Ohioans case for $900M in unemployment briefed before Supreme Court

Audio By Carbonatix

(The Center Square) – The state continues to get help from a Columbus-based policy group in its effort to stop additional COVID-19 era unemployment funds from going to Ohioans.

The Buckeye Institute filed a brief with the Ohio Supreme Court after lower courts ruled the state must distribute $900 million in taxpayer funds allocated by Congress for relief to those who lost their jobs due to the pandemic.

The program offered an extra $300 per week to those unemployed between Dec. 27, 2020, and Sept. 6, 2021. Gov. Mike DeWine said the program was discouraging Ohioans from returning to work.

Twenty-four other states also opted out of the program.

Lawyers for The Buckeye Institute say state law does not require the governor to accept federal money.

“Ohio’s Cooperation Statute does not command that Gov. DeWine accept every federal dime offered,” said Jay R. Carson, senior litigator at The Buckeye Institute. “In Bowling v. DeWine, the Ohio Supreme Court has the opportunity to rein in the 10th District’s judicial overreach and end this judicial fiscal mandate.”

It’s the fourth brief from The Buckeye Institute in a case that has worked its way through the court system over the past few years.

The Supreme Court decided in November to take the case.

It’s the second time around for the lawsuit, which challenged Ohio’s Cooperation Statute that courts ruled required the governor to take all federal money offered.

The Supreme Court refused to hear the case the first time around after the Republican majority state Legislature changed the statute to clarify that the money does not have to be accepted.

However, the trial court and Ohio’s 10th District Court of Appeals ruled against the state following the change, saying the state must distribute the $900 million it refused to accept when it opted out of the Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation Program.