Ohio Law Forces Transgender Candidate to Use Deadname When Voting

Ari Faber has been living as a man for nine years. But because of a state law, Mr. Faber, a Democratic candidate for the Ohio Senate, will appear on the ballots with a woman's name during the March primary.

The law, passed in 1995 to prevent deception, requires candidates who have changed names in the past five years to list their previous names on election petitions. It has become an obstacle for Mr. Faber, who has not legally changed his name, and the three other transgender people seeking a seat in the Ohio Legislature this year.

One candidate was disqualified for failing to do so; another saw her campaign challenged; a third campaign faced a disqualification hearing; and Mr. Faber was ordered to operate under his deadname, a term transgender people use for a birth name they no longer use.

The uneven application of the law in four counties comes as Ohio joins other states with Republican-controlled legislatures in restricting transgender people's access to what is known as gender-affirming care, while barring them from sports teams and public restrooms that match with their gender identity.

The confusion over Ohio's naming law also reflects how transgender people across the country are struggling to adapt to systems that have not accounted for their existence.

It has also created uncertainty. The candidates whose campaigns are allowed to proceed fear that a different interpretation of the law later in the race could result in a disqualification or removal from office if they are elected.

Mr. Faber, 29, said the Belmont County Board of Elections told him to run as Iva Faber, the name he was given at birth but which he stopped using when he came out as transgender in 2016 as student at Ohio University.

“I'm a little concerned that supporters might be confused when they see my dead name on the ballot,” Mr. Faber said. “It's frustrating because it feels like Iva is a completely different person than I am now.”

Mr. Faber, the outreach director of an interfaith nonprofit in Athens, Ohio, said he had run print ads as Iva (Ari) Faber, but his campaign emphasized his last name. (Although Mr. Faber is running unopposed in the primary, he will most likely face State Senator Brian Chavez, who is running unopposed in the Republican primary, in the general election.)

Ohio's names rule does not appear in Ohio's 33-page candidate guide. All four candidates said they were not aware of it when they submitted their petitions for certification, noting that there was no room in the petitions to include additional names.

Mr. Faber said he learned of the rule in January after it was cited in the disqualification of another transgender candidate from a House race elsewhere in the state.

That candidate, Vanessa Joy, a real estate photographer in Stark County, Ohio, was disqualified as a Democrat for a seat in the state House of Representatives after filing petitions without her first name on them.

Ms. Joy appealed the disqualification to the Stark County Board of Elections, and lost. She said she is still working to get the law changed, out of concern that if one of the transgender candidates were to win in the November election, they could be prevented from taking a seat because of the law. It states that a person elected under a changed name who has not disclosed his former name will be suspended from office.

The names rule was one of more than 50 provisions introduced in 1995 as part of an overhaul of state elections.

“The intent was simply that candidates cannot simply change their name to conceal a prior identity,” said Don Mottley, a former Republican member of the Ohio House of Representatives and co-sponsor of the bill.

“I had absolutely no idea in my mind about being with someone who was transgender because that wasn't really on anyone's radar at the time,” he said.

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose, who is running for U.S. Senate as a Republican, has said the law applies to any candidate and there are no plans to change it.

But Ms Joy called the law “a barrier to entry” and said transgender people often have their name change details sealed for fear of harassment or violence.

“Society hates us so much that people find every possible way to attack us and threaten our lives,” she said.

After Ms. Joy was disqualified, she said, a local newspaper published her birth name. Then a blogger published nude photos of her and other personal information, including a bankruptcy filing under her birth name, sparking an onslaught of harassment on social media.

She argues that the law, which already has an exception for marriage, should also provide an exception for those who fear that disclosing previous names would make them vulnerable to violence.

Atiba Ellis, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, said the law seemed like a “neutral requirement” but that “selective enforcement of this law could be a bludgeon.”

The voting name issue arose amid intense debate over transgender rights in Ohio. In December, the House of Representatives passed a bill to ban minors from using puberty blockers, hormone therapy or gender transition surgery, and to require schools and colleges to separate students and athletes based on sex at birth.

Mr. Faber traveled to the Statehouse in Columbus to protest the bill, joining about 500 others in submitting testimony against it.

In December, Governor Mike DeWine, a Republican who has sometimes been at odds with his party on transgender issues, vetoed the bill.

But as Republican leaders in the House of Representatives and the Senate began lining up votes to override the veto, which they accomplished in January, Mr. DeWine appeared to reverse course: issuing an executive order which bans gender transition surgeries for minors in the state.

Following Ms. Joy's disqualification from the House race, said Mr. DeWine he agreed that the law regarding previous names should be changed so that transgender candidates are not barred from elections for keeping their dead names off the campaign trail.

Ms. Joy's disqualification prompted reviews of the three other transgender candidates certified to run for state office this year.

Arienne Childrey, the founder of the Northwest Ohio Trans Advocacy, is running as a Democrat for a seat in the Ohio House. She wanted to challenge Rep. Angela King, a Republican from Celina, Ohio, who sponsored a bill that would criminalize drag shows outside adult entertainment venues.

In September, Ms. Childrey, 41, led a protest against the bill on the lawn of the county courthouse.

In January, following news of Ms. Joy's disqualification, the chairman of the county Republican Party challenged Ms. Childrey's candidacy based on the name rule. But the Mercer County Board of Elections decided that as a Republican he was not a voter and therefore could not mount a challenge.

Ms Childrey said she doubts the challenge is over.

“Given the nature of politics in the state of Ohio,” she said, “I would argue that it's almost guaranteed that if we won, they would try to refuse to seat us.”

In Montgomery County in southwestern Ohio, Bobbie Brooke Arnold, an independent contractor who ran for the state House as a Democrat, also faced a challenge after Ms. Joy's disqualification.

Ms. Arnold said voters in West Alexandria, Ohio, the town of 1,320 where she lives, and in surrounding Preble County, where she helped organize the election, the province's first-ever pride event learned last May that she is transgender.

The county elections board director determined that Ms. Arnold had not “misled” voters when she omitted her previous name from the petitions, and ruled that she could appear on the ballot with her chosen name.

“I have been incredibly vocal about my trans identity,” Ms. Arnold said, “about who I am.”