COLUMBUS, Ohio—The Libertarian Party of Ohio might soon be headed into yet another court battle over whether the state should continue to recognize it as a minor political party.

Secretary of State Jon Husted’s office says that the Libertarians, along with the Ohio Green Party, lost their ballot access because their respective candidates for governor in the Nov. 6 midterm election didn’t get the 3 percent of the vote required under state law to remain a recognized minor party. The Libertarians’ gubernatorial nominee, Columbus activist and filmmaker Travis Irvine, got 1.8 percent of the vote, according to unofficial totals.

But Ohio Libertarians point to a part of the law (specifically, section 3501.01(F)(2)(b) of the Ohio Revised Code) stating that the “3-percent” requirement is only for minor parties that have been recognized for at least a year before the election. The Libertarian Party of Ohio regained state recognition in July for the first time since 2014, a year after the GOP-controlled legislature passed new ballot-access rules (which the Libertarians tried unsuccessfully to fight in a lengthy court battle).

Secretary of state spokesman Sam Rossi disputed the Libertarians’ assertion that the “3-percent” requirement doesn’t apply to them in this case.

“They pointed to one sentence, but if you look at all of [the law], there’s other things to take into consideration there, in the way that it’s phrased,” Rossi said.

Rossi also noted that the Libertarian Party of Ohio’s chair, Harold Thomas, claimed the day before the 2018 midterms that Irvine needed 3 percent of the vote to “automatically achieve 2020 ballot access."

Rossi declined to comment further, saying the Libertarians are likely to file suit over the matter against Husted’s successor, Republican Frank LaRose, who will be sworn in as secretary of state in January.

Indeed, that’s exactly what Libertarian Party of Ohio spokesman David Jackson said his party would do, if they are notified by Husted’s office that they are de-certified as a minor party.

“They’d be breaking the law, so we’d have to report this and sue them for breaking their own law,” Jackson said.

If Libertarians lose state recognition, they (as well as the Greens) would each have until 125 days before the 2020 election to submit roughly 43,000 petition signatures from registered voters to regain ballot access.

Being a recognized minor party brings a number of perks – the most visible of which is that candidates can appear on the ballot under their party’s name, rather than having to run as “independents.” State recognition also allows minor parties to hold primaries, and their candidates need fewer petition signatures to get on the ballot, among other advantages.

Meanwhile, no one’s disputing that the state’s only other recognized minor party, the Ohio Green Party, will lose their ballot access for the first time since 2008. Their gubernatorial candidate, Constance Gadell-Newton, garnered 1.1 percent of the vote, according to unofficial totals.

Nathan Lane, the Ohio Green Party’s co-chair, said in an interview that once the midterm election results are certified on Nov. 27, there will be “almost an immediate petition drive to regain ballot access.

“We’ve already had 20-some people sign up to assist with the effort, so I think it would be kind of foolish on the leadership’s part to silence that desire from our membership,” Lane said.

Lane also said that Ohio Greens and others are in the “very early stages” of putting a proposed state constitutional amendment on the ballot to set up a “ranked-choice” voting system in Ohio.

Under such a system, each voter ranks candidates in order of preference. If no candidate wins an outright majority, the candidate in the race with the least number of votes is dropped, and his or her votes are redistributed based on his/her supporters’ second choices.

Maine is the only state that currently uses ranked-choice voting for federal and state elections, though it’s being challenged in court as Maine elections officials continue to count ballots in the neck-and-neck race for that state’s 2nd Congressional District.