After a chaotic 24 hours, polls will be closed in Ohio for Tuesday’s primary.
Late Monday night, Ohio Health Director Dr. Amy Acton declared coronavirus a health emergency and ordered polls closed.
Good.
If I were Judge Frye, I would be issuing an order to show cause why Mike DeWine should not be held in contempt and egregiously sanctioned for representing to the court, roughly two hours before he suspended the election, that he needed a court order to suspend the election because he, the governor, did not have authority to suspend the election himself.
So far the governor has been doing a good job. Sadly this was a mess and has undermined his credibility. It should have been done last week.
Is that the ghost of Jeff Sessions on the left???
I am not commenting at all about this particular emergency. But I know fascists and I know the GOP.
“Emergency” is a word that can be used very creatively, and the finality of these kinds of decisions can leave people looking at the rear-view window in stunned amazement.
Counterpoint: Bad.
ETA: “A democracy, if you can keep it.” Mike DeWine just decided we shouldn’t.
Omg, you’re right!!! What the hell is Jeff Sessions doing in Ohio!!! 
There goes Democracy. Now that this has been allowed, there is nothing stopping a few Red States from fucking up the November elections if it looks like Trump is going to lose in a landslide.
Would just take one or two to cancel to have Trump declaring that the whole election is invalid, and he’ll have 5 supremes backing him.
This, 1000%. We now have precedent for lawlessly closing the polls. Think these assholes won’t use it in other circumstances, or on lesser pretexts?
So far, the only cancelled/postponed elections have been declared by Republican governors, correct?
Correct but the person in charge of the Dept of Health can declare an emergency and shut down the public spaces. DeWine is then obligated to enforce that even though I’m sure he told her to.
This is a big pile of dog shit we are all standing in and the GOP is not to be trusted.
I think DeWines actions are honorable at this moment.
Sometimes saving lives takes precedence over following the correct legal procedure. The middle (or rather, the beginning) of a massive public health crisis is one of those times.
We have a fascist in the WH with 16,000+ lies to his credit, who stole the 2016 election and will steal this one if we do not stop him. And has already declared a Bogus “Emergency” …
Bad backdrop for Edicts-From-The-Top
New York has proposed, but I don’t believe they’ve actually acted on it, yet.
It’s not cancelled, just delayed.
Louisiana’s (Bel Edwards-D) is postponed until June.
1944, we held an election. Right around the Battle of the Bulge.
Surely saving lives was more important than having that election, right?
Oh, please. We don’t have a democracy anymore if, on a whim, the people in power can unilaterally decide to stay in power.
I’m no expert on Ohio law, but the tiebreaker between “Dept of Health” and “Our Goddamned Democracy” should probably go to Our Goddamned Democracy.
No, the hell with that. His fascist ass told a court yesterday that he had no authority to shut it down. If he subsequently told her to shut it down – and let’s be real, he did – he needs to be sanctioned egregiously by that court.
More info:
Bipartisan agreement on the Supreme Court. Judges with conflicts recused.