Ohio Appeals Panel Pushes State on Waived Covid Unemployment Aid

A panel of Ohio appeals judges hearing a case on Wednesday about the governor’s decision to withdraw early from a Covid-19-era federal expanded unemployment program pushed an attorney for the state on whether the case was, as she argued, moot.

Assistant Attorney General Ann Yackshaw told the Columbus-based Ohio Court of Appeals, 10th District panel that the state Supreme Court’s one-sentence 2022 ruling—which said, “this cause is dismissed, sua sponte, as moot”—meant a trial judge should’ve dismissed the claims. Yackshaw said “cause” is analogous to “case” or “lawsuit” and that the justices, despite their refusal to elaborate, were clear in what they wanted.

“When the Supreme Court said ‘this cause is moot,’ they said ‘this case is moot,’ and to go any further than that here today would be to exceed this court’s subject matter jurisdiction,” Yackshaw said.

Judge M. Shawn Dingus (D) was skeptical of Yackshaw’s argument that the order was clear, questioning if she was asking the udges to “essentially read those very few tea leaves that the Supreme Court has left.”

The state is appealing a Franklin County Common Pleas judge’s ruling from February the the state should try to recover the estimated $900 million funds the state missed out on by withdrawing from the program two months early.

Marc E. Dann of DannLaw likened the appealed ruling to the one involving Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, whom the US government said was mistakenly removed from the country to a prison in El Salvador. Dann, a former Demoratic state attorney general, compared the US Supreme Court earlier this month saying that federal officials must “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return with the trial judge ordering DeWine to ask for the $900 million.

“This is on all fours with our situation here,” said Dann, representing the plaintiffs.

The state defendants have also argued that Ohio law doesn’t require the state to participate in any program set up through legislation to address the pandemic.

While Yackshaw argued that the court could diverge from a different 10th District panel’s 2021 ruling that said DeWine must provide the money to those who qualified, Judge Carly M. Edelstein (D) said she was “struggling” with how the Ohio Supreme Court’s one-line ruling would mean the new panel could diverge from that.

Yackshaw said the justices’ decision allows them to do so.

Judge Laurel Beatty Blunt (D) also sat on the panel.

The plaintiffs are also represented by Zimmerman Law Offices PC.

The case is Ohio ex rel. Bowling v. DeWine, Ohio Ct. App., 10th Dist., No. 25-AP-000191, oral argument 4/30/25.