Report: Ohio Issue 1 campaign mainly fueled by out-of-state spending

Proponents of Issue 1, a proposed amendment to the Ohio state constitution raising the threshold for citizen-led ballot measures to 60%, have claimed their effort will prevent “out-of-state special interests” from corrupting local elections. But according to an analysis by the Ohio Capital Journal, the “yes” campaign committee, Protect Our Constitution, has received a majority of its funding from out-of-state special interests.

Capital Journal’s Nick Evans:

The yes campaign committee, Protect Our Constitution, raised a little more than $4.85 million according to its filing. Nearly all of it came from a single individual who lives out of state.

Illinois billionaire Richard Uihlein donated a total of $4 million to the committee. The right-wing megadonor owns the Uline shipping and office supply company, and his grandfather and great-grandfather ran Schlitz brewing.

The largest contributions aside from Uihlein were $100,000 each from a PAC solely funded by the Ohio Chamber of Commerce, and another connected with Ohio nursing homes. Other substantial contributions came in from Washington, D.C., Georgia and Tennessee. But less than $700,000, or just 14% of the total, came from Ohio donors.

The Ohio Capital Journal also notes that the “One Person One Vote” campaign, the “no” committee, has raised funding from outside Ohio:

The filing doesn’t show anyone giving quite as much as Uihlein did in terms of dollar amount or percentage of the total. Still, the campaign did attract some pretty big fish. Karla Jurvetson, a Silicon Valley psychiatrist and philanthropist, cut checks totaling about $1.1 million.

Election Day for Issue 1 is on Tuesday, Aug. 8. Early voting has already begun.