The stage is set for a long-awaited House vote on SJR 2. The resolution would ask voters whether the threshold for amending the constitution should be 60% rather than a simple majority.
But lawmakers pushing the plan may not be celebrating yet. A parallel effort to send the question to voters before they consider an abortion rights amendment seems to have fallen short.
Supermajority amendment backers are now left to decide whether to accept half a loaf, or to try some last-minute maneuver to set up an August special election.
Speaking after the vote to place SJR 2 on the House calendar, the House speaker and the minority leader said they expected the latter. But it’s not clear what that gambit might look like, or if it would succeed.
Placing the 60% amendment on the ballot in August was never part of the plan. Lawmakers voted to get rid of those elections around the same time the first attempt at imposing a supermajority threshold fell apart. They only thought to revive August elections after the latest supermajority effort missed the deadline for the May primary.
Lawmakers pursued a May and then an August election to ensure an abortion rights amendment would have to clear a higher bar. But that argument didn’t move everyone in the Republican caucus.
Rep. Sharon Ray, R-Wadsworth, offered an amendment to SJR 2 stripping out reference to August elections.
“When we did away with August special elections last year after we put our precinct election officials...
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