Senate Race Centers On Voter ID Laws After Candidate Backed Judge Who Called Them ‘White Supremacy:’ REPORT

Ohio’s Senate race has become focused on voter ID policy as a former Democratic senator who voted to confirm a federal judge who reportedly linked such laws to “white supremacy” fights to reclaim his seat.

Former Democratic Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown, who is running for the seat again, supported Natasha Merle in a 2023 vote for a post with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, according to Fox News. Merle was confirmed by a margin of one vote. She had reportedly tied voter ID laws to “white supremacy” years before. (RELATED:Trump-Backed Senate Hopeful Was In Love With DEI — Until She Entered Politics)

Responding to the policies of President Donald Trump’s first term in a 2017 podcast appearance, Merle reportedly said that “it’s inconsistent to denounce White supremacy but not repudiate voter ID laws, to not repudiate the Muslim ban, to not repudiate ‘the wall,’” Fox reported.

“These are all things that support and are grounded in White supremacy. The voter ID bills disproportionately impact black and brown voters,” Merle continued, according to the outlet. “They disproportionately prevent black and Latino voters from voting. So you cannot say you are not for white supremacy and, at the same time, be for disenfranchising black and Latino voters.”

In 2020, Merle seemingly compared such voter ID laws to “dogs and whips” previously used on minorities to repress American minorities, according to a Washington and Lee University School of Law video. She claimed that states like Alabama, Texas and Florida had “created new barriers to make voting harder,” including voter ID laws, with the “implicit and sometimes explicit support of the Justice Department.”

Republican Ohio Sen. Jon Husted, who took the place of Vice President JD Vance, said he didn’t know much about Merle, but told Fox that she had held a “shocking, radical point of view.”

“I’ll just say this, when you look at the polling data, 60% to 70% of African American and Hispanic voters support the idea of voter ID,” Husted added, himself being a big advocate of voter ID laws.

Democratic opposition to today’s voter ID bill, the SAVE America Act, has previously relied on pointing to non-voter ID provisions within the bill as a reason not to support the bill at large.

WASHINGTON, DC – JANUARY 21: U.S. Sen. Jon Husted (R-OH), as his wife Tina Husted looks on, is ceremonially sworn in by Vice President JD Vance in the Old Senate Chamber at the U.S. Capitol on January 21, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)

However, Husted decided to test this by trying to pass a standalone voter ID bill through unanimous consent, which would have enacted a nationwide voter ID requirement, but Senate Democrats didn’t support the bill.

“I gave them a simple, clean, straightforward proposal, and then they blocked it, and then when we took it to a roll call vote, every single Democrat voted against it, thus proving that they were unwilling to put their words into action when given the choice,” Husted told Fox, and implied that the Democrats were “controlled” by the “radical left” to do so.

After the standoff, Brown decided to attack voter ID bills, referring to them as “unnecessary barriers that threaten the ability of hardworking Ohioans to vote early, mail in their ballots, or vote on Election Day.”

Husted told Fox that Brown and the Democrats had spent their time during the Biden administration letting in over 10 million people into this country, alleging that many of these illegal immigrants could get on the voter rolls without the necessary protection. (RELATED: Liberal Justices Baffled By Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Solo Dissent In ‘Textbook’ Free Speech Case)

As the Husted-Brown race draws closer and the SAVE America Act continues its debate in Congress, a September 2025 Fox poll found that 84% of registered voters were in favor of using a photo ID to prove citizenship before voting.

The Daily Caller reached out to Brown’s campaign for comment.