BY JEFF SKINNER

Statewide – With the special election vote looming over the heartland, tensions are higher than ever, as everyone looks to see how Ohioans will vote on August 8. Their decision will have a significant impact on the November ballot initiative regarding abortion.

Issue 1 is not simply a left vs right issue either. Both sides are becoming increasingly divided and decentralized as the two parties attempt to galvanize their base into one camp or the other. The right has seen a number of grassroots initiatives slowly gain progress, such as the medical freedom initiative, which would be significantly impacted by the passing of Issue 1. Similarly, the left has long since championed the removal of money from politics despite the massive Vote No campaign being championed by deep pockets both out of state and out of country, seeking to change the landscape of Ohio indefinitely.

According to Mark Pukita though, the decision could not be clearer. Pukita is a former candidate for the Ohio senate and a strong supporter of Issue 1. While those who may be on the fence about Issue 1 are concerned about the increasing metrics for passing new amendments, according to Pukita, it’s simply increasing the threshold to what has been a historical marker regardless.

“I’m an engineer by degree and I am very analytical,” Pukita said. “There is a lot of emotion around this and I wanted to look at the details around citizen initiated proposals to amend state constitutions, not only Ohio. There are only 18 states that allow for citizen initiated constitutional amendment proposals and only 8 have a 50 percent unqualified threshold. I was interested in understanding the real statistics, I looked at ballotpedia on every citizen amendment since 1950 and found that the majority of them, I’d say 80 percent, passed or failed by more than 60 percent. Only a few fall in between such as a minimum wage increase and casino related issues. These were all things from out of state or big business kind of as groups.”

As with any political maneuvering, the real prize is never as straightforward as one issue. Though it is obvious the urgency to raise the amendment threshold comes down to the November abortion amendment, according to Pukita, that is just the start of foreign interest in domestic issues. Outside entities are already collecting signatures on ballot initiatives that will fundamentally alter the Ohio landscape for the future.

“They are already collecting signatures to go to Yost for removing qualified immunity for first responders,” Pukita said. “That is already in the works and then will come red flag laws, then freedom of speech laws and before you know it we are going to become California.”

According to Pukita, the constitution should form the bedrock for legislation withing a state or nation and bedrock should not be formed with something as malleable as clay. The current Ohio constitution offers a far lower threshold to change than even many blue states would permit and as such, has allowed for special interest groups of various kinds to add amendments which should truly be legislation instead.

“We literally have parcel numbers for where casinos can be located in our constitution, that is ridiculous,” Pukita said. “We are looking for an easy fix and the fix is not easy the fix is getting people motivated to understand civics and what’s going on. I see the risk of having our constitution hijacked by outside interests because of our low bar as more important than to be able to change the constitution with citizen generated initiatives.”

Ohioans will decide the future of the state constitution this Tuesday at the polls. The outcome of the vote will have drastic impacts on the future of the constitution.