originally introduced to update the ballot issue numbering system. However, in addition to providing President Biden with a path to appear on the November ballot, the amendment introduced by Senate Republicans includes poison pill language that Senate Democrats have voted against multiple times.

House Bill 271 now returns to the House for its consideration. The House has scheduled a special session on Thursday, May 30 pursuant to the governor’s proclamation.