Ohio Legislature Passes HB 272
The Ohio House passed HB 272 on September 1, mainly across party lines, which would prohibit churches from being closed during any future pandemic or state of emergency. The Ohio Senate passed this bill in the end of May, but it had set on the long lineup of backlogged bills of the Ohio House.
The bill states that it would, “expand the basis of a court’s exercise of personal jurisdiction to include any basis consistent with the Ohio Constitution and the United States Constitution, to prohibit a public official from ordering the closure of all places of worship in a geographic area, and to prohibit a public official from changing the time, place, or manner of conducting an election, except in certain circumstances.”
This would also prevent any improper election date scheduling, such as the Ohio primary which was instigated by the DeWine/Husted administration earlier this year.
HB 272 now goes to the Governor’s desk, where we are waiting to see if this bill will actually become law.