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Attorney General Mike DeWine
DeWine Rejects
Petition for Legalize Marijuana in Ohio Amendment
(COLUMBUS, Ohio)—Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine today rejected the
petition for the proposed Legalize Marijuana in Ohio amendment because
the summary of the petition was not “fair and truthful.”
On April 17th, the Ohio Attorney General’s Office received a written
petition to amend the Ohio Constitution by adding the Legalize
Marijuana in Ohio Amendment. Attorney General DeWine’s letter rejected
the summary for two reasons: 1) the summary incorrectly stated the
amount of tax distributed to the Municipal and Township Government
Stabilization Fund, and 2) the summary omits portions of the proposed
amendment, and those omissions prevent the summary from meeting the
fair and truthful standard. Specifically, the summary states that
amendment language only allows persons 21 years of age or older to
share marijuana accessories with other such persons, but the summary
omits amendment language noting the age limitation does not apply to
patients with proper medical certification.
“For these reasons, I am unable to certify the summary as a fair and
truthful statement of the proposed amendment,” DeWine stated in his
letter rejecting the petition. “However, I must caution that this is
not intended to be an exhaustive list of all defects in the submitted
summary.”
In order for a constitutional amendment to proceed, an initial petition
containing summary language of the amendment and 1,000 signatures from
Ohio registered voters must be submitted to the Ohio Attorney General.
Once the summary language and initial signatures are certified, the
Ohio Ballot Board would determine if the amendment contains a single
issue or multiple issues. The petitioners must then collect signatures
for each issue from registered voters in each of 44 of Ohio’s 88
counties, equal to 5 percent of the total vote cast in the county for
the office of governor at the last gubernatorial election. Total
signatures collected statewide must also equal 10 percent of the total
vote cast for the office of governor at the last gubernatorial election.
The full text of today’s letter and of the initiative petitions
submitted can be found at www.OhioAttorneyGeneral.gov/BallotInitiatives.
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