The Ohio Supreme Court has agreed to consider a motion seeking to invalidate the petition for the Right to Reproductive Freedom with Protections for Health & Safety that will add abortion production to Ohio's constitution.

The complaint, which lists Secretary of State Frank LaRose and the Ohio American Civil Liberties Union as respondents, alleges that the petition fails to comply with all the statutory requirements. 

Specifically, the two allege that since the amendment would repeal certain parts of Ohio's Human Rights and Heartbeat Protection Act if adopted and does not list said changes in its amendment, the petition should not be on the November ballot.

The complaint, which was filed Saturday, says the amendment would repeal several sections including:

-No person shall knowingly and purposefully perform or induce an abortion on a pregnant woman with the specific intent of causing or abetting the termination of the life of the unborn.

-A person who intends to perform or induce an abortion on a pregnant woman shall determine whether there is a detectable fetal heartbeat of the unborn human individual the pregnant woman is carrying.

-A person who knowingly and purposefully performs or induces an abortion before determining if there is a fetal heartbeat is guilty of performing or inducing abortion before determining whether there is a detectable fetal heartbeat, a felony of the fifth degree.

Both sides will have until July 31 at 4 p.m. to file initial responses to the complaint. Following that, the party that filed the complaint will be able to file evidence backing their claim by Aug. 1 and the respondents by Aug. 4. Then a brief reply can be filed by Aug. 7 by the party alleging the petition is invalid.

This timeline has raised concerns from both LaRose and the ACLU.

According to a response filed by LaRose on Saturday, the relators’ proposed schedule does not address any timeline for respondents to answer the
complaint, Additionally, the complaint raises issues that could have been raised long before July 28, which would have given more time for the respondents to adequately address the issues raised.

As a result of the delay in filing the complaint, both LaRose, Ohio Attorney General David Yost and the ACLU have proposed a timeline giving them more time to respond to the complaint. However, right now it is unclear if the court will approve these requests.