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Oklahoma’s Supreme Court clears the way for State Question 836, a petition to allow open primaries. Learn how this could impact voters, political parties, and future elections.

Saturday, September 20th, 2025

By: Sam Carrico

The Oklahoma Supreme Court has ruled that State Question 836 can move forward. The proposal would create open primaries, allowing all voters to see all candidates on a single ballot regardless of party. News On 6’s Sam Carrico spoke with political analysts and party leaders to break down what this could mean for Oklahoma voters.

State Question 836 is a ballot initiative that would create open primaries in Oklahoma. All candidates, regardless of party, would appear on a single primary ballot. The top two vote-getters would advance to the general election.

Political analyst Scott Mitchell says the initiative “has the potential over a 10 to 20 year period of changing the way Oklahoma looks very, very drastically.”

AJ Griffin, a former Republican state senator and organizer of the initiative, says: "It deserves to be placed in front of the voters of the state of Oklahoma."

Griffin adds that the goal is to ensure that “every voter has an opportunity to look at every candidate, and then each elected representative must be held accountable by every voter.”

State GOP Chair Charity Linch argues that the proposal would weaken political parties and mimic systems in left-leaning states.

"Don't California my Oklahoma, please," she said. Linch added, "The Republicans need to decide who the Republican candidate is going to be, and then let everyone decide in the general election."

Oklahoma Democratic Party Chair John Waldron supports the measure, saying: "Anything that gives voters more choice is a good idea because it improves democracy in our state."

Organizers will have 90 days to gather about 173,000 verified signatures. They expect to start in mid-October.

The state Supreme Court ruled that State Question 836 is exempt from the new state law that limits the number of people in each county who can sign a petition that calls for a state question, since it was filed before the new law took effect.correct reference to which justices joined Vice Chief Justice Dana Kuehn’s separate writing.)

Read at News 9.

By Tres Savage - Tuesday, September 16, 2025

A group dedicated to opening Oklahoma’s primary elections can move forward with its initiative petition, the Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled today.

State Question 836, also referred to as Initiative Petition 448, would end Oklahoma’s closed primary system and replace it with open primaries where “all candidates for a covered office would appear on the same primary ballot without regard to party affiliation, and any qualified voter could vote for any candidate without regard to party affiliation.”

In late June, attorneys for the Oklahoma Republican Party and former Tulsa County GOP Chairwoman Ronda Vuillemont-Smith argued before the state Supreme Court that SQ 836 would violate the First Amendment by forcing political parties to support candidates they may not normally support. In a 6-3 decision Tuesday — where six justices joined a majority opinion finding the petition sufficient “to pass constitutional muster” — Justice Douglas Combs wrote that the proposal “does not impose any severe burden on protestants’ associational rights” and is “legally sufficient.”

“Proponents’ asserted interests in allowing independent voters to participate, in electing the most popular candidates, in gaining efficiency, in increasing voter participation and turnout, in providing voters with greater choice, and in promoting fairness is sufficient to pass constitutional muster,” Combs wrote. “We do not find any clear or manifest facial constitutional infirmities in the proposed measure.”

Combs’ opinion was joined by Chief Justice Dustin Rowe, Justice James Winchester, Justice James Edmondson, Justice Noma Gurich and Justice Richard Darby. In a separate writing, Justice Dana Kuehn was joined by Court of Civil Appeals Judge Robert Bell to concur that the petition should advance but to dissent as to the finding of constitutionality at this stage. (Bell joined the court for the case owing to Justice Travis Jett’s recusal, and Justice M. John Kane IV concurred in part and dissented in part but did not write to explain his position.)

“The people’s right to propose law and amendments to the Oklahoma Constitution through the initiative process is precious, and any doubt as to the legal sufficiency of an initiative petition should be resolved in its favor,” Combs concluded. “Protestants have not met their burden to prove IP 448 contains any clear or manifest facial constitutional infirmities. Nor have they demonstrated the gist is misleading. Their challenge to the proposed ballot title is premature at this stage. We therefore hold, on these grounds, that IP 448 is legally sufficient for submission to the people of Oklahoma for signatures.”

In Kuehn’s separate writing joined by Kane and Bell, she said they “agree with the majority that Initiative Petition 448 should go to а vote of the people” but have concerns about the court’s “shifting jurisprudence” on whether a petition’s constitutionality should be reviewed before it goes to a vote of the people.

“I disagree with the decision to determine whether the petition itself violates the Oklahoma Constitution,” Kuehn wrote. “In State Chamber of Oklahoma v. Cobbs I explained that Title 34 and the Oklahoma Constitution, read together, do not give this court the authority to determine the constitutionality of the merits of any initiative petition before it is put to a vote of the people.”

The majority found that SQ 836’s “gist” — or description — met petitioners’ obligations.

“We find the gist is not misleading insofar as it uses the term ‘open primary’ to describe a primary system that the U.S. Supreme Court has previously labeled a ‘non-partisan blanket primary.’ The primary system being proposed is sufficiently described in detail within the gist,” Combs wrote. “Potential signatories who read the gist should not be confused or misled by any label. The proponents could choose any label they want, so long as their gist proceeds to define what they mean by that term. Here, they’ve chosen the label ‘open primary,’ and their gist proceeds to define exactly what they mean by that term.”

Petitioners of SQ 836 will have 90 days to collect nearly 173,000 valid signatures from Oklahoma voters. The Vote Yes on 836 campaign released a statement from petitioner Tony Stobbe, a U.S. Coast Guard veteran and Oklahoma voter registered “No Party” with the State Election Board.

“State Question 836 is about making sure every voter has a voice in our elections, giving our voters more choices, and making the system fair for everyone, regardless of their party affiliation,” Stobbe said. “Today’s ruling is a victory for Oklahoma voters and a defeat for the insiders and power-brokers who benefit from today’s closed, exclusionary primary process. We are eager to begin collecting signatures and to take this transformative conversation directly to the people. In the next few weeks, you’ll see our volunteers on street corners, in parking lots, at sporting events, and in every corner of the state, talking with everyday Oklahomans about why it’s time to open our primaries and put voters first.”

A new law passed this legislative session to limit the number of signatures that can be collected in larger counties could apply to SQ 836’s efforts, but it is also facing pending court challenges from SQ 836 supporters. On Monday, the Supreme Court issued a temporary stay of SB 1027, pending full litigation of its challenges.

(Update: This article was updated at 6:45 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 16, to include comment from Tony Stobbe and additional information. It was updated again at 1:35 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 17, to correct reference to which justices joined Vice Chief Justice Dana Kuehn’s separate writing.)

Read from NonDoc.

OKLAHOMA CITY – Two Oklahoma veterans – one a pediatrician, the other a U.S. Coast Guard commander – have filed a legal challenge to SB 1027 in Oklahoma, a law they say unconstitutionally targets their statewide citizen initiative to implement open primaries, State Question 836 (SQ 836).

The lawsuit, filed in the Oklahoma Supreme Court, does not specifically call for SB 1027 to be overturned. However, the plaintiffs – Dr. Ken Setter of Tulsa and Tony Stobbe of Edmond – assert that retroactively applying it to SQ 836 violates Article V, Section 54 of the state constitution, which prohibits retroactive laws from altering proceedings already in motion.

SQ 836 was submitted for review in January 2025. SB 1027 wasn’t signed into law until June.

The proposed ballot measure – spearheaded by Oklahoma United – seeks to establish an open primary system that would allow every registered voter in Oklahoma, regardless of party, to participate. Right now, the state uses closed primaries which restrict access to registered party members only.

The law makes it clear that parties have the right to allow independent voters to participate if they choose – giving them the authority to determine the extent of voting rights in Oklahoma.

The lawsuit challenging SB 1027 is not the only legal battle over SQ 836 or the bill. The state’s Republican Party has challenged the constitutionality of the measure, arguing in court that it "creates the false appearance that candidates are endorsed by or affiliated with the party.”

Specifically, SQ 836 eliminates party primaries altogether and establishes a nonpartisan primary system similar to what’s in place in Alaska, California, and Washington. All voters and candidates participate on a single ballot, regardless of party.

And just like the systems in California and Washington, as well as what is used in many local municipalities across the US – including Oklahoma – the top two candidates advance to the general election.

The Oklahoma Supreme Court heard oral argument in this case on June 24. While a decision was not immediately handed down, Vice Chief Justice Dana Kuehn said the court would not violate the peoples’ constitutional power to determine what measures go on the ballot.

“There’s no tension until it’s a law or a constitutional change that then someone challenges and brings to us, and then we decide,” she said. 

We don’t even know if they’re going to get enough signatures. We don’t know if the gist (ballot summary) is okay. We don’t know any of those things. And I just want to understand why you think we should be here right now.”

The insinuation here is that the lawsuit was filed prematurely.

As previously reported on IVN, SB 1027 imposes a host of new restrictions on citizen-led initiatives, including stricter signature requirements, funding disclosure rules, and limitations on who can circulate petitions.

Specifically, the bill:

• Caps the number of signatures that can be collected per county: 11.5% of votes cast in the most recent gubernatorial election for statutory changes, and 20.8% for constitutional amendments.
• Gives the secretary of state the power to remove the summary of a proposed ballot measure (called the gist).
• Requires petition gatherers to be registered Oklahoma voters.
• Requires initiative campaigns to refrain from accepting out-of-state donations.
• Requires initiative campaigns to disclose the source of their donations.

Of note is the cap on signatures per county. The bill’s author, House Speaker Kyle Hilbert (R-Bristow), said the bill is about fairness to rural voters. “The metros are getting double the say the rest of the state under the current process,” he said.

However, other states have laws that achieve this outcome without placing a signature cap -- like requiring citizen initiative campaigns to get x number of signatures from each county that go toward the total number of signatures collected.

The Oklahoma Policy Institute found in June that SB 1027 would exclude millions of voters from the petition signature process. There are more than 2.3 million registered voters in Oklahoma, of which 1.15 million voters participated in the last gubernatorial election.

The institute concluded:

“When applying SB 1027’s formula statewide, its requirement would exclude 2.2 million registered voters (or 94.4% of registered voters) from signing a petition for statutory amendments; it would exclude 2.1 million registered voters (or 89.8% of registered voters) from signing a petition for constitutional amendments.”

As the bill can be applied retroactively, it is possible – without court intervention – that it will affect SQ 836, which is what Setter and Stobbe are challenging.

“You don’t have to agree with SQ 836 to see what’s happening here is wrong,” said Setter, a lifelong Republican. “Politicians should not be attempting to stop this measure by sabotaging it with unconstitutional laws. They should let the voters decide.”

Setter added that SB 1027 “doesn’t just bend the rules in favor of powerful politicians—it breaks them entirely for Oklahoma voters.” Stobbe, a politically unaffiliated voter and military veteran, emphasized how the law directly harms nearly half a million independents like him.

“I served my country, not a political party,” he said. 

Being politically independent is important to me—and to thousands of veterans and active-duty military across this state. Not being able to vote in Oklahoma’s most meaningful elections is a slap in the face. Having an unconstitutional law try to block the very state question meant to fix that problem is even worse.”

The Oklahoma Supreme Court recently upheld similar constitutional protections in its 2024 ruling on State Question 832, reaffirming that new laws cannot disrupt initiative efforts already underway.

Advocates of SQ 836 argue that open primaries are needed in a state in which closed partisan primaries determine the outcome of most general elections. They further assert that the citizen initiative process has long served as a vital check on legislative inaction.

“For a century, Oklahomans of all political stripes have used petitions to solve problems the Legislature either wouldn’t touch or couldn’t get across the finish line,” said Stobbe. “This is bigger than one law—it’s about defending our right to be heard when our government stops listening.”

While Setter and Stobbe’s suit narrowly focuses on the retroactive application of SB 1027 to SQ 836, a separate challenge takes aim at other parts of the law that plaintiffs say restrict political speech and violate constitutional rights.

Read at Independent Voter News here.