It's looking more likely that Ohio won't have an election on Super Tuesday next year. The Ohio House passed a bill to move the primary from March to May. Democrats who were frustrated with the redistricting process would not give the house enough votes to pass an emergency clause so the bill could go into effect before filing deadlines. Republican Lou Blessing expressed his frustration.
He says, "Sometimes, we heard about vote suppression, I think when you do something like this, not passing the emergency clause, what happens is you're suppressing an election. You're not even have people to run against."
In the end, Republican lawmakers went around Democrats...passing instead an amendment requiring boards of election to honor petitions filed for either the current or new districts. Democratic Representative Dennis Murray took offense to that amendment.
He says, "Instead of advancing the cause which we have been trying to advance is to allow public participation and public input. This is an amendment which only a lawyer could love. It is really parliamentary trickery."
The bill to move the primary, and the amendment to allow leniency with candidate filings, now goes to the Ohio Senate for its approval.