Ohio lawmakers put a constitutional amendment on the ballot in November to enshrine voter ID requirements.
Late in the evening on June 10, the Ohio General Assembly passed Senate Joint Resolution 10 (SJR 10), placing a proposed constitutional amendment on the November 2026 ballot. The resolution, which also had a companion measure in the Ohio House (House Joint Resolution 9), required approval by three-fifths of each chamber to advance to voters.
If passed in November, the amendment would enshrine Ohio’s existing voter photo ID requirement into the Ohio Constitution. Under current law (passed in 2022, taking effect in 2023), Ohioans must present a government-issued photo ID to vote in person. The proposed amendment would make that requirement permanent and constitutional, limiting the ability of future General Assemblies to modify or repeal the requirement.
Approval by a simple majority of voters would be required for the amendment to take effect.
Voter ID is already state law. There is no evidence of widespread voter fraud in Ohio. Yet lawmakers fast-tracked a constitutional amendment to permanently lock in voter ID requirements.
The Constitution should protect voting rights broadly, not lock in specific requirements that could prevent voter access down the road.
This isn’t about election security. It’s about who gets to participate in our democracy.
Why this matters:
There is no evidence of widespread voter fraud in Ohio, even prior to the photo ID law taking effect in 2023. This amendment is a solution to a problem that does not exist on this scale.
Embedding the requirement in the Constitution removes future flexibility for the legislature to respond to unintended consequences or access barriers.
The proposed amendment does not constitutionally guarantee free ID cards, despite existing state law providing for them. A future legislature could eliminate that access while the ID requirement remained constitutionally protected.
Critics from both the left and right have raised concerns about the resolution’s implications, suggesting this is not simply a partisan divide.
The timing of the resolution, fast-tracked in a midterm year following a call by the Republican gubernatorial candidate for this action, raises legitimate questions about its purpose. Republican leaders have denied it is intended as a turnout driver or “juicer,” but Democratic leaders and good government advocates have been direct in their skepticism.
At a House committee hearing, 78 individuals and organizations testified in opposition. Only one Ohio group and one individual (whose testimony was unrelated) testified in support.
The ACLU and other opponents have raised concerns that language in the resolution could be used to eventually restrict early voting or absentee voting, even as sponsors deny this intent.
College students and young voters without driver’s licenses are specifically disadvantaged, as student IDs are not accepted under the proposed amendment.