New Ohio Election Integrity Commission preps to start efforts

Say goodbye to the Ohio Elections Commission.

A provision in the state’s two-year budget, an amended version of House Bill 96, eliminated the half-century-old commission, replacing it with the Ohio Election Integrity Commission. Instead of an independent agency, the new commission will be located within the Ohio Secretary of State’s Office.

According to a State Affairs report, the current commission, which is to be abolished by Jan. 1, has 151 pending cases related to referrals from county election boards.

“We’ll work through cases as best we can, make determinations and decisions and deal with things like we normally would,” outgoing Executive Director Phil Richter said in an interview with State Affairs. “We’ll work to try and close out the commission and its operations.”

The Ohio Elections Commission was created in 1974 amid the Watergate scandal. Mirroring the Federal Elections Commission, the state-level version was created to enforce the state’s laws governing campaign finance and fair campaign practices.

It was established as an independent entity starting on Jan. 1, 1996.

In May, Secretary of State Frank LaRose called for reform of the commission, urging lawmakers to strengthen its oversight. He fired off a letter to Senate President Rob McColley, R-Napoleon, calling out what he said was the commission’s lack of action on significant referrals from his office, which he said went unanswered.

“The commission has become an increasingly toothless and inconsistent shell of what it was intended to be,” LaRose said in a release at the time. “To date, it has issued nearly $100 million in fines that have so far gone uncollected, sending a terrible message that you can break the law and get away with it. There is no reason to have campaign finance laws in Ohio if we cannot meaningfully enforce them, yet that is precisely where the commission has left us.”

According to the Ohio Capital Journal, under the current iteration of the Ohio Elections Commission, the governor appoints six of the seven members, with three Republican members and three Democratic members appointed. The six members pick a seventh member who has no partisan affiliation.

Elected officials will pick all five members of the new version, which critics said could give one party a larger advantage. The secretary is tasked with picking the chair, while the majority and minority leaders in the House and Senate each have a pick.

In an email to State Affairs, Ben Kindel, LaRose’s press secretary and deputy communications director, said the office is working on a transition plan.

“We’ll be ready not only to assume this new responsibility but also to enforce Ohio’s election laws more effectively,” Kindel said in the email. “This new structure improves the commission’s oversight, makes it more accountable to the public, and streamlines the caseload process.”

In signing the Buckeye State’s biennial budget last month, Republican Gov. Mike DeWine vetoed a provision that would have created a new Election Integrity Unit tasked with prosecuting election law violations, such as election fraud and voter suppression.

Before the budget’s passage, the Ohio Senate passed Senate Bill 4, which similarly established the new Election Integrity Unit. The House has not yet considered the proposal.

“If we are not improving Ohio’s election law then we are moving backwards and asking for trouble,” Ohio Sen. Theresa Gavarone, R-Bowling Green, said in a release last month after the Senate’s passage of SB4.

“There is no doubt that this legislation will improve the election process in the state of Ohio,” Gavarone added. “One case of voter fraud is one case too much and I’m confident that the Election Integrity Unit will bolster not only our election systems but our Republic.”