If you're an Ohioan who plans on voting for Jill Stein, the former Green Party candidate who is running as an independent presidential candidate on the Ohio ballot this year, your vote is not likely to count.
Secretary of State Frank LaRose has been notifying voters that even though Stein’s name is on the ballot, her candidacy is not legitimate in Ohio. LaRose’s office said it received a letter from Anita Rios, a longtime Green Party candidate in Ohio, saying she had withdrawn as Jill Stein's running mate. The office said the withdrawal came after the deadline to remove a candidate’s name from the ballot.
But Rios said that the withdrawal letter wasn’t legitimate.
“That letter that he got was not from me and did not have my signature. I have subsequently sent him a notarized letter that stated that I did not authorize that letter and I didn’t send it,” Rios said.
LaRose’s office says the initial letter requesting Rios' name be withdrawn was delivered by the Ohio Green Party Chair. According to the office, any candidate may withdraw from the race at any point leading up to Election Day.
Rios said her name was initially put on Stein’s ticket in Ohio as the placeholder for Stein's eventual vice presidential candidate when petitions were circulated back in January. Stein chose Butch Ware to be her running mate in August. LaRose’s office said that happened after the deadline to file a certification of a candidate to fill the vice-presidential vacancy, which is 86 days prior to the election.
LaRose’s office explained local boards of elections must remove the name of any candidate who withdraws on or before the 70th day before an election and that those boards will not remove the name of any candidate who withdraws after the 70th day before an election. The result is that the Stein/Rios ticket will appear on the ballot but votes for them will be invalidated.
“If those votes do not count, it says something really sad about our democracy here in Ohio,” Rios said. “But we are fighting to have those votes counted and I would encourage all Jill Stein’s voters to go ahead and vote for her.”
The Stein campaign has filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court in Columbus, arguing LaRose’s decision infringes on their constitutional rights to free speech, association, and equal protection and the voting rights of the Ohio-based plaintiffs. Rios said her name should never have been removed from the Ohio ballot.
“I am officially the vice presidential candidate for all intents and purposes in Ohio,” she said. Rios said the Stein campaign realizes Ware was chosen too late to legally have his name on the ballot but Rios said she could stay as a placeholder then votes could end up counting for the Stein/Ware campaign.
The Secretary of State’s office refers to Ohio Revised Code Section 3513.30: (E) When a person withdraws under division (B) or (D) of this section on or before the seventieth day before the day of the primary election or the general election, the board of elections shall remove the name of the withdrawn candidate from the ballots according to the directions of the secretary of state. When a person withdraws under division (B) or (D) of this section after the seventieth day before the day of the primary election or the general election, the board of elections shall not remove the name of the withdrawn candidate from the ballots. The board of elections shall post a notice at each polling place on the day of the election, and shall enclose with each absent voter's ballot given or mailed after the candidate withdraws, a notice that votes for the withdrawn candidate will be void and will not be counted. If the name is not removed from all ballots before the day of the election, the votes for the withdrawn candidate are void and shall not be counted.
LaRose’s office said Ohio law requires every board of elections to notify voters either with the leaflet included with the absentee ballot, or post that information at all in-person voting locations. And that will continue to happen as voters go to the polls.
“This isn’t illegal. This isn’t anything bad. This is a healthy exercise in democracy,” Rios said.
