In Montana, a campaign filed around 117,000 signatures on June 21, 2024, for a ballot initiative to provide for a state constitutional right to abortion. To qualify for the ballot, 60,359 valid signatures are required. County clerks have until July 19 to verify the signatures and submit them to the secretary of state’s office. The…
In Rhode Island, a new law requires that ballot measure questions be written in plain language and reasonably calculated to be understood by those with an eighth-grade reading level. The bill was passed unanimously by the state legislature and signed into law by Gov. Daniel McKee (D) on June 4, 2024. Currently, five measures have…
The Arizona State Legislature adjourned on June 15, 2024, and referred 11 measures to the ballot—five state statutes and six constitutional amendments. This is the most legislatively referred measures on the ballot since 1984, when 13 measures were on the ballot, and the third-highest year on record in the state. Some measures did not make…
The California Supreme Court ruled on June 20 that the Taxpayer Protection Act (TPA), as supporters call it, cannot appear on the Nov. 5 ballot because its proposed changes to vote thresholds for new taxes amount to a revision of the state constitution, which cannot be enacted via a citizen initiative. Under the state constitution,…
Voters in Arizona will decide on a ballot measure regarding state agency rulemaking if the new rule increases regulatory costs by a certain amount. The measure, Senate Concurrent Resolution 1012 (SCR 1012), was introduced to the Arizona State Senate on January 23, 2024. It passed the Senate on February 22, 2024, by a 16-13 vote,…
Arizona voters will decide on a measure that will make it a state crime to unlawfully cross the border from Mexico, as well as allow for state and local police to arrest individuals who unlawfully cross the border. This measure will appear on the ballot on Nov. 5, 2024. The measure, HCR 2060, was introduced…
Voters in three South Dakota counties will decide on June 4 whether to prohibit the use of automatic tabulating machines to count votes and require the hand-counting of ballots. In South Dakota, paper ballots are used in elections, and automatic tabulating machines or systems are permitted to count the paper ballots. South Dakota Canvassing organized…
For 2024, 110 statewide ballot measures have been certified for the ballot in 35 states, five more measures than the average (105) for this point in the election cycle from 2012 to 2022. The average number of statewide ballot measures certified for an even-numbered year during this period was 157. Here’s an update on the…
In South Dakota, a citizen-initiated constitutional amendment that would establish top-two primaries in the state was certified on May 21, 2024. Voters will decide on the initiative at the general election on Nov. 5. South Dakota Open Primaries, the campaign behind the initiative, submitted about 46,500 signatures on May 7. A random sample determined that…
Protect Patients Now, which is sponsored by the California Apartment Association, has qualified an initiative for the November ballot in California that would require entities defined as prescription drug price manipulators to spend at least 98% or more of their revenue earned from their national participation in the 340B program on direct patient care to…