Vanessa Joy, who aspired to run for a seat in the state House, claimed she was unaware of the law requiring individuals to list their previous names on nomination petitions.
After failing to include her former name in campaign materials, a transgender woman was barred from running for the Ohio House of Representatives, raising concerns that other candidates might encounter similar challenges.
In a letter from the Stark County Board of Elections on Tuesday, real estate agent Vanessa Joy learned that she had been disqualified from running for state House in Ohio’s 50th District.
Ms. Joy had until Friday evening to file an appeal after the committee cited a state law mandating that anyone running for office list any name changes on the candidacy petition within five years of the election.
In an interview, Ms. Joy stated that she had appealed the board’s ruling and intended to challenge the regulation in court. She aims to be one of the first openly transgender elected officials in Ohio.
Using the term for a trans person’s birth name, she said, “I probably would have bit the bullet and put my deadname next to my legal name if I had known this law existed.”
She added that some transgender individuals have their birth names sealed out of concern for their safety and that “I would have done it because I care enough to get on the ballot, but this will be a significant barrier to entry.”
When Ms. Joy submitted the dozens of signatures required to secure a spot on the ballot, the state elections board did not express any concerns, and Ohio’s candidate guide made no mention of the law in her appeal letter.
Additionally, she claimed that the law had been “applied haphazardly.” The LGBTQ Victory Fund, a national organization that supports candidates from the LGBTQ community, reports that despite not including previous names in their election documents, at least two other transgender congressional candidates will run for office in Ohio this year. According to the organization, it was unclear whether those candidates had changed their names in the past five years.
42-year-old Ms. Joy was raised in a traditional Catholic home. After the death of her parents, who she said would have objected to her decision to transition, she came out as trans two years ago. She also left her job managing the family’s manufacturing business to become a photojournalist.
As Republicans have advanced a wave of legislation globally restricting trans people’s access to healthcare, limiting which public restrooms they can use, and influencing which youth sports teams they may play on, she said she chose to make her transition public on social media and in podcasts.
She stated, “I want to give other people my age the courage to transition or run because the Republicans have an absolute supermajority grip in Ohio.” “Maybe they’ll say, ‘Well, I can do it, too,’ if they can see a transgender woman running for office in conservative Ohio.”
The Ohio law, according to Rick Hasen, a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, who specializes in election rights, has a rationale.
He said, “The reason you’d want to know a candidate’s prior names is if they have something in their past that they were trying to hide, like a criminal history or some embarrassing incidents.” “Voters want to be able to vet backgrounds.”
However, according to Atiba Ellis, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, some laws that initially seemed balanced in the context of election rights had the unintended consequence of being exclusionary.
“This dismissal raises the possibility that this becomes a new method of exclusion in the anti-transgender climate in Ohio,” he said.
The Ohio secretary of state’s spokesperson, Melanie Amato, said that the office was aware of the requirement.
In an email, Ms. Amato stated that the law applies to everyone and that there is currently no discussion about amending it.
Sean Meloy, vice president of political programs for the LGBTQ Victory Fund, claims that a record number of trans individuals ran for office and were successful last year. He anticipates that trend to continue in 2024.
According to Mr. Meloy, it’s difficult to estimate how many states have laws similar to Ohio’s that might make it challenging for transgender candidates to run.
An LGBTQ Victory Fund compilation shows that there were no openly trans politicians in the U.S. in 2017. At least 14 trans people are serving in state legislatures this month.
