DEMOCRACY & VOTING RIGHTS

OHIO LEGISLATIVE BLACK CAUCUS FOUNDATION
THE STATE OF BLACK CIVIC POWER IN OHIO (2026)
OLBCF's own analysis of Black political participation in Ohio, published as a Juneteenth special edition. Of the 1.04 million Black Ohioans eligible to vote, 603,000 did not cast a ballot in the 2022 midterm, which is 58 percent of the Black voting-eligible population. The brief maps where those non-voters live by region and by county. In a state where statewide races are decided by 5 to 8 points, they are the margin.

ALL VOTING IS LOCAL
THE UNCOUNTED BALLOTS OF 2024 (2025)
​All Voting Is Local examined provisional ballot rejections in Ohio's 2024 general election. It documents 34,364 rejected provisional ballots, up from 24,369 in 2020 despite lower turnout, with 7,053 thrown out for missing identification. The report ties the increase to HB 458, which narrowed acceptable ID and cut the window to fix an ID problem from ten days to four.

BRENNAN CENTER FOR JUSTICE
BLACK VOTERS STAND TO BENEFIT FROM REFORMED REDISTRICTING CRITERIA (2024)
A Brennan Center analysis testing whether the Citizens Not Politicians amendment's partisan fairness standard would weaken Black voting strength in Ohio. Across more than 5,000 simulated congressional maps, 452 met the amendment's standard, and in 282 of those the Black voting-age share of the Cleveland-based 11th District fell by less than one point. It answers the objection that fair maps cost Black representation.

BRENNAN CENTER FOR JUSTICE
OHIO'S GERRYMANDERED STATE HOUSE DISTRICTS LACK ELECTORAL COMPETITION (2024)
The Brennan Center measured competition across all 99 Ohio House districts under the maps drawn by the Ohio Redistricting Commission. About 9.1 million Ohioans, 77 percent of the state, live in districts where the general election outcome is not in doubt, and 15 districts had only one major-party candidate on the ballot. It quantifies how little general election leverage most Ohio voters hold.

ELECTORAL INNOVATION LAB
A CITIZEN'S GUIDE TO REDISTRICTING IN OHIO (2023)
A plain-language primer on how Ohio's 2015 and 2018 reform amendments were meant to work and why the Ohio Redistricting Commission kept producing maps the courts rejected. It documents that Republicans won 67 of 99 Ohio House seats, 67.7 percent, on 58.8 percent of the 2022 vote. It also sets out the commission's membership and the penalty for maps passed without bipartisan support.

TECHNOLOGY SCIENCE, HARVARD UNIVERSITY
VOTER REGISTRATION DROPS IN OHIO'S 90-DAY QUIET PERIOD (2025)
Latanya Sweeney of Harvard audited every Ohio voter registration cancelled inside the National Voter Registration Act's 90-day quiet period before the 2024 election. Of 109,119 removals, 14,539, or 13 percent, had no documented explanation, including 1,533 in Franklin County and 637 in Butler County. It gives legislators county-level evidence rather than advocacy claims.

VOTING RIGHTS LAB
2026 BATTLEGROUND REPORT (2026)
The Voting Rights Lab compares voting rules in seven states, Ohio among them, against the rules in place for the 2022 midterms. The Ohio section documents the removal of non-photo ID options, the limit of one ballot drop box per county at board offices during business hours, and a tenfold rise in mail ballots rejected for arriving late after the 2025 repeal of the postmark grace period.