BREAKING NEWS: GOP Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine Slams Own Party For Possible Exclusion Of Biden On Ballot
Gov. Mike DeWine (R-OH) delivers remarks on voting access for the 2024 election.
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NewsTranscript
00:00More than a month ago, Ohio's Secretary of State, Frank LaRose, informed the leaders of our state that the Democratic National Convention this year is being held after the Ohio deadline for getting a candidate on the ballot for President of the United States.
00:16Obviously, that creates a problem.
00:19When this has happened in the past, the Ohio General Assembly has passed bills that have remedied the situation to ensure that candidates from both major political parties are, in fact, on the Ohio ballot.
00:33That's what has happened in the past.
00:37Now, after Secretary LaRose's statement this year, leaders of the General Assembly indicated they would work on bills to remedy this situation.
00:48The Senate has passed several bills that would remedy this situation.
00:53However, the House of Representatives has failed to do this.
00:59The legislature had session yesterday and, again, failed to take any action.
01:07This is simply unacceptable.
01:12Ohio is running out of time to get Joe Biden, the sitting President of the United States, on the ballot this fall.
01:21Failing to do so is simply not acceptable.
01:25This is a ridiculous, this is an absurd situation.
01:30Therefore, tonight, pursuant to Article III, Section 8 of the Ohio Constitution, I am calling a special session of the Ohio General Assembly to begin this coming Tuesday, May 28th.
01:45The purpose of this session will be for the General Assembly to pass legislation ensuring that both major presidential candidates will be on the Ohio ballot in November, as well as legislation that would prohibit campaign spending by foreign nationals.
02:05It is important that when Ohioans cast their vote for President of the United States, United States Senator, and many, many other officials this fall, that they have the opportunity to cast a vote for either of the major party candidates for these offices.
02:25It's important that when they go to vote for President, that Joe Biden be on the ballot, as well as Donald Trump.
02:35I'm happy to answer any questions.
02:37Governor, the Board of the Nation is regarded as a, and the ensuing PAC restrictions that would be with it, is regarded pretty much as a poison pill by the Democrats.
02:50Well, look, I don't know why this would be a poison pill.
02:53I'm not going to get into the merits of it, other than to say that I think when you ask most Ohioans, they would think that it's a ridiculous situation that a foreign national can come in to the state of Ohio, or not even come into the state of Ohio, and spend a significant amount of money to effect an Ohio ballot issue.
03:15We do not allow them to do that for candidates.
03:18Why in the world should we allow them to do that for a ballot issue?
03:22The Senate has already passed legislation in this regard.
03:28So, clearly, it is an issue.
03:30It's an issue that should be debated and should be dealt with, one way or the other.
03:34Governor, is there a need for a long-term fix rather than a short-term one?
03:39Yes, there certainly is a need for a long-term fix.
03:43But a short-term fix is pretty darn easy to do.
03:48It's been done before.
03:50This is not hard, and it's just something that needs to get done.
03:55But, yes, I would certainly like for the legislature, recognizing that parties have their conventions at different times during the summer, sometimes depending on who the incumbent president is, and they make their own choices.
04:09So, it's not something that we should be dealing with in the future.
04:12But, for now, I will be certainly satisfied with a short-term fix.
04:18We've done this in the past.
04:19We need to do it again.
04:21Speaker Stevens says this is a non-starter, that they are not going to bridge the divide in the House to get a legislative amendment.
04:28I missed the first part of your question.
04:30Speaker Stevens said earlier this week, and I know that was before the session, that the legislature, the House at least, is not going to come to an agreement on this.
04:37What is the special session going to do?
04:39And what is your conversation with Speaker Stevens?
04:42Well, I'm not going to talk about my conversation with the leaders, but I have had a conversation with the Speaker.
04:49I've had a conversation with the Senate president as well.
04:52Look, I'm the governor of the state of Ohio.
04:55I have an obligation to take this action.
04:59This is called in the statute an extraordinary action, an extraordinary situation.
05:05This is an extraordinary situation when we have the ridiculous situation that we have not taken action to deal with a problem that is, because of the way the Ohio law reads and because of when the Democrat convention is,
05:22it has the potential, it's not just the potential, his name would not be on the ballot unless a court would intervene.
05:30And we should not be looking to the courts to solve our problems in the state of Ohio.
05:35This is a very simple, there's a very simple solution to this problem, and we should take this action, and I believe the legislature will next week.
05:46How would it look like if the House of Representatives continued to debate this and at the end of the day, the Biden is not on the ballot of Ohio State?
06:02How would it look like?
06:03How would what?
06:04How would it look like if...
06:07Well, I think it would look terrible if, you know, we have two major candidates.
06:13One is going to be president of the United States.
06:15One is president now.
06:16The other has been president.
06:18The American people, the people of Ohio have the right to have these choices and make these choices.
06:23And I just think, you know, for that not to happen, it's pretty hard to explain to anybody why in the world they would walk in and not have the choice of who to vote for.
06:36So it's, but it's easy.
06:38It's easy to fix.
06:39This is not hard.
06:40It just needs to happen.
06:43Is it necessary that Republicans kind of, quote, get something in return for putting Joe Biden on the ballot, or do you think it ought to be a clean bill?
06:53Look, I'm calling for the action on both of these.
06:57I think we should not have foreign nationals interfering and spending money in Ohio ballot races.
07:03This is, Ohioans should be dealing with this.
07:07And all we're doing, all it would be doing with this legislation is being consistent with what we do in regard to candidates.
07:14I just think most Ohioans would be shocked if they knew that, you know, you could have a millionaire or billionaire get involved in Ohio races, put, you know, ads up.
07:27I just think people would be shocked if they knew that.
07:30And that's what the law is today, and that's what can happen today, and that is what has happened today.
07:35So I don't think, I don't find it a very controversial issue.
07:39We'll see, and we'll see what, you know, what the legislature does with that, but the Senate has already taken action on it.
07:47So these are two issues that are related, two issues that relate in the sense that they have to do with voting and what will be coming up in the fall.
07:56But do you think it's necessary that Republicans get that in return for putting Joe Biden on the ballot?
08:03I'm not going to comment about that.
08:05Look, again, the major point here is a presidential race that the Ohio voters have the right to be able to make those choices.
08:18They will make choices, but if one of the major candidates is not on the ballot, that is a very sad, sad thing.
08:28You said that has happened in foreign nations.
08:31I mean, I don't know if you should say what you should say.
08:33Put it under your example.
08:35My team can give you examples, but they've clearly contributed before.
08:40Are you citing examples of, for instance, a senator calling and a senator gathering and have cited in the arguments in the legislature?
08:46I don't know what they've said.
08:47We'll get you that.
08:49You said you would prefer a permanent solution.
08:51The House bill has a permanent solution.
08:53The Senate bill does not.
08:55So why not prefer that one?
08:58Look, a permanent solution would be fine with me, but I will be satisfied, at least for now, if we can deal with this problem that Ohio is facing.
09:13Governor, is it technically an emergency right now?
09:16Do they really have until August 6th to pass an emergency bill?
09:22First of all, you know, I don't know anyone who thinks that there is a vote to pass an emergency measure.
09:29So we are really right up, I'm told.
09:32I talked to the Secretary of State today.
09:34I'm not going to quote him, but I did talk to him today.
09:38And my understanding is we are literally up against the wall here.
09:43That if we would go beyond Wednesday of next week, then when you do the math, you have some very, very serious, serious problems.
09:51So we're, you know, I've waited.
09:55I've been patient.
09:57And my patience has run out.
10:00And I think the patience of the people of the state of Ohio, their patience should have run out by now as well.
10:05It's an ongoing debate.
10:07It has obviously caught national headlines as well.
10:09What does this signal about the state of the legislature and the state of the Ohio government to the rest of the country?
10:15Well, I'm not going to comment on that, so.
10:19Anybody else?
10:21All right.
10:22Thank you all very much.
10:23Can we get an example now of the, I mean, you're advocating for real effort to put on this?
10:30Well, whether or not, I believe it has occurred.
10:33I believe there's evidence it's occurred.
10:35But whether or not it's occurred, again, I don't believe Ohioans feel that we should have four nationals, not citizens, not citizens of Ohio, who are spending money to try to influence Ohio voters.
10:54I just don't think Ohioans are in favor of that.
10:58I mean, you're going to want to assess this.
10:59But the reason I ask is because, repeatedly, the examples used in the legislature is Solicitor General A is throwing it into left-leaning group B in Washington.
11:10Washington group is giving it to Ohio issues.
11:13The money loses its identity because it's vulnerable.
11:17Look, this is the legislature.
11:20I'm calling them back.
11:22They can debate this.
11:24Those issues can be all the issues that you're bringing up here.
11:28Those certainly can be debated at that time.
11:31The main point is we need to give Ohio voters the opportunity to vote for either of the two major candidates that they want to vote for.
11:41And without action by the legislature or action by a court later on, that would not happen.
11:48Thank you.
11:49Thank you.