Oklahoma United & Vote Yes 836: good trouble tulsa
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Margaret & Ros
Margaret & Ros
Margaret & Ros
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Tulsa World, 3/20/25
Dr. Kenneth Setter: Oklahoma lawmakers are attacking direct democracy; time to fight back
Oklahoma’s constitution guarantees citizens the right to petition their government, giving the people a direct voice in shaping policy when elected leaders fail to act. But over the past several years, the Legislature has systematically chipped away at this right, making it harder and harder for citizen-led initiatives to reach the ballot.
Now, with Senate Bill 1027, lawmakers are launching one of the most aggressive attacks yet on the petition process — limiting voter participation, adding bureaucratic red tape and making it nearly impossible for grassroots movements to succeed.
SB 1027 — sponsored by Sen. David Bullard, R-Durant, and House Speaker Kyle Hilbert, R-Bristow — would restrict how many signatures can be collected from different parts of the state, capping the number from larger counties at an arbitrarily low percentage. It passed out of the Senate on Tuesday by a 36-8 vote.
Under SB 1027, no more than 10% of petition signatures could come from a county with a population over 400,000, which applies only to Oklahoma and Tulsa counties. No more than 4% could come from a single smaller county.
Right now, petitioners must collect 173,000 signatures to put a constitutional amendment to a ballot for a statewide vote.
SB 1027 would allow only 35,000 signatures (20% of the required signature total) from Oklahoma and Tulsa counties combined, despite these counties having 36% of Oklahoma’s registered voters. The remaining 138,000 signatures would have to come from the rest of the state.
Oklahoma, Tulsa, Cleveland and Canadian counties together account for 48% of all registered voters in the state. Under SB 1027, petition circulators in these four counties would be capped at 48,400 signatures, or 28% of the required total.
This clearly and intentionally limits the ability of voters in larger counties to petition their government. This is not democracy — it is voter suppression.
Proponents of SB 1027 claim that petition efforts target only a small number of counties and should be forced to collect signatures more evenly across the state. This is false.
The most recent successful petition campaign collected signatures from all 77 counties. There is no valid reason to impose arbitrary caps on where signatures can be gathered. These limits do nothing but suppress citizen participation and will almost certainly lead to costly lawsuits, forcing taxpayers to foot the bill for an unconstitutional law.
SB 1027 wouldn’t stop at limiting signature collection — it would add several other unnecessary hurdles designed to make petitioning harder, including transferring power over initiative petitions from the Oklahoma Supreme Court to the Secretary of State, a political appointee with no legal training who would have unchecked power to reject petitions based on subjective criteria.
SB 1027 would force petition signers to verify that they have read or had the entire ballot title read to them. This is an unnecessary obstacle and double standard. Voters are not required to attest to reading an entire state question before voting on it; nor, for that matter, are legislators required to attest to reading the bills they vote on.
SB 1027 would severely hamper how campaigns use paid signature gatherers to support their effort, adding increased costs, administrative burdens and reporting requirements.
Oklahoma has the shortest signature-gathering window in the country (90 days) and the highest number of required signatures per capita. So the use of paid signature gathers has been made unavoidable. SB 1027, once again, intentionally targets the way successful citizen-led efforts work in an attempt to cripple all future ballot initiatives.
Oklahomans want and deserve more, not less, input into the policies that impact our state and our families. If this law passes and is allowed to stand, it will severely and permanently weaken Oklahomans’ constitutional right to petition their government.
Make your voice heard by contacting your legislators and asking them to vote no. This is not a partisan issue; this is about protecting every Oklahoman’s right to participate in democracy. Don’t let politicians take that away.
Kenneth Setter, M.D., is a retired pediatrician from Tulsa and one of three petitioners on State Question 836.
Oklahoma United supports sq 836 for fully OPEN PRIMARies.
THE OKLAHOMAN, 3/9/25
Bill that dramatically changes initiative, referendum process clears Senate committee
At least one nationally recognized expert on the U.S. Constitution said the bill's restrictions on the initiative process are unconstitutional. Robert McCampbell, an Oklahoma City attorney who specializes in constitutional law, wrote that the bill was unconstitutional.'
"The bill includes provisions that restrict petition circulators, prohibit out-of-state contributions, grant broad discretionary power to the secretary of state over citizen-initiated petitions, and retroactively change the procedure for initiative petitions. Each of these provisions conflicts with well-established legal precedent," McCampbell wrote in a four-page memo analyzing the measure.
The government, McCampbell said, is not free to "impose burdensome roadblocks to the citizen initiative process."
"The courts are unanimous that circulating a petition is 'core political speech' where First Amendment protection is at its 'zenith," he wrote. "The restrictions on core political speech embodied in SB 1027 cannot survive scrutiny under the First Amendment."
Other opponents of the bill, echoing McCampbell, said SB 1027 would "make it dramatically harder for Oklahomans to bring issues directly to a vote, undermining one of the most fundamental avenues for public participation in policymaking."
"(The) vote to advance SB 1027 is a disappointing step backward for democracy in Oklahoma. By making it harder for citizens to bring issues to the ballot, lawmakers are silencing the voices of everyday Oklahomans and limiting public participation in policymaking," said Margaret Kobos, founder of Oklahoma United. "The right to petition is fundamental to our state's history and this bill adds unnecessary barriers that will make it nearly impossible for grassroots efforts to succeed."
