Elections board deadlocks in dispute over Ohio congresswoman’s residency

By The Associated Press

FILE - Rep.-elect Emilia Sykes, D-Ohio, joins other newly-elected members of the House of Representatives as they arrive at the Capitol for an orientation program in Washington, Nov. 14, 2022. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)[ASSOCIATED PRESS/J. Scott Applewhite]

AKRON, Ohio (AP) — A county elections board deadlocked Thursday about whether a Democratic member of Congress from Ohio resides in her Akron district, sending the matter before the state’s Republican secretary of state to break the tie.

U.S. Rep. Emilia Sykes described the challenge to her residency, brought by a Republican political activist, as “a deeply offensive lie,” and proceeded to cast her early vote after the hearing and to encourage others to do the same. She faces GOP nominee Kevin Coughlin in the Nov. 5 election, a contest considered among the nation’s tightest House races.

Both of the Democrats on the Summit County Board of Elections voted against the challenge while the the two Republicans supported it. The case does not affect Sykes’ candidacy and board members seemed to agree that nothing currently was stopping Sykes from legally voting for herself in Akron.

Sykes, a first-term member of Congress, did not attend the meeting but submitted a three-page affidavit. She says she has lived on North Howard Street in Akron for 11 years, her driver’s license lists that address, her congressional pay stubs are addressed to her there, she attends church nearby and she usually returns to that property when not in Washington, D.C.

The dispute centers around a form filled out earlier this year by her husband, Kevin Boyce, that said she was part of his household in Columbus. He is an elected member of the Franklin County Board of Commissioners in Columbus, which is about 130 miles (209 kilometers) southwest of Akron.

Boyce in late September told the Summit Board of Elections that Sykes does not, in fact, reside with him in Franklin County.

“There’s nothing wrong with that, for spouses to have different residences,” her lawyer, Don McTigue, argued to the elections board Thursday. “I hope that we’re well past the day when we are going to make assumptions that a woman’s residence is where her husband lives, or vice versa.”

The Republicans and the Democrats on the board each have two weeks to send a letter about the matter to Secretary of State Frank LaRose, so the dispute almost certainly will not be resolved before the election.