Graphic from "Fighting for Ohio Jobs" on Facebook

Following the lead of union front We Are Ohio, a number of other left-wing organizations are piling on with demands for permissive early in-person voting in the Buckeye State. Writing for Examiner.com, Steve Palm-Houser reported that on September 12 a “voting rights coalition” submitted 80,000 signatures calling for weekend voting hours.

“On Wednesday morning, members of ColorOfChange.org and allied organizations delivered over 80,000 petition signatures to the offices of Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, asking him to fully restore weekend voting hours in Ohio,” Palm-Houser wrote.

ColorOfChange, which “exists to strengthen Black America’s political voice,” is a national progressive organization founded by 9/11 Truther and self-described Communist Van Jones, President Obama’s former Green Jobs Czar.

Palm-Houser quoted Ohio Student Association representative Alwiyah Shariff, who said, “Husted is directly undermining the rights of students, senior citizens, and working people to vote.”

In a February 2012 People’s World story announcing the creation of the Ohio Student Association, a founder wrote, “We had formed a union for Ohio students!”

People’s World is the official website of Communist Party USA.

Palm-Houser listed several other groups involved in the ColorOfChange petition drive: MoveOn.org, Change.org, Ohio Organizing Collaborative, Fighting for Ohio Jobs, and Stand Up for Ohio.

Media Trackers readers will recognize the deceptive cosponsor inflation in this list, as the Ohio Organizing Collaborative is a left-wing lobbying group and Fighting for Ohio Jobs is merely an Ohio Organizing Collaborative campaign. Stand Up for Ohio is a union front.

Palm-Houser’s story also quoted Bob Ward, a pastor in the First English Lutheran Church. “Many members of my church are struggling with the trials of day-to-day life, and making voting more accessible by mandating weekend voting hours throughout the early voting period would lessen voter confusion and make their lives easier,” Ward said.

Ward identified himself as “a pastor in a community of color,” playing to the narrative from We Are Ohio and other progressive groups that suggests black Ohioans are incapable of voting on election day, by mail, or during the weeks of early in-person voting set by Secretary of State Husted’s schedule - which includes 11 days with in-person early voting after regular business hours.

Husted, a Republican, has been under fire for his opposition to in-person early voting hours scheduled on weekends. Husted has sought to impose a uniform early voting schedule statewide, writing an August 15 directive to that effect which he rescinded on September 7 in the face of a lawsuit from Obama for America and other Democrat groups.

The suit filed in federal court has been backed by liberals comparing a lack of early voting the weekend before the November 6 election to Jim Crow laws. This is a train of thought ColorOfChange, labor unions, and other progressive groups have climbed aboard while lobbying for Election Day to be replaced with Election Month.

Even by Husted’s supposedly oppressive schedule, early in-person voting in Ohio begins October 2. Husted has also provided for every registered voter in the state to receive an absentee ballot application by mail.

Support from leftist groups for expensive, community organizer-friendly early voting hours – and opposition to voter identification laws – has been widely documented in Ohio and elsewhere. Last year, Husted himself undercut an attempt by Republicans in the Ohio General Assembly to require voters to present photo ID.

Husted is nonetheless referred to today as the “secretary of suppression” by labor unions and other progressive groups demanding that elections be conducted on their terms.