Editor's Newsletter

In the gerrymandered Ohio Statehouse, Republican supermajorities exercising unconstitutional, undue power have made an operating philosophy out of afflicting the afflicted and comforting the comfortable. This past week has provided Ohioans prime examples of both.

On Tuesday, Republican lawmakers from both the Ohio House and Senate introduced legislation to eliminate the state income tax. This would leave a $13 billion deficit. The lawmakers say they could make up the money by raising the sales tax, cutting spending, and letting the economy allegedly “fix itself.”

On Wednesday, the gerrymandered Ohio Senate Republican supermajority joined the gerrymandered Ohio House Republican supermajority in overriding Gov. Mike DeWine’s veto of a law banning gender-affirming care for trans youth. The ban takes effect 90 days following the Senate’s override. Lawsuits are likely.

The legislature needs a 60% supermajority support to override the governor. The only reason why Republican lawmakers control more than 60% of both the Ohio House and Ohio Senate is unconstitutional gerrymandering.

Gerrymandering

An average of Ohio voter preferences in the last 10 election cycles including 2022 shows a 56 to 43 Republican-to-Democratic split in voter preferences. But Republican lawmakers have a 67 to 32 supermajority in the Ohio House, controlling 68% of seats, and they have a 26 to 7 supermajority in the Ohio Senate, controlling 78% of seats.

The 135th Ohio General Assembly was elected in 2022 under Statehouse maps declared to be unconstitutional gerrymanders five times by a bipartisan Ohio Supreme Court majority.

Despite a constitutional mandate to draw districts reflecting voter preferences, the Republican politicians controlling 5 of 7 seats on the Ohio Redistricting Commission ignored the court rulings, hired and then dismissed independent mapmakers, ran out the clock, and forced voters to cast ballots in unconstitutional districts after an anti-abortion lobbyist sued to a Trump-appointed majority federal court for a favorable ruling.

Even those two Trump judges on the split court couldn’t bring themselves to say that Ohio’s current maps are constitutional. Instead, they said that — in forcing voters to use the unconstitutional maps — “we chose the best of our bad options.” The dissenting judge said the majority ruling “abrogates controlling decisions of the state Supreme Court, and unwittingly rewards the Commission’s brinksmanship over the rights of Ohio voters.”

In the start of its second year, this is now what Ohio is getting out of our gerrymandered legislative branch of government: A proposal for massive wealth redistribution toward the top so that well-off people who already have nothing to worry about can have more money, and a new anti-trans law taking away access to critical health care resources from a vulnerable community.

Under a system of gerrymander-rigged elections, only primaries matter. The results of the legislative general elections are nearly all foregone conclusions. The only challenge a lawmaker might face is getting primaried by someone willing to be more extreme than they are.

So it’s no coincidence that in the heart of a presidential year primary season, lawmakers are lavishing red meat for the base, no matter who they harm.

Making wealth inequality worse

Eliminating the income tax system means that the highest income people pay a whole helluva lot less in taxes, but governments still need revenue, y’know, for roads, schools, civilization. So sales taxes are raised. Often local levies have to try to cover differences and property taxes go up. Fees for everything you can think of get hiked. And all kinds of public services are slashed — which means local layoffs — as public safety, personnel, and community programs get axed.

And of course, the newly redistributed tax burden falls heaviest on low- and fixed-income families.

The National Conference of State Legislaturessays that those with lower incomes typically spend about 3/4 of their earnings on items that are subject to sales tax, whereas top earners spend about 1/6 of their income on taxed items: “Replacing the average state’s most productive revenue stream could lead to budget instability and would increase the regressivity of the overall tax system.”

Ohio already has the 15th-most unequal system of taxation, according to the Institute for Taxation and Economic Policy. Eliminating the income tax in favor of a regressive system would only make things worse. It helps those who don’t need any help, and hurts those who can least afford it.

Victimizing vulnerable families

Meanwhile, more than 100 families with transgender members have made plans to leave Ohio, TransOhio said Thursday. They have set up an emergency fund for transgender Ohioans who need assistance leaving the state.

Gerrymandered Ohio Republicans made a primary season political point of ripping life-saving health care guided by medical professionals away from trans kids and their families, and now 100 families have their lives thrown into chaos as they request emergency funds to leave — trying to figure out how they can uproot everything to keep their families safe from a state government that shows nothing but contempt for them.

A 2022 study published in JAMA found access to hormones and puberty blockers for young people ages 13-20 was associated with 60% lower odds of moderate to severe depression and 73% lower odds of self-harm or suicidal thoughts compared to youths who didn’t get these medications.

Gender-affirming care is supported by every major medical organization in the United States. No Ohio children’s hospital performs gender-affirming surgeries on minors and children’s hospitals across Ohio, the Ohio Children’s Hospital Association, and the Ohio Academy of Family Physicians all opposed this law.

Republican lawmakers were warned against it over and over, by doctors, psychologists, endocrinologists, medical groups, and just about every other kind of respected academic and professional expert on the issue one can imagine.

They didn’t care. They don’t care.

They don’t care who they hurt. They don’t care how much they hurt them.

They don’t care how much they hose everyday Ohioans in favor of helping out the wealthy and well-connected, whether through public corruption or tax giveaways.

Why should they care? Under gerrymandering, they can never be held accountable through competitive general elections.

So as long as they slake the thirst of their own ambition, the rest of us can eat rocks.