On October 31, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a final decision regarding an ongoing challenge against voting laws in Ohio. The challenge, brought by Cleveland attorney Subodh Chandra, proposed that certain voting law be relaxed to prevent provisional and absentee ballots from being thrown out over minor errors, such as the illegibility of cursive writing. Chandra claimed that because of these stringent rules, voters were disenfranchised from participating in the election process, especially in urban areas, whose boards of elections process higher volumes of these types of ballots.
The decision, which was issued in a just a one sentence statement, ultimately ruled against Chandra’s last-minute call to action. Ohio Secretary of State John Husted backs the decision, saying that rejected ballots due to information deficiencies have a minimal effect on election outcomes.
