David Skolnick

The Nov. 5 ballot will have a proposed constitutional amendment on it to change how state legislative and congressional districts are drawn.

Gov. Mike DeWine admits the current system that gives control over those maps to politicians — overwhelmingly Republicans, including himself — needs to be changed despite his decisions to vote several times in favor of maps later ruled unconstitutional by the Ohio Supreme Court.

But DeWine strongly opposes the redistricting amendment saying it will make a bad situation — which has Republicans with a supermajority in the Legislature — much worse.

The proposal, backed by Citizens Not Politicians, would remove elected officials from the process and replace them with a 15-member panel of five Republicans, five Democrats and five independents that would draw the maps. None of the panelists can be elected officials or lobbyists.

One of the amendment’s key provisions is the maps would have to match the voting results in statewide partisan elections during the past decade — about 57% Republican and 43% Democrat — and keep communities of interest together.

DeWine at a Wednesday news conference said that “proportionality” conflicts with keeping communities of interest together and the former “trumps everything else.”

He added: “If this amendment were to be adopted, Ohio would actually end up with a system that mandates — that compels — map drawers to produce gerrymandered districts. In fact, Ohio would have gerrymandering in the extreme.”

DeWine asked voters to defeat the ballot and he would then get together with the state Legislature next year to formulate a new plan that he said is heavily based on what is done in Iowa.

This is similar to what Republicans sought to do before last November’s abortion rights constitutional amendment. They wanted voters to reject that amendment, saying it was too extreme, and said they’d work on compromise legislation. Voters approved the amendment with 57% support.

Citizens Not Politicians and Democrats, who are in the minority in the state Legislature, blasted DeWine for the proposal.

Maureen O’Connor, a retired Ohio Supreme Court chief justice and a Republican who decided with the three Democratic justices against the constitutionality of seven GOP-drawn maps, said, “The disinformation from the governor” is “insulting to everyone in Ohio.”

She said the Iowa system permits “the governor and other politicians (to have) the final say on maps.”

O’Connor added DeWine “and his friends in the Legislature are already scheming to overturn what voters will pass in November. We’re done listening to self-serving politicians tell us how they want to keep rigging the game.”

In Iowa, where there are four congressional districts compared to 15 in Ohio, a nonpartisan group gets to draw boundaries, but they have to be accepted by the Iowa Legislature. If after two rejections, Iowa state lawmakers can make changes and have the final say over maps.

Citizens Not Politicians reported Wednesday raising $23 million during the first half of this year and spending $24.8 million. It had a $1.8 million carryover and reported having no money as of June 30. About 85% of the money raised came from those outside Ohio, which has long alarmed Republicans about out-of-state influence over state issues.

Republicans, who say the redistricting proposal won’t take politics out of the process, were quick to back DeWine in urging its rejection by voters. But none said they backed the governor’s so-called Iowa Plan.

DeWine said if he can’t get cooperation from the Legislature, he would lead an initiative to get it on the ballot.

Ohio Auditor Keith Faber, co-chairman of the last Ohio Redistricting Commission and a Republican, said while the current system isn’t perfect — primarily because Democrats initially “did not negotiate in good faith” — the new proposal is a disaster.

“The proposed amendment is advanced by well-funded allied liberal interests and organizations clocked as a ‘citizen effort’ and is designed to gerrymander to achieve their desired political outcome,” Faber said.

Ohio House Minority Leader Allison Russo, D-Upper Arlington and an ORC member, said DeWine attempted “to confuse and misdirect voters from the truth. … Republicans are desperate because they know their gerrymandered grip on power is coming to an end.”

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