Leader Isaacsohn, Ranking Member Sweeney: GOP Budget Chooses the Wealthiest Few Over Ohio's Kids, Seniors, and Working Families

COLUMBUS – House Minority Leader Dani Isaacsohn (D-Cincinnati) and House Finance Committee Ranking Member Bride Rose Sweeney (D-Westlake) today voted “NO” on House Bill (HB) 96, the Republican-crafted state operating budget, citing cruel and chaotic cuts and its abject failure to invest in children, public education, healthcare and basic services – all while shoveling billions to the wealthy and well-connected. 

“Budgets are about choices. This GOP budget chose to benefit the wealthy few while ignoring the real relief struggling families need with high property taxes, skyrocketing childcare costs, or access to affordable healthcare,” said Leader Isaacsohn. “At a time where our public officials are failing to protect Ohioans, this budget is another excuse to push culture wars, reward huge donors, and abandon our children. This budget isn’t just fiscally unsound–it's a failure of leadership. People deserve better.”

"This legislature had both the power and the funds necessary to fully fund public schools, to cut taxes for families with young children, or to guarantee property tax relief for homeowners on July 1, and we could have done it without needing to raise any new taxes. Instead, it made a deliberate choice not to.” said House Finance Committee Ranking Member Sweeney.

“This budget chose billionaires over the everyday Ohioans. It traded in a tax credit for working families for a handout to millionaires. It decided to put 800,000 Ohioans at risk of losing their health insurance so that we could extend the state’s Sales Tax Holiday for a few extra days in August. Rather than fully funding our public schools, who are responsible for educating more than 80% of Ohio children, this budget will send more state dollars to private schools than our traditional public schools. The people of Ohio deserve better than the choices being made in this budget.”

HB 96 protects a broken status quo—leaving local communities, property tax payers, and families to shoulder the burden alone. Ohio deserves a budget that lifts people up, not one that leaves them behind. 

This budget makes the wrong choices in so many ways: 

• An Income Tax Scam: Republicans call it a “flat tax” but it’s really a fat tax cut only for the wealthiest few. Four out of every five Ohioans will see $5 or less under the bill, while someone making $2.5M gets a $18K tax break. The choice to include this flat tax will cost the state $1.67B over the next two years. Cutting taxes only for the wealthiest isn’t going to solve the real problems facing Ohioans. It’s not going to make childcare cheaper, it's not going to make the cost of rent or healthcare go down, and it's definitely not going to lower rising property taxes. 
• Gutting Public Schools: For decades, the state legislature has failed to uphold its share of responsibility to provide adequate state funding for public education. This budget continues to prioritize billions in vouchers for private schools over the investments we should be making in the public schools where 90% of students in the state go to school. The Fair School Funding Plan is a bipartisan, constitutional solution developed by education experts, and Ohio has the resources to fully and fairly fund it. Yet the statehouse republicans deliberately chose to ignore the evidence and continue to underfund our schools.
• Forcing Schools to Put More Property Tax Levies on the Ballot: This budget passes the buck on property tax relief by trying to raid savings accounts that school districts have diligently invested in, instead of the state stepping up to provide the relief. This will only force more schools to put levies on the ballot more often to stay open, so either your taxes will keep going up or your schools will be closing because the state is failing to act. 
   
• Fewer Childcare Slots to Support Working Ohioans: Ohio consistently ranks among the lowest states for public investment in child care, which continues to be the biggest household expense for families with children. While child care costs have risen by an estimated 40% in the last 10 years, the state has reduced investment. A recent study from the US Chamber of Commerce found that Ohio is losing out on more than $5B in untapped economic potential due to our lack of investment in child care.
• Jeopardizing Healthcare Access: Almost 800K Ohioans will be at risk of immediately losing their health insurance and all Ohioans will see hospitals and providers in their communities at risk of closing. For years, Republicans have targeted Medicaid expansion. Now they're using a draconian and unnecessary trigger law to strip healthcare coverage from hundreds of thousands Ohioans if the federal government lowers its contribution by even a single dollar.
• Steals Ohioans’ Unclaimed Funds for Billionaire Browns’ Owners: The budget still includes the state fronting $600M by seizing unclaimed funds from Ohio residents for a new Cleveland Browns stadium in a suburb of Cleveland, which would move the stadium from its downtown location, which is opposed by local leaders. 
• Attacks on Collective Bargaining and Organized Labor:  Prohibits workers from negotiating about their working location assignments both in an education setting and as a state employee. Conversations around work reporting locations are critical so that employees can effectively perform their job duties without wasted time and costs, better serving the people of Ohio and the students in our schools.
• Overriding the Will of the Voters on Cannabis Funding: Voters overwhelmingly passed Issue 2 and were clear about how they wanted their tax dollars spent. This budget overrides the 57% of Ohioans who made those choices, and instead chooses to redirect most of the tax dollars to a budget that subsidizes billionaire stadiums. 

 HB 96 passed the Ohio House of Representatives by a vote of 59-38 Wednesday. It now heads to Governor DeWine for signature. While the Governor may mitigate some harm through line item vetos, this budget still remains one of the most immoral in Ohio history. This is the first budget to pass without a single Democratic vote in more than a decade.