Ohio Supreme Court Dismisses GOP's Voter Registration Challenge

The GOP's efforts to call into question votes by tens of thousands of Ohioans has failed before the all-Republican Ohio Supreme Court.

Here is what the Akron Beacon Journal reported in one of the more detailed newspaper accounts.

COLUMBUS: The Ohio Supreme Court today dismissed a lawsuit against the state's chief elections official over the handling of voter registration verifications after Republicans asked that it be tossed.

The move ends a court battle that had the potential to affect the ability of roughly 200,000 newly registered voters to cast a ballot in a crucial swing state. It had become a flash point for partisan accusations, with Democrats and voting rights groups accusing Republicans of trying to disenfranchise voters whose driver's license and Social Security numbers didn't match other government databases.

Republicans claimed Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, a Democrat, was trying to cover up fraud.

Ohio GOP Chairman Bob Bennett said he asked that GOP fundraiser David Myhal, who filed the suit, withdraw his claims so that the parties can work toward a solution outside of court.

''We didn't file this lawsuit, but I've asked that it be withdrawn in the interest of negotiating a solution out of court,'' Bennett said in a statement. ''The legal wrangling on this issue has gone on long enough.''

The GOP presented the same argument to the U.S. Supreme Court that Myhal was making before the Ohio Supreme Court. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled against the GOP last week because it said the party didn't have standing to bring the claim.

The basis for this and other GOP lawsuits is that Ohio is among a handful of states where there have been high "no match" rates when information on voter registrations forms is not the same as that person's Social Security or driver's license records. Republicans have contended that gap -- often the result of typos and data-entry errors -- should be enough to set those voters' ballots aside until the discrepancies can be verified.