Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose has referred to county prosecutors 597 cases he said involved voters who were unlawfully registered to vote, going back to 2019. And, he said 138 of them voted within the past year. But, since 2019, county prosecutors have prosecuted only a small number of those referred.
The head of the lobby group representing county prosecutors said most of those cases identified by LaRose cannot be prosecuted.
Lou Tobin, executive director of the Ohio Prosecuting Attorneys Association, said there’s good reason why county prosecutors have acted on only a handful of the cases passed to them by LaRose.
“These are referrals that often lack minimal evidence necessary to pursue charges or pursue an indictment, let alone obtain a conviction," Tobin said.
Tobin said the referrals from LaRose's office often turn out to be nothing.
“Our experience with referrals from this secretary of state is that many of the cases he refers haven’t been properly investigated by his office or it is just a lead and when a prosecutor chases down the lead, it turns out that there’s nothing there," Tobin said.
Since LaRose took office in 2019, only a dozen of the hundreds of cases he has referred have resulted in enough evidence to bring charges.
Joe Mas, a Columbus attorney who has handled a few cases of immigrants who were prosecuted, said in most cases the problem isn't criminal intent.
“In none of the cases was it someone who was trying to get away with something," Mas said. "In every single case, it was a mistake or understanding."
Tobin said county prosecutors have a lot on their plates.
“We take exception to the idea that prosecutors are not doing their job," Tobin said. "I think the secretary of state just doesn’t like the outcome of our review and so now he is forum shopping by taking these cases to the attorney general.”
LaRose is taking another action to get prosecution
LaRose said there's plenty of evidence of wrongdoing in many of the cases he referred. And he said he thinks county prosecutors have not made possible cases of voter fraud a top priority.
“In many cases, it comes down to the fact that county prosecutors only have limited bandwidth and they have chosen to prioritize their time going after rapists and murderers and drug dealers," LaRose said.
LaRose said county prosecutors have had plenty of time to take action on cases so he is doing something he said Ohio law allows; he has referred voter irregularity cases to Attorney General Dave Yost. LaRose said that's allowable if action isn’t taken at the county level in a reasonable amount of time. And LaRose said some of these cases are years old and charges should have been brought by now.
LaRose said he believes there's another reason prosecutors may have been dragging their feet - political considerations.
“Some of these are delicate. They are involved with local candidates that run for office and maybe do something wrong with their petitions or what have you so there can be political sensitivities but that, to me, is not a concern. If you violate the law, you should face justice," LaRose said.
Can the attorney general prosecute these cases?
LaRose said possible voter crimes must be prosecuted though he admits cases of it are "extremely rare." There are eight million registered voters in Ohio. LaRose's office has raised questions about the validity of about 600 of them. But he said all cases of voter wrongdoing should be prosecuted.
There are questions about whether Yost's office has the legal ability to prosecute many of these cases that were referred to him because they involve possible illegal registrations, not wrongfully voting.
