A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit filed by Republican Sarah Thomas Kovoor, who attempted to overturn the state’s “sore loser” statute after being denied the ability to run last year for a Trumbull County Common Pleas Court judicial seat.

U.S. District Court Judge James L. Graham of Ohio’s Southern Division agreed with the Ohio Attorney General’s Office, which was defending the secretary of state in the lawsuit, that the state law doesn’t violate Kovoor’s constitutional rights under the 1st and 14th Amendments.

The judge also rejected Kovoor’s request that a 2024 election for the seat, won in an unopposed election by Democrat Cynthia Westcott Rice of Brookfield, be held. Rice ran for a common pleas seat that was vacated July 31, 2022, by the retirement of Democrat Peter J. Kontos of Warren. Kovoor of Howland was the county Republican party’s choice for that position.

Kovoor said she plans to file a jurisdictional brief in the case.

“It’s not completely over yet,” she said. “I want to find out the situation for other people in the same position.”

Kovoor said she plans to run next year for a common pleas court judicial seat held by Democrat Andrew D. Logan, who cannot seek re-election in 2024 because of the state’s judicial age limit.

DEMOCRAT CHAIRMAN

Mark Alberini, Trumbull County Democratic Party chairman and chairman of the county board of elections, said his party has a number of “strong candidates that have expressed interest in that seat and are in the decision-making process currently.”

All four general division common pleas court judge are Democrats.

The two Democrats on the board of elections, including Alberini, voted last Aug. 19 to not certify Kovoor to the ballot with the two Republicans voting to certify. Secretary of State Frank LaRose, a Republican, broke the tie in favor of the board’s Democrats.

“At every level, the courts have spoken and reached the same finding that she was not eligible to run,” Alberini said. “There’s no surprise there. It’s not a shocker.”

After LaRose ruled against her, Kovoor filed a case with the Ohio Supreme Court. The court unanimously ruled Sept. 16 against Kovoor’s effort to get on the ballot, citing Ohio Revised Code Section 3513.04.

That law states: “No person who seeks party nomination for an office or position at a primary election by declaration of candidacy … shall be permitted to become a candidate by nominating petition … by declaration of intent to be a write-in candidate or by filling a vacancy under section 3531.31 of the Revised Code at the following general election for any office.”

The only exceptions are for boards of education, the governing board of an educational service center and township trustee.

The Ohio Supreme Court reviewed the sore loser provision two other times before the Kovoor ruling and found it to be constitutional.

Kovoor filed a lawsuit Sept. 21 in U.S. District Court against LaRose to get on the Nov. 8 ballot, contending a state law violated her constitutional rights.

In his decision, Graham wrote that Kovoor didn’t request a preliminary injunction so last November’s election “came and went without intervention from this court.”

Graham also wrote that Kovoor failed to respond to a motion from the state to dismiss her complaint.

“It was what it was,” Kovoor said in response to a question about why she didn’t file a response motion.

Kovoor unsuccessfully ran May 3, 2022, for the Republican nominee for a seat on the 11th District Court of Appeals. She was appointed Aug. 14 by the Trumbull County Republican Party’s central committee to be the party’s nominee for a vacant common pleas court judicial position that was held by Kontos.

SORE LOSER STATUTE

LaRose and the Ohio Supreme Court determined Kovoor wasn’t eligible under the state law known as the sore loser statute.

Graham wrote in his decision: “The court finds the Supreme Court of Ohio’s treatment of the sore loser statute is a reasonable, nondiscriminatory law. It applies evenly across the board. Any individual, whatever their political affiliation, who loses a primary election is barred from participating in the following election. The sore loser statute also does not unduly limit access to the ballot.”

Graham added: “An individual becomes a sore loser only after obtaining access to the primary ballot and losing the primary election. Such an individual could have avoided becoming a sore loser and obtain access to the general election ballot by forgoing the primary election.”

In his Aug. 31 decision, breaking a Trumbull County Board of Elections tie on Kovoor’s candidacy, LaRose sided with the two Democrats on the board that she was ineligible because of the same law.

EARLY RETIREMENT

When Kontos retired early, Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, was given the names of three people, including Kovoor, to replace Kontos on Aug. 11 by the county Republican Party. The decisions by LaRose and the Ohio Supreme Court that Kovoor wasn’t eligible left the GOP without a candidate. DeWine chose not to name a successor.

Rice was sworn in Dec. 12 as the first woman elected to the common pleas general division in Trumbull County.

In the federal lawsuit, Kovoor stated the 1st Amendment violation was not permitting the county Republican Party to “select candidates for election to public office.”

The 14th Amendment issue, according to Kovoor’s lawsuit, was the refusal to put her on the ballot was a violation of the equal protection clause.

In his decision, Graham wrote the sore loser provision “imposes only a slight burden on the 1st and 14th Amendment rights.”

Ann Yacksaw, an assistant Ohio attorney general, filed a motion Nov. 4 to dismiss the lawsuit on behalf of LaRose saying Kovoor wasn’t eligible to run because her candidacy would violate state law.

Yacksaw added: “Perhaps the sorest of these three primary-election losers, Kovoor now attempts to forum shop for a different answer in federal court. She asks this court to upend decades of precedent from Ohio’s highest court and declare a thrice-upheld statute facially unconstitutional. Her complaint should be dismissed.”

In a Dec. 8 motion to dismiss the amended complaint, Yacksaw wrote: “Kovoor presents no reason for a federal court to depart from decades of precedent from Ohio’s highest court finding otherwise.”