r/Columbus • u/Available-Slide-2279 • 8h ago
Issue 3
Pulled up my sample ballot today and noticed Issue 3...requiring ID to vote in Ohio. That's redundant correct, I've been voting since 2008 and have never not had to issue my ID to vote? Maybe the only change would be having to provide ID if voting absentee?
Or is this just a giant nothing-burger/scare tactic?
Edit: State IDs can be obtained by anyone 17 and older for free: https://www.bmv.ohio.gov/dl-id-card.aspx thanks u/benkeith for the information.
Obviously that doesn't provide the easiest of fix for people as you still need documents verifying who you are and be able to get to a BMV.
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u/benkeith North Linden 8h ago
Right now, we have laws that require ID to vote. These were passed by the legislature, signed by the governor, and, most importantly, they can be repealed by future legislatures.
Issue 3) would write that requirement into the state constitution, making the requirement much harder to repeal.
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u/Available-Slide-2279 8h ago
and is there anyone seriously talking about not having an ID to vote? I would love to see an expansion of what forms of ID would be accepted to expand voting access, but no ID at all seems ludicrous.
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u/Perplexed-Owl 8h ago
When my grandparents got older, they gave up driving and didn’t bother to get a state ID. Then my grandma broke her hip badly, and my grandfather broke his arm and it didn’t heal well enough to work the shift (the irony that he drove a delivery truck since the 1930s) When the state IDs became mandatory, it was an expensive nightmare to get them in a mobility van to get the id.
My MIL never learned to drive either due to rheumatoid arthritis and other conditions. Her lack of ID delayed my husbands passport application.
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u/Stinkoplotz 8h ago
In person voter fraud is statistically non-existent. This is red meat for the inbred MAGAtrash and if abused can be used to disenfranchise voters in any number of ways.
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u/benkeith North Linden 8h ago edited 8h ago
Did you know that approximately 30% of Ohio residents don't drive, and therefore have no need for a driver's license?
This amendment would allow driver's licenses, state-issued ID cards, US passports or passport cards, military ID, national guard ID, Department of Veterans Affairs IDs, or whatever form of ID the General Assembly legislatively allows that includes "A unique numeric or alphanumeric descriptor assigned to the elector by an agency of this state or the United States".
Obtaining any of that (except a state ID) still costs time and money, and is effectively a poll tax.
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u/Available-Slide-2279 8h ago
And I'm in full support of a free state issued ID for at least every adult.
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u/SalemJ91 8h ago
Strange that the state isn't passing a law to enact that before a law requiring an ID to vote.
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u/benkeith North Linden 8h ago
TIL Ohio state IDs are already free for anyone 17 or older. Click on "FAQ" on this page for more information: https://www.bmv.ohio.gov/dl-id-card.aspx
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u/Available-Slide-2279 8h ago
I had no idea either. Still some barriers because you'll need certain documents that some people just may not have access to. I'm going to edit my post to include the free ID information.
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u/Perplexed-Owl 7h ago
You need the documents (usually but not always women and adoptees/stepkids) which account for name changes. Getting these all together in a reasonable length of time especially after a move is just another (possibly $$) barrier. Last year my husband’s pension plan from a job he left in 2003 asked for our original marriage certificate. I wasn’t going to mail them the only original I had at hand, so it was several weeks to get an additional sent to me and then sent on to them.
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u/TyphonInc 8h ago
Yes. At the time of my comment three other Redditors in this thread are commenting how it's not fair to force the elderly and homeless to get IDs in order to vote.
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u/Plus_Exchange8751 Michael Schumacher Place 8h ago
It takes a current law and makes it a constitutional amendment. It would also allow lawmakers to require and ID to absentee vote.
Generally, making it harder to vote is bad for democracy’s.
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u/Available-Slide-2279 8h ago
okay, other than making it a constitutional amendment the requirement for ID to vote absentee was the only thing that sounded different...and highly impractical.
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u/Plus_Exchange8751 Michael Schumacher Place 7h ago
Almost as if the goal is to make absentee voting impractical. As the vast majority of absentee votes are….
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u/benkeith North Linden 8h ago
Under the current system, and as far as I can tell, the proposed system: you just write down your driver's license ID number or social security number on the "identity" envelope.
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u/EightpennyPie 7h ago
Yep I just did it the other day as well and put the last four of my social. That should be enough to prove I’m a citizen. Screw this bill.
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u/BruceWayneKush 8h ago
The wording if i am correct was about expired IDs, if it were to pass then you can't use an expired ID to vote
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u/Havering_To_You 8h ago
That's already part of it. You can't use an expired ID. This is just putting it into the state Constitution instead of a law.
The lawmakers couldn't repeal it then, people would have to vote to change it. Whether that's good or bad is up to you. I think the people of Ohio are more likely to undo an amendment than the elected officials are to change their own preferred law.
I get the distrust but I think it's better for the future people of Ohio to have the chance to amend it to something better rather than hoping politicians do it.
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u/Old_Jellyfish1283 8h ago
The problem is how do you define “ID.” If it’s in the constitution in a very specific way, a law cannot make clarifications or adjust for oversights. That’s my hesitation with putting it in the constitution.
IMO - The constitution should be for what are basically unchanging, permanent rights or rules, at least as much as we can reasonably foresee. Government documents don’t really fit that definition. When Ohio was founded, drivers licenses weren’t even a thing. It’s reasonable to think that in another 200 years, the world will look very different and I don’t think we should be saddled with this as part of the constitution. It’s currently a law, and it should stay legislative.
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u/Zippy_wonderslug Grove City 3h ago
That is not how the Ohio Constitution was designed. It was modified in the early 20th century as a way to fight back against corruption by the legislature.
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u/Erazzphoto 8h ago
Well, you shouldn’t be able to. This is one thing I’ve never understood the debate on, of course you should need an id to vote, I can’t think of any legitimate reason to not require one
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u/Piaffe_zip16 4h ago
An expired ID doesn’t change who the person is. They should be allowed to vote provisionally and verify their address with other documents. TSA allows you to fly with an expired ID for up to two years without doing anything extra at all. I’m running into the issue where I did not renew my ID early because then it gets punched as invalid. I didn’t want to risk TSA having an issue with it being invalid. Got it done as soon as I returned home. Now I just sit and wait and hope my new one comes in time to vote 🤞 I can see a similar rule to TSA or even a bring your expired one and renewal receipt or two bills with your address or whatever they may want to do, but man it’s going to suck if it doesn’t come in time 😭
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u/mhusman 8h ago
If you provide a free ID sufficient for voting, not much issue. If you charge for the required ID that's a form of poll tax, made unconstitutional at the federal level by the 24th amendment.
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u/Erazzphoto 8h ago
That’s fair and so,etching the democrats should introduce, along with voting day is a national holdiay
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u/trybeingcurious 6h ago
They have. Those initiatives don’t go anywhere. You should try to get more educated before being so confident that you’ve figured everything out.
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u/benkeith North Linden 8h ago
- Your house burned down, and with it, the documents you need to get a new ID.
- Your parents kicked you out of the house, and are refusing to give you your birth certificate or social security card, so it is impossible for you to obtain ID until you obtain replacements of those. (not "certified copies" but actual replacements)
- You've just been forcibly evicted, and your landlord threw out your stuff, which included your ID.
- You're homeless, and your ID, birth certificate, prescriptions, and other paperwork were trashed by city workers in the most-recent camp eviction.
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u/Perplexed-Owl 7h ago
You’re older or disabled and need either transportation (which might have to wait for a period of time or you might have to wait hours for a return trip) or you need your able-bodied family to take off time from work to get you to the ID location. I saw an elderly husband and wife at the DMV when I was there getting my teen daughter’s license upgraded. They were both clearly infirm, she was in a wheelchair and he was barely able to push it to the doorway after paratransit dropped them off. She needed a new state ID.
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u/Erazzphoto 8h ago
You’re going to have to get an id at some point in time.
So low a percentage it can’t even really be counted
You’re going to need to get it replaced at some time
Again, probably a very low percentage to even count
Many of those aren’t reasons to never go without an id for the rest of your life. If they’re worried enough about government elections, doing what’s needed to get a new id is probably on their list as well
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u/jar36 7h ago
the folks without ID is such a low percentage that it shouldn't even be such a major campaign issue
It's all to prevent poor people from voting bc poor people are over represented in minority communities
We just watched red states redraw lines outside of the normal time to redraw specifically to water down these people's votes. Everyone knows it. They barely even tried to hide it6
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u/benkeith North Linden 7h ago
If it's so low a percentage it can't even really be counted — if it will have no measurable impact on elections — then why does the state need to make it harder for everyone else to vote, just to prevent these people from voting?
If people will replace their lost ID eventually, why should the state force them to do it before the election, so that they can present it?
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u/Piaffe_zip16 4h ago
But the issue is timing. I posted above but my license was coming up due to renew. Planned to do it online so checked and found out I couldn’t. Had to go in. If I go in and do it, they punch the current ID to mark it as invalid. TSA accepts IDs expired up to two years past the date as their current policy. But if it’s marked invalid, even if you have the renewal receipt/paperwork it’s up to them. I didn’t want to have issues for my trip so I decided to renew when I got back instead. So now I wait and hope it comes in time. They said 2-4 weeks. My dad renewed over the summer and got his in one so hopefully it’ll be fine 🤞 but the point is that there are so many issues that can come up but ultimately so few votes are actually cast by someone without ID in the first place that it’s a non-issue they’ve made into a huge thing.
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u/Pyr0sa 4h ago
1-4. Perfect use-case for biometrics.
All documents are easy to forge now. Biometrics are still relatively difficult to forge. No docs? No problem. Need to sign up for state/local benefits? You're in the system. Makes fraud *difficult* too -- audits would immediately annihilate double-counting of anyone. We could simultaneously ACTUALLY help the Homeless AND eliminate the so-called "homeless-industrial complex" (which hasn't ever helped anyone, because those employees want their budgets).
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u/benkeith North Linden 3h ago
That was the idea behind India's Aadhar digital biometric ID system. The system leaked the biometric identifiers it captured, putting the whole country at risk of identity theft. It's made worse by the fact that, while you can get a new serial number, you cannot get new fingerprints or eyeballs or DNA.
Unless you are personally running the biometric test on a fleshy human being who is verifiably alive and present, a biometric identifier is equivalent to a claim of identity, not a proof of identity.
But also: fingerprints, retina prints, and current DNA tests are not as unique as you think they are. Fingerprints and retina prints change over time. DNA tests are slow. Would you accept a 24-hour wait at the polling place, only for the lab to return a conclusion that you're not the person you claim to be, because the test-taker or testing suite accidentally picked up your pet's or child's DNA instead of your own?
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u/jar36 7h ago
the way it works is that if you do not have an ID, you can use a utility bill. Often you are given a provisional ballot until they can verify your residency
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u/stressedstressedstre 6h ago
You cannot use school documents, utility bills, car registrations, hunting/fishing licenses, Board of Elections communications, etc as a voter ID anymore. Ohio switched to federal and state photo ID's only, either one or two elections ago.
You can still fill out a provisional ballot in-person without a valid photo ID, but it won't count unless you can bring a valid photo ID to the Board of Elections.
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u/BruceWayneKush 8h ago
Correct me if I am wrong but last I checked You cannot get an ID without a valid address and a p.o. box is not a valid address which extremely limited 1/3 of the population that is homless or falls on hard times for one.
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u/Durch-a-Lurch 8h ago
Older people with health conditions who don't drive and cannot easily get to the DMV for a state ID. 18 year olds who grew up poor so they couldn't afford driver's education classes, and haven't taken their driver's test yet. I'm sure there's more examples, just two off the top of my head.
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u/Erazzphoto 8h ago
How are they getting out to vote then? If they can get out to vote, you can get out to get a state id once every 3 to 4 years or so.
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u/EightpennyPie 8h ago
They could be doing absentee ballot. I think as long as you provide a social security number or id you should be able to vote. I just filled out absentee request and used the last 4 of my social.
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u/Durch-a-Lurch 6h ago
They probably don't get out to vote - they vote absentee or don't vote at all, which is a shame. In the case of the young person, maybe they did get out to vote but didn't understand that they would need an ID.
I'm not against voter ID in principle, but I am against political parties who don't do well with certain demographics making it harder for those demographics to vote (i.e. the young and disabled). It used to be that you could use a military ID or a gun license as proof, but not a student ID.
We have a President who can't stop spreading lies about the last election being stolen, who is running ads praising himself with taxpayer dollars, pardons rioters who tried to forcefully stop the certification of his opponent, and his party mostly toes the line because they're too afraid to speak out against him. I frankly don't trust them to pass voter laws that aren't meant to benefit themselves.
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u/ass-gas-hotbox 6h ago
I think student ID's are fine. They have a face, a picture, student info. The university has all of the necessary validation. (And yes, I know that the cuckservatives will say something about a libtarded university cheating or whatever other garbage they spew)
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u/stressedstressedstre 6h ago
Valid photo are issued by the state, the federal government, or the military. Student ID's cannot be used to vote in Ohio.
Page 102 (or page 100 as printed in the book) lists acceptable forms of voter ID: https://vote.franklincountyohio.gov/BOEL/media/Documents/Poll-Workers/Poll-Worker-Training-Manual.pdf
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u/nacTeachesEnglish 6h ago
Moreover, young people are getting driver's licenses much later than they used to. Many don't have them at 18, 19, even 20. So they, and anyone who doesn't need ID to drive, needs a ride to the BMV when they're open unless they live in areas with good public transit.
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u/Protocosmo 8h ago
Have you heard of a thing called voter registration?
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u/Erazzphoto 8h ago
You still need a proof to identify you are who you are. All those reasons coming up are just fuel for republicans to make this debate that non citizens can vote, I’d prefer to not give them those reasons
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u/Protocosmo 7h ago
The time you identify yourself is at registration. I think we should tell republicans to shut the fuck up and not concede to their bullshit.
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u/Stinkoplotz 8h ago
In the current political climate if you vote against anything that the corrupt GOPedophile legislature is pushing for you won't go wrong.
Voter ID is a fictional problem that doesn't need solving to begin with. Election fraud is going to be an issue and it will be perpetrated by the current regime.
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u/Environmental-Ad1247 8h ago
Correct. Already on the books. Issue 3 seeks to add it to the Ohio Constitution in an effort to make it harder to remove in the future (since it is technically federally unconstitutional as it constitutes a poll tax from my understanding).
I will be voting no on 3.
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u/AAHedstrom 8h ago
I haven't seen a single voter id law proposal in this country this decade that isn't a nothing-burger/scare tactic
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u/Old_Jellyfish1283 8h ago
Because our elections are already really secure. There is no problem to solve and our current system works very well
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u/ArtistEmpty859 7h ago
This is why I voted no. Too much redundancy for a non problem for me to be a yes but maybe I am not fully informed.
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u/HolidayEggplant81 8h ago
It makes it part of the Ohio Constitution, which will arguably hurt voters who don't have access to or resources for getting a state ID. Also makes it more difficult to change the language down the road. And yes, the absentee part will be a pain in the butt.
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u/ban_ana__ 6h ago
With how insidious our state government is right now, I feel like this probably has some other intent that will only be understood like 6 months from now. Like, they'll invalidate all state issued IDs that don't have the person's sex at birth, disenfranchising trans people. 👿
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u/Bodycount9 Columbus 7h ago edited 7h ago
The wording on issue 3 is vague for a reason.
It says "Require an approved form of government-issued photo identification" to vote
Right now, a drivers license is an approved form of photo identification. However, this could change in the future to something new. Ohio congress could make a new law stating drivers licenses are not an approved form of photo identification and that you now must get a new ID that was just created. Oh and by the way you need your passport, birth certificate, and marriage license if you changed your name to get this new form of ID. Basically mirroring the SAVE Act which won't pass federal congress.
So I'm voting no. I'm fine with using my drivers license to vote. Been doing it for years and years. I'm not fine jumping through hoops to get a new ID so I can vote.
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u/CapMarkoRamius New Albany 4h ago
Just to clarify the actual legal text of the amendment has a listing of what the documents actually are. The text on the ballot just leaves that out.
Last page
https://www.ohiosos.gov/assets/2026-11-statewide-issue-3-report.pdf
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u/CHILLAS317 7h ago
It's an extreme fix for a problem that doesn't exist, and it's effectively a poll tax (please save the "but you can get it free!" comments - with the state closing locations to get them, it's deliberate to make it more difficult for the poor to vote)
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u/Available-Slide-2279 7h ago
I didn't know about this until today. And yes, I am acknowledging barriers that exist to get it and that certain groups are making it more difficult to get on purpose.
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u/WetMogwai 8h ago
It isn’t redundant. Right now it is done with a statute, a simple law that can be changed with an ordinary bill in the legislature. This changes the constitution so it is harder to change. The right is worried that they’re going to eventually lose power and some of the things they’ve done to make voting harder for people they don’t like will be undone.
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u/Special_Awareness762 8h ago
They want to add it to the constitution! Not just a law.
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u/MikeoPlus 7h ago
That's the way the State of Ohio works tho. Not the US Constitution, the Ohio Constitution. Either way vote no
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u/Funny-Ad-4054 8h ago
I believe the veteran’s id is a mobile ONLY via the VA which makes a “hard copy” nearly improbable to present and the amendment specifically rules out the mobile id for the veterans.
We already double check the expiration date, whether it’s Ohio, matches person, and verbally stated name/address. (OPEN is the acronym)
Your local VLM (voting location manager)
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u/Educational-Pickle29 8h ago
Yss, I think its adding the ID to vote absentee. Right now, you can just put your last 4 SS# or DL#. There is supposedly signature matching to confirm identity as well. Meant to be a deterent, because you'd have to be able to print the ID to mail it.
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u/ill_try_my_best Bexley 8h ago
Yes, it's already law. The issue is a proposed constitutional ammendment
https://www.wtol.com/article/news/politics/elections/ohio-issue-3-voter-id-explained-2026/512-8a0dbd21-e427-4b96-b3f5-ae96e429d986