My mom said both issues are expected to pass. And that yes, there has been quite a bit of dishonesty on the “no on 1” side.
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On the marijuana measure, Michigan has legalized recreational marijuana, so a lot of Ohioans are simply driving to Michigan for their weed. I half wonder if Michigan isn’t funding the “no” side in order to keep the tax revenue in Michigan.
But the fact that Michigan is presumably getting a lot of tax revenue from Ohioans crossing the border to buy weed (it’s a popular summer vacation spot for Ohioans, so they can just buy weed on vacation and bring it back even if they don’t live particularly close to the border) is certainly being used by the “yes” folks.
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13% counted in Ohio
Legal Abortion: 59% yes
Legal Marijuana: 56% yes
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Kentucky Governor: CNN just called it… the Democrat incumbent won (currently 52.8%)
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Mississippi is Alabama with less money - and Alabama voted Tommy Tuberville to the Senate purely because he was a Republican, despite all the times he demonstrated he was barely qualified to scoop shit out of a dog kennel at the local animal shelter.
I expect Reeves to win by a larger margin than he did in 2019 (+5.1%) for all the same reasons. [And yes, I recognize last time Reeves really won via Mississippi’s Electoral College - but even had the race been decided by popular vote, he still would have won.]
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CNN and ABC have both called the Ohio Issue 1 as a yes. (Legal abortion in the constitution.)
Mississippi governor the Republican is well ahead but not much counted.
VA Senate apparently being called for the Democrats.
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All of the other Kentucky races are running about 60% Republican / 40% Democrat or thereabouts, but Beshear (D) is at 52.8%.
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CNN projects Ohioans approved recreational marijuana.
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Michigan isn’t too worried about OH having legal weed, other than business owners near the border. It’s a hit to tax revenue, but there are other prohibition states that will still travel to Michigan, including Ohio since I’m going to call a bungled rollout meaning Michigan availability is just easier near the border for a while.
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Legal abortion and legal weed both passed in Ohio, by almost identical margins – 56.6% and 57%.
I expect it was mostly identical voters, people either voted Yes to both or voted No to both.
I also think the young people who don’t normally vote were moved to come to the polls because they cared about these issues. Some were stronger on 1 and others were stronger on 2, but the fact that they were both on the ballot helped both of them.
I doubt that this signals any change in Ohio votes on other issues. A year from now, these will be in the rear view mirror and Ohio will be electing Republicans. Ohio Republicans should be glad these issues were on the 2023 ballot instead of the 2024 ballot.
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True, that seems likely. My understanding is that this still leaves a lot up to the legislature, who largely does NOT want legal recreational weed.
If we’re going to talk about bungled weed rollouts, in FL, DeSantis is opposed to legal weed and has raised the cost for a license from 60k this year to 1.3M next year. The licenses fund a regulatory agency that has a surplus so aren’t necessary financially. And the state is predicting that raising fees by a factor of 20 will result in about 50% increase in revenue. I’m too lazy to do the math on what fraction of owners they are thus implicitly assuming will choose not to renew, but it’s high.
That’s interesting. Watching the returns coming in legal abortion had been at 59% and legal weed at 55% in the early counting. So clearly not all identical voters. In the early counting there were (at least) 4% who were yes on abortion / no on weed. But later on there must have been more yes on weed / no on abortion voters to cause it to even out.
For sure
Early voting, which skews Democratic, is included in the initial results. So having the margin increase over time suggests that voting yes on 1 was more popular among Democrats than 2, while 2 was more popular among Republicans. Which makes sense to me. Totally anecdotal, but I used to play an online game against a staunch Republican whose 3 political beliefs are unions are good, weed should be legal, and brown people are bad. One of those beliefs apparently is more important to him than the others.
Wow. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine opposes both legal abortion and legal weed and campaigned against both. He’s a hardcore conservative who (unusually) took Covid seriously and did a good job with Covid but is otherwise pretty far right. He was a big proponent of Ohio’s heartbeat bill.
Curious if he’ll resort to such extremes.
Republicans learning in Iowa that voters don’t always agree with culture wars.
About 51% of voters cast ballots against a measure to give City Hall officials oversight over the library’s actions and budget, according to unofficial results. The non-binding referendum reached the ballot after some residents petitioned the library board to remove a graphic novel about gender fluidity, mirroring a national debate driven by conservatives over what books taxpayer-funded libraries should carry.
Some residents tried to strip the board of its power after the library’s leaders rejected a request to remove or restrict access to “Gender Queer: A Memoir” in November 2021. Maia Kobabe’s 2019 graphic novel includes sexual images and explains how the author came to identify outside of the gender binary.
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Wanted to note that the following groups are the only ones from the linked poll with <50% support for reproductive rights:
- People aged 65+ (60% against)
- People aged 45+ (53% against - ages 40-49 were 36% against and 50-64 split exactly 50/50 so 65+ is skewing this)
- Never attended college (52% against)
- Republican (70% against)
- Conservative (77% against)
- Married women (51% against)
- White evangelicals (70% against; was 30% of those polled)
It’s encouraging that the physical demographic most opposed is the one that’ll stop being able to vote the soonest. And regardless one’s thoughts on white evangelicals being less common over time, it’s nice that their voice in this political decision is decidedly waning.
I’m sure that “married women” is being skewed by conservative Evangelicals being more likely to marry and less likely to divorce. Was still surprised it beat 50% opposition, but didn’t expect any lower than 40%.
It’s my prediction that rec weed will be widely available in Ohio in 3 years at best, perhaps 4-5. Within the first 2 years you’ll have the first places open their doors but it will only be in certain cities that quickly got their shit together for licensing.
Other towns will drag their feet with the licensing process. Ultimately, the hoops they set up will be too onerous for most small businesses, so the cannabis corporations like Skymint will franchise into those areas. Not that I despise places like Skymint, but they’re just a new generation of Phillip Morris.
I don’t know how long your governor has on his term, but he’ll also slowplay the rollout.
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