CLEVELAND, OH – Today the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio filed a court motion on behalf of the Ohio Green and Constitution parties, asking to have them added to a pending lawsuit against Ohio's new rules for minor political parties.
“The ACLU’s interest in this case is nonpartisan,” said ACLU of Ohio Legal Director James Hardiman. “Voters should have the right to support any candidate or party of their choice. When the major parties thwart the efforts of the minor parties to present themselves to voters on Election Day, they are attacking that right.”
The lawsuit, originally filed by the Ohio Libertarian Party, alleges that the new rules unfairly hinder their ability to participate in next year’s election by preventing them from holding a party primary, stripping them of state recognition, and retroactively removing their candidates from the 2014 ballot.
The suit was originally filed to challenge a separate state law requiring petition circulators to be Ohio residents, but it has been since amended to challenge the new minor party rules as well.
The ACLU motion argues that representatives of the Green and Constitution parties should also be included as plaintiffs because they are directly impacted by the law and also because they will be impacted by the outcome of the case.
