COLUMBUS, Ohio – The country watched Monday as Ohio’s voting process was thrown into chaos, following unprecedented, last-minute efforts from Gov. Mike DeWine and other state officials to postpone the state’s primary election.

The sequence of events started Monday morning when DeWine and his team decided it wouldn’t be safe for older Ohioans to vote or work the polls, citing updated federal guidance on the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Before the end of the night, media, county elections officials and even top statewide, elected officials received, shared and acted upon information that turned out to be false.

And voters watching it unfold were left wondering whether or not the election would take place, and ultimately, who they could trust.

The process through which the election was postponed threatens to harm ​the public goodwill ​and national acclaim Republican Gov. Mike DeWine has built up over the past week as he’s asked Ohioans to accept restrictions that increasingly restrict their day-to-day-lives. It also shows the high stakes facing the first-term governor and other state officials as they navigate an unprecedented public-health crisis.

“We were kind of waiting to hear what would happen and then I watched the press conference this afternoon with the governor and secretary of state and heard the news about the lawsuit,” said Danielle Doza, 32, of Cleveland, a Cuyahoga County poll-worker who was considering calling off for health reasons. “It left us all up in the air. We didn’t know if we should arrive at 6 p.m. to setup the polls. We got a robocall around 4:45 p.m. finally that just said, ‘Do not arrive at your polling location.’”

It was not the last call poll workers got that night.

“I saw some elections quoted as saying it was like a yo-yo, and I think that was generally the experience most had to one degree or another,” said Aaron Ockerman, executive director of the Ohio Association of Election Officials.

Officials close to the process described DeWine and others doing the best they could with limited information in a high-pressure environment.

Ultimately, with the election now on hold, they said the important thing is Ohioans’ lives are protected. As an example of what could have happened in Ohio, they cited problems with Illinois’ Tuesday election, which media outlets have reported has been befallen by nonfunctioning polling places, unsanitary conditions and low turnout. Officials there already have blamed the state’s governor, J. B. Pritzker, for not canceling the election, according to the Chicago Tribune.

“I slept for about three hours last night,” Secretary of State Frank LaRose, a Republican, said in an interview. “But I slept very well feeling like I made the right decision, and I think the governor is confident he made the right decision.”

Here’s how it unfolded.

The canceled press conference

At 10 a.m. Monday, LaRose was scheduled to hold a news conference. Along with Health Department Director ​Dr. Amy Acton, he was expected to share new procedures put into place to protect voters and poll workers at the Tuesday election.

The night before, LaRose had ordered county boards of elections to set up a curbside voting protocol, and loosened absentee ballot restrictions for those either hospitalized or quarantined due to COVID-19, the disease the coronavirus causes. The DeWine administration signed off on the plan that night, LaRose said.

But shortly before the news conference was to have begun, Lt. Gov. Jon Husted called LaRose, saying it was no longer safe to conduct the election as planned. Watching mounting death tolls in Italy, the administration was concerned that telling older Ohioans to go vote or work the polls was unsafe.

The CDC also had issued new guidance recommended canceling public events larger than 50 people.

State officials huddled with attorneys, attempting to come up with legal options of how the election could be postponed. DeWine shared their decision that afternoon, around 2:20 p.m.

He told reporters in Columbus he didn’t have the legal authority to move the election. But he said state officials would back what was essentially a legal gambit.

Two Franklin County voters, both older than 65 with recent health issues, would file a lawsuit in Franklin County Common Pleas Court, asking a judge to delay the election, DeWine said. They would say they didn’t want to risk their lives to vote. The state wouldn’t oppose it, recommending that the judge for public-health reasons set a June 2 election date.

“Is it a perfect decision? No, absolutely it is not. But’s the best we believe of the alternatives," DeWine told reporters. “... And it doesn’t force people to choose between their health and their constitutional rights.”

Courtroom confusion

The lawsuit wasn’t filed until after 5 p.m., after the Franklin County courthouse had closed. But some counties, including in Cuyahoga County, had already told their workers to proceed assuming the case had been settled.

The plaintiffs were both DeWine associates. One, Judith Brachman, was director of the Ohio Department of Aging under then-Gov. George Voinovich’s administration, in which DeWine served as lieutenant governor. The other, Jill Reardon, previously worked in DeWine’s office when he was state attorney general.

State officials were hopeful they’d get a favorable ruling. The judge randomly assigned to the case was Common Pleas Judge Richard Frye, a Democrat with a history of ruling against state officials in complex cases.

The judge began hearing arguments around 6:30 p.m. Besides Frye, also in the courtroom were a handful of reporters, attorneys — representing the plaintiffs, the state, Republican state Rep. Jason Stephens and the Ohio Democratic Party — and Republican state Rep. Niraj Antani, wearing casual pants and tennis shoes, who’d rushed from Dayton to try to argue in front of the judge.

But while arguments were still going on, national media outlets, including CNN and the Guardian, initially falsely reported Frye had ruled in the state’s favor. Hannah News, a Statehouse news service with widespread readership within state government, did too before correcting it.

It appears some had misinterpreted a blank order the plaintiffs submitted for Frye to sign as a completed order.

“Hannah reported the judge granted it, so the news service at the Statehouse was the source for that,” said Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost. “I saw it, and I think Frank saw it. We were all under the impression for about 10 minutes” that the state had effectively won the case, he said.

Using the incorrect information, state officials told county elections workers the election was off.

Ohio Director of Elections Amanda Grandjean, having received the go-ahead from Yost’s office, immediately sent notice to county boards of election.

“Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Frye granted Plaintiffs’ order in Judy Brachman and Jill Reardon v. Ohio Secretary of State,” Grandjean wrote in an email sent at 6:59 p.m. to local elections officials. “There will not be an election tomorrow. We will provide details regarding the order as soon as humanly possible.”

County boards started operating as if the election wasn’t happening. Franklin County sent a missive to poll workers telling them not to arrive to their polling locations. The Stark County Board of Elections website had a notice telling voters the election was off. Even high-ranking staff within the DeWine administration believed they had won.

Frye, however, did not grant the order, meaning for the time being the election was on. He said he was legally uncomfortable with doing an end-around the legislature.

“There are too many factors to balance in this uncharted territory to say that we ought to take this away from the legislature and elected statewide officials, and throw it to a Common Pleas court judge in Columbus 12 hours before the election,” he said.

He issued his ruling around 7:05 p.m. Because the plaintiffs had only asked him to block the election, he did not issue any sort of order telling the state what to do.

State and local officials went silent as reporters from all over Ohio tried figuring out what was happening.

Radio silence

For two hours – and what felt like eons to those trying to figure out what was happening – this mad scramble continued with no update from DeWine, LaRose or any other state or local official.

DeWine, Husted, LaRose and Yost joined a conference call with lawyers, working through their legal options. They considered pushing for a midnight appeal, a federal lawsuit or filing for immediate action with the Ohio Supreme Court.

Meanwhile, House Speaker Larry Householder told other Republican members that the election remained on.

“While there has been talk of an attempt for an action from the Court of Appeals, to my knowledge the court is closed until 8:30 a.m. tomorrow and polls open prior to that,” he wrote in a memo. “You should instruct your constituents that the Election is scheduled to occur March 17 as set by Ohio Law.”

Shortly after the 9 p.m. hour, DeWine and LaRose sent their first public release.

"The only thing more important than a free and fair election is the health and safety of Ohioans,” DeWine and LaRose said. “The Ohio Department of Health and the CDC have advised against anyone gathering in groups larger than 50 people, which will occur if the election goes forward. Additionally, Ohioans over 65 and those with certain health conditions have been advised to limit their nonessential contact with others, affecting their ability to vote or serve as poll workers. Logistically, under these extraordinary circumstances, it simply isn’t possible to hold an election tomorrow that will be considered legitimate by Ohioans. They mustn’t be forced to choose between their health and exercising their constitutional rights."

The statement didn’t clarify what the state planned to do. In the meantime, poll workers in Cuyahoga County were once again contacted around 9 p.m. with a robocall that the election was back on. They were to report to their polling sites at 5:30 a.m.

Officials provided no updates, other than a 9:38 p.m. text from Husted to a reporter, which read: “Stay tuned.”

At 10:10 p.m., the DeWine administration announced they would close the polls. Acton, ​the health department director, would issue a public-health order, citing a section of state law that gives the director authority to issue special orders “to prevent the spread of contagious or infectious diseases.”

DeWine had argued earlier that the governor didn’t have legal authority to move the election, requiring the Franklin County lawsuit. But now he decided he could effectively do so by ordering the polls to be closed.

“The hope was we could do an order that the court would issue …Because that would have addressed it and provided clarity,” said Dan Tierney, a DeWine spokesman. “The court chose not to do that. so we had to review that ruling and proceed down other routes.”

A closer observer put it another way: “Think about it like being locked out of your house. You can try the door or break a window. If the door doesn’t open, you can break the window and fix it later.”

4 a.m. Supreme Court ruling

Responding to the order, Jon Cross, a Republican state lawmaker, took to Twitter, calling the situation a “constitutional crisis.”

We have a constitutional crisis now in Ohio. I will be fighting in the AM to keep our polling locations OPEN in the 83rd district with law enforcement, as the Ohio Department of Health can not shut down an election. #ConstitutionalCrisis — Jon Cross (@joncrossoh) March 17, 2020

And at 11:30 p.m., LaRose issued an order to county boards of elections, instruction them to begin working toward a June 2 election.

But it wasn’t over. Corey Speweik, a judicial candidate in Wood County, had filed suit earlier in the evening with the Ohio Supreme Court seeking to block the state from delaying the election.

The court hadn’t viewed the suit with urgency after the Franklin County judge’s decision had apparently set the election on a path to continue, according to Ed Miller, a court spokesman. But after the DeWine administration issue its health order, justices decided to convene a late-night vote. Citing the “exigent circumstances," they gave the state until 1:30 a.m. to respond.

Four justices — two Democrats, two Republicans — issued an unsigned decision unanimously rejecting the complaint, which had been filed before DeWine’s administration issued a public health order closing the polls over the new coronavirus. Two justices running for re-election — Justices Judith French and Sharon Kennedy — and Pat DeWine, who is DeWine’s son, did not participate.

Justices voted by phone, issuing a 4-0 ruling at 4 a.m.

And when 6:30 a.m. arrived on Tuesday, polls remained closed.

As of now, elections workers are preparing for a June 2 election. But lawsuits could come soon, LaRose said. Householder announced Tuesday he plans to convene the General Assembly to set a different date.

“Over the last 18 hours, unprecedented chaos and confusion have reigned over Ohio’s election system,” Householder, a Perry County Republican, said in a statement. “The Ohio legislature must provide an act to respond to our local elections officials, precinct workers, candidates and most importantly, Ohio’s voters, that provides clarity and certainty regarding Ohio’s primary election.”

House Minority Leader Emlia Sykes, an Akron Democrat, said in a Monday statement she is “deeply disappointed” with how the situation was handled.

“This is why Ohio needs to update its archaic system and modernize voting like so many other states have, so we can adapt to emergencies,” she said. “I hope the missteps we have seen tonight lead to a much deeper discussion at a later time about increasing accessibility to the ballot box.”

Asked about the election in Washington, President Donald Trump said he thought DeWine did well.

"The governor of Ohio's doing a great job. If he called it off, I can understand that. He's definitely somebody who knows what he's doing."

He said DeWine felt it was necessary, and it was a decision he made.

But "somebody's challenging it, so the courts will ultimately decide."

DeWine said hindsight is always clearer than having to make decisions in the moment.

“Look, we can we can all look back and say, ‘I wish I’d done that,’” he said during a Turesday afternoon briefing. “I wish I made it earlier, but that’s when we made that decision. And that’s where we are today.”

Read more coverage here:

67 confirmed Ohio coronavirus cases: Gov. Mike DeWine’s Tuesday, March 17 briefing

Ohio House leaders look to convene session to change state’s primary election date

Ohio polls remain closed following overnight ruling from Ohio Supreme Court

Today is NOT really Election Day: Capitol Letter