Ohio House, Senate budgets rid agency tasked with campaign finance oversight
The following article was originally published in the Ohio Capital Journal and published on News5Cleveland.com under a content-sharing agreement.
Ohio’s state Senate has approved a two-year spending plan that eliminates the Ohio Elections Commission. Negotiators from the House and Senate still have a vast array of differences to hammer out, but both chambers advanced proposals that axed the state campaign finance watchdog.
Barring a veto by Gov. Mike DeWine, it seems likely the commission is on its last legs. The question is how exactly lawmakers plan to wind down the agency and reassign its responsibilities.
The Senate’s plan
Instead of an independent seven-member commission, the Senate proposes a five-member body known as the Ohio Election Integrity Commission housed in the Ohio Secretary of State’s office. The secretary would choose the chairman. Majority and minority leaders in the state House and Senate would get one pick each.
Currently, the governor selects six of the seven members on the Ohio Elections Commission evenly split between Democrats and Republicans, and the seventh member is selected by those six and must have no partisan affiliation.
Under the new proposed set-up, all of the commission members would be selected by partisan elected officials, creating a situation where one party or the other would have a 3-2 advantage on the commission.
Speaking to reporters before the budget was approved, state Sen. Jerry Cirino, R-Kirtland, argued that the Secretary of State’s office is a better home for campaign oversight.
He said many lawmakers don’t think it’s as “effective as it as it should be. Didn’t have a lot of teeth,” he explained. “We feel it’s going to be better to monitor elections in the Secretary of State’s office. I think it’s a natural fit.”
The Senate proposal also requires the commission chair to be either an attorney or someone with at least four years’ experience in election administration. The remaining commission members must meet the same requirements or be a former general election candidate. The new commission would also investigate voter fraud allegations.
The changes address some of the loudest critiques leveled against the agency.
In the Ohio House, Finance Chairman, state Rep. Brian Stewart, R-Ashville, dismissed the commission as seven people “playing judge,” who don’t need to have any legal training at all.
“That’s a silly system,” he argued.
He and several other lawmakers have also bristled at the pace and demands of Ohio Elections Commission hearings. They argue the agency takes too long reach a decision and hearings, held in Columbus, demand too much of their time.
Reactions
Ohio Senate Democrats blasted the chamber’s budget proposal on several fronts including the elimination of the Ohio Elections Commission.
“From public schools, to universities, to health care, to the Elections Commission,” Sen. Bill DeMora, D-Columbus, argued, “this bill is complete garbage that attacks the average Ohioan to benefit rich Republican donors.”
Outside observers have criticized the idea of eliminating an agency — particularly one tasked with campaign finance oversight — in the state budget rather than in a standalone bill. Folding the changes into the spending bill avoids public hearings with attention focused squarely on that policy.
But Senate President Rob McColley defended the approach.
“Anytime you are rearranging agencies, there’s corresponding budgetary impacts to that,” he said at a press conference introducing the changes. “Trying to account for that in another agency, that’s also what would make it appropriate for the budget.”
The appropriation piece was a central ask in a letter Secretary of State Frank LaRose sent McColley last month. LaRose stressed that reforming the commission was “long overdue,” but “we need to improve it, not abolish and decentralize its authority.”
The Senate’s plan incorporates several of LaRose’s suggestions for a reimagined commission. The name, legal training requirements, and broader jurisdiction were all ideas LaRose’s staff has shared with lawmakers.
The one thing that didn’t make it was the appropriation. If the Senate insisted on dissolving the commission, LaRose said, his office would need “at least $800,000 in additional operating funds and the possible expansion of office space to accommodate unbudgeted personnel.”
Senators gave him $250,000. They also pared back a business services fund under his umbrella by $200,000 over the next two years. The Ohio Capital Journal reached out to LaRose for comment. He did not respond.
The mood around commission offices?
“Concern, I guess is probably the best word,” longtime Ohio Elections Commission Executive Director Phil Richter admits.
While he’s open to critiques or ideas for improving the agency, he also still believes in its mission. After 30 years working there, he said, “I think it’s fulfilled an important role, an important independent role, enforcing Ohio’s campaign finance laws. To take that away, I think, is a disservice to the citizens of the state of Ohio.”
His overriding concern, though, is what happens between July and January if lawmakers go forward with their plans.
The Senate proposes transferring Ohio Election Commission staff to the Secretary of State’s office, but it’s not clear if the Secretary is getting funding to cover their salaries. The budget proposals also direct the commission to transfer cases to the secretary by Jan. 1, 2026, but appropriations for the commission itself get zeroed out in both proposals.
“It’s one thing to say that the commission remains in existence until January 1,” Richter said, “but if there’s no money in the budget for that? I don’t know. I don’t know how we go about doing the work without money.”
