From Democracy Docket:
On Thursday, Aug. 24, the Republican-controlled Ohio Ballot Board approved new summary language for an abortion rights amendment that will be decided by voters this November.
The summary language, which is now longer than the full amendment, was rewritten by Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose (R) in a complete overhaul of the previously certified “fair and accurate” wording. The board approved the language in a 3-2 along party line vote on Thursday. While the summary language does not change the full amendment text itself, it is what voters will see in the booth when voting on the proposal.
The move follows the defeat of Republican-backed Issue 1 earlier this month, which would have required future constitutional amendments in the state to garner 60% support from Ohioans as opposed to the current 50% threshold. LaRose, who campaigned heavily for Issue 1, finally admitted in June that Issue 1 was “100%” about keeping the abortion rights proposal from passing.
Here’s some more info:
Among the revisions, the word “fetus” in the amendment was changed to “unborn child” in the ballot description.
The original language seeks to assure access to abortion through what is called viability, when the fetus is able to survive outside the womb. It states, “abortion may be prohibited after fetal viability,” but not in cases where a treating physician deems the procedure necessary to protect the life or health of the pregnant person.
LaRose’s summary turned that section on its head. It now says the amendment would “always allow an unborn child to be aborted at any stage of pregnancy, regardless of viability if, in the treating physician’s determination” the life and health exception applies.
“The entire summary is propaganda,” said Lauren Blauvelt, co-chair of Ohioans United for Reproductive Rights, the statewide coalition of organizations supporting abortion rights and related causes that has proposed the amendment.
She noted that the state’s Republican attorney general, Dave Yost, certified the group’s original wording as fair and accurate and that 700,000 Ohioans read it when they signed petitions to get the measure on the fall ballot.
“The amendment that is put forward is clear about reproductive freedom and reproductive health care decisions that Ohioans should be able to make for themselves, and that is ultimately what the vote in November will be about,” she said.
This has LaRose’s fingerprints all over it even if he’s trying to deny it:
The leader of the Ohio Ballot Board, Secretary of State Frank LaRose, said the changes were made by “staff” of the board, though Democratic board member and state Rep. Elliot Forhan said “I would assume that the buck stops with the secretary of state.”
LaRose during the meeting also said that, “having worked extensively on drafting this, I do believe it’s fair and accurate.”
LaRose has been vocal in his opposition of the amendment, even saying the effort around the previous Issue 1, which would have changed the threshold to approve a constitutional amendment had it not been roundly defeated, was targeting the abortion rights fight specifically.
At the beginning of Thursday’s meeting, he prefaced the board’s activity by saying the group was not there to “debate the merits” of the amendment or the marijuana ballot initiative also on the table at the meeting.
Board member and state Sen. Theresa Gavarone, however, gave a speech in the middle of the meeting harshly criticizing the amendment and calling it “a bridge too far,” even after multiple comments by LaRose about the neutrality with which the board was supposed to conduct their business.
“This is a dangerous amendment that I’m going to fight tirelessly against,” Gavarone said. “But that’s not why we’re here today.”
Gavarone also claimed, as anti-abortion groups throughout the state do as well, that the amendment is “an assault on parental rights.” Neither the amendment nor the summary approved by the board mention parental rights of any kind.
The senator continued her comments during the board meeting, saying the true nature of the amendment “is hidden behind overly broad language,” despite the fact that the board summary took out pieces of the full text.
This is just a pathetic attempt by LaRose to salvage his doomed Senate candidacy:
His recent high-profile efforts to raise the threshold for amending the Ohio constitution — in a bid to maintain strict abortion regulations — failed overwhelmingly in a state that has become reliably Republican.
And as LaRose tries to curry favor with Trump — and his party’s Trump-friendly MAGA base — he’s found himself changing his views on key issues.
In a recent interview with Jewish Insider, LaRose, 44, maintained that he is “likely” to receive Trump’s blessing, noting that the former president endorsed his reelection campaign last cycle. “He wants to be with somebody who can win the race and also be a good ally of his in the Senate, which I would be,” said LaRose. “I’m the only candidate in this race who’s ever been endorsed by President Trump.”
While LaRose has privately raised doubts that Trump’s endorsement still “matters” to most Republican voters, according to leaked audio obtained by Politico, he stressed to JI that he “would love to have” the former president’s backing, which could be decisive in a state Trump won by eight points in 2020. His hope for the nod “doesn’t mean we agree on everything,” LaRose said, clarifying that their differences are “mostly stylistic.”
LaRose has had quite a beating in the press lately:
Rob Nichols, a veteran Republican communications operative who had served as press secretary for LaRose’s office, was fired because of the tweets Tuesday, three sources with knowledge of the situation told NBC News.
An interim press secretary, Mary Cianciolo, confirmed Wednesday in an email that Nichols is no longer employed by the secretary of state's office but declined further comment. Nichols, reached by telephone, declined to comment.
The firing comes at a turbulent time for LaRose, who is also a GOP Senate candidate. He is fresh off being the face of a losing ballot issue that would have raised the threshold for amending the Ohio Constitution months and jeopardized an abortion-rights measure up for a vote in November.
And LaRose’s supportive comments made about then-Vice President Mike Pence’s role in certifying the 2020 election also caught Trump’s attention last week, raising speculation that LaRose was losing a race for Trump’s endorsement to primary rival Bernie Moreno.
The trouble for Nichols began last week, when a progressive activist in Ohio shared screen grabs of late night tweets responding to her on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter and asked publicly if the account belonged to Nichols. The account, which has since been deleted, did not identify Nichols by his full name or job, but those close to him acknowledge it was his.
And it’s not looking good for LaRose to win the Previous Guy’s endorsement:
But what caught Trump’s attention wasn’t so much LaRose’s reaction to the landslide loss or the setback that loss represents to the GOP’s anti-abortion rights base. Instead, Trump was keyed in to the final moments of LaRose’s interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press NOW" on Wednesday.
Host Chuck Todd asked if then-Vice President Mike Pence was right to ignore Trump’s pressure to block certification of the 2020 election results. LaRose said he believed that Pence “made the best decision he could with the information in front of him.”
Siding against Trump can be costly in GOP primaries, especially in states like Ohio, where Trump won twice by comfortable margins, and especially at a time when Trump's own poll numbers remain robust despite federal charges related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. LaRose’s remarks were relatively lukewarm — he asserted that he wasn’t privy to the same information that Pence was — but that didn’t stop people from making sure that Trump heard them.
“The video was sent to Trump by multiple people, and he has watched it,” said a source close to Trump who requested anonymity to share details of private communications.
But LaRose’s primary opponent also has some issues with past Tweets:
Since Moreno launched his first 2022 Senate run, his past anti-Trump statements and social media activity have come under scrutiny. In May, when Moreno launched his 2024 campaign, the Daily Mail reported on now-deleted tweets from 2015 and 2016 in which he compared Trump to “a car accident that makes you sick.”
But Moreno’s attempt to scrub his past expressions of views over the 2020 election and Jan. 6 has not yet been reported. He also has not fully scrubbed them: his record of liked tweets remains publicly available.
On Jan. 6, he liked a tweet from the actor Mark Hamill, who wrote, “the only other person enjoying this chaos & anarchy as much as our defeated president is Vladimir Putin.”
A week after Jan. 6, Moreno liked a post by Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX), who defended former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) as a “principled leader” with “a hell of a lot more backbone than most” after she voted to impeach Trump.
But LaRose has certainly become everyone’s top target now:
State of play: Just as Issue 1 was a proxy for November's abortion rights amendment, LaRose's support was a proxy for his Senate campaign hopes in 2024.
- It was a high risk, high reward strategy — victory last Tuesday could have helped thwart the abortion amendment and made LaRose a hero among anti-abortion conservatives.
Instead, LaRose became the face of defeat in a 14-point drubbing that cost Ohio taxpayers $20 million.
- Ohio Democrats are calling him "Issue 1's biggest loser."
- Fellow GOP Senate candidate Bernie Moreno's campaign called the special election result a "preview of what would happen with Frank LaRose at the top of the ticket in 2024," per NBC News.
- The Libertarian Party even filed a Hatch Act complaint with the U.S. Office of Special Counsel alleging LaRose's support for Issue 1 was illegal because of his role as secretary of state.
We’re going to have give LaRose another humiliating defeat in November so here are a few things you can do before then:
1. Click here to get involved with Ohioans for Reproductive Freedom’s GOTV efforts.
2. Check your voter registration, register to vote and information about early voting.
3. If you’re an Ohio voter, click here to sign up to be a poll worker.
4. Click below to donate and get involved with U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown’s (D. OH) re-election campaign and his fellow Ohio Democrats campaigns:
Sherrod Brown
Emilia Sykes
Greg Landsman
Marcy Kaptur
Shontel Brown