Ohio Group Garners Over 700,000 Signatures for Ballot Initiative to End Gerrymandering

Citizens Not Politicians, a campaign to end gerrymandering in Ohio, has collected over 700,000 signatures on a ballot initiative that would fundamentally change how congressional and legislative maps are drawn.

“Ohio has one of the most extreme cases of gerrymandering in the country,” the campaign said in a statement.

The campaign seeks to amend the state constitution with the Citizens Not Politicians Amendment, which would take map-drawing power from lawmakers and instead vest it in a 15-member independent citizen commission.

Chris Davey, spokesperson for Citizens Not Politicians, said it’s important to take politicians out of the equation here because “their number one consideration is to keep them and all of their friends in power.”

The commission’s members would represent all political parties, different geographical areas and the demographics of the state.

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Citizens Not Politicians said in a statement that all 99 seats in the Ohio House of Representatives are up for election in November, but “uncompetitive districts and uncontested races all but guarantee victory to one party,” and “millions of Ohioans won’t have a voice in state politics.”

More than 9 million Ohioans, about 77% of the state’s population, reside in districts “where elections for state representatives are not in serious dispute,” according to an analysis from the Brennan Center for Justice.

Also, the Ohio Supreme Court has struck down congressional and legislative maps for being unconstitutional seven different times.

“And seven times the politicians ignored the court,” Davey said. “They flaunted the rule of law and they thumbed their noses at the citizens of Ohio, and they imposed those unconstitutional gerrymandered maps anyway.”

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https://www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/ohio-group-garners-over-700000-signatures-for-ballot-initiative-to-end-gerrymandering/