CLEVELAND, Ohio – A group seeking the removal of Mayor Frank Jackson took out petitions Friday in hopes of putting his fate before voters.

Jeff Mixon, president of Black Lives Matter in Cuyahoga County, had filed an affidavit with the clerk of Cleveland City Council, the first step in the recall process. By collecting petitions, he started a 30-day clock.

To force a recall vote, petitions must be returned to the council clerk by Feb. 19 with more than 12,000 valid signatures from Cleveland residents who voted in the 2017 mayoral election.

What prompted the effort?

Black Lives Matter in Cuyahoga County and Black on Black Crime contend the recall is needed to hold elected officials accountable. Removing Jackson from office is part of a broader effort to eventually recall Cuyahoga County Executive Armond Budish, U.S. Rep. Marcia Fudge and Cleveland Councilmen Blaine Griffin, Basheer Jones and Ken Johnson.

In a video posted to Facebook, Mixon outlines the groups’ positions.

“In Cleveland and Cuyahoga County, we are tired of leadership that serves corporate Cleveland and corporate Cuyahoga while ignoring the needs of the people who put them in office,” Mixon said in the video.

“At Black Lives Matter in Cuyahoga County, we don’t know if we can get these folks out of office,” Mixon said. “But we can definitely pull the paperwork, get the petitions and start a recall and at least send a message that we’re tired of leadership that serves corporate Cleveland instead of leaders who serve the people.”

Mixon’s group is not affiliated with the national Black Lives Matter organization. A different group, Black Lives Matter in Cleveland, has that affiliation.

What’s the process?

Cleveland's charter allows any registered city voter to seek removal of an elected official. The voter must file an affidavit with the clerk of City Council, as Porter and Mixon did. That affidavit must name the target of the recall and the reasons for seeking that person's removal from office.

The clerk provides petitions to supporters of the recall to collect signatures from registered voters. To be counted, the signers must have voted in the last city election.

In the case of a mayoral recall drive, petitioners must gather 12,160 signatures - 20 percent of the vote in the last city election – and return the petitions to the clerk within 30 days.

Those who sign the petition must have voted in the 2017 election for their names to be counted.

If enough signatures are verified as valid, the city schedules the recall election.

Is this Mixon’s first try?

No. This was the third try to start a recall drive against Jackson.

Mixon filed an affidavit jointly with Al Porter, president of Black on Black Crime, about two weeks ago. That petition was rejected when it was discovered that Porter did not live in Cleveland.

A second affidavit was rejected because it was written as if the organizations were submitting it, rather than an individual elector.

Meanwhile, another affidavit – one targeting Griffin – was rejected because it misspelled Blaine Griffin’s name. No new affidavit has been filed against Griffin.

What about other recall attempts?

No recall election has ever been successful in Cleveland.

In 2015 a petition drive led by a group that called itself Cleveland: A Return to Excellence Committee sought to remove Jackson. It submitted nearly 13,000 signatures, but 98 percent of them were rejected as invalid, in great part, because petitions were not filled out properly.

Twice in 2018, petitions were pulled for recall attempts against Basheer Jones. In both of those cases, the petitions were not returned.

Most famously, Dennis Kucinich survived an effort to remove him as mayor in 1978, the year Cleveland slipped into default. That effort reached the ballot that August, with Kucinich prevailing by just 236 votes.