On May 24, Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt signed SB 1027. It says that statewide initiative petitions face a limit of how many signatures may come from any particular county. No more than 11.5% of the last gubernatorial vote inside Oklahoma and Tulsa Counties will count.
Under several Ninth Circuit precedents, the bill would be unconstitutional, but Oklahoma is in the Tenth Circuit. The Tenth Circuit has never had a case on county distribution requirements for initiatives.
The Utah Supreme Court struck down a somewhat similar law in 2002 in Gallivan v Walker, but that is not binding, although it should be influential.
The new law also requires circulators to be registered Oklahoma voters. A past Oklahoma identical provision has already been held unconstitutional. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that states can’t require circulators to be registered voters, and the Tenth Circuit ruled that Oklahoma can’t ban out-of-state circulators.
anti-Democracy minority rule gerrymanders in all State. legislatures
with tyrant monarch guvs
since 1776
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PR
APPV
TOTSOP
https://electionlawblog.org/?p=150026
ELB-
666 SS numbers – voters
see olde Bible – Revelations end chapter
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/05/27/npr-sues-trump-administration-over-federal-funding/83875521007/
NPR vs trump
too many looter gangs to count who now claim a const right to get usa taxpayer $$$ cash ???
Everyone is entitled to all congressionally authorized spending, and federal employees and contractors should be entitled to their jobs.
Illegal aliens are an invading army, but we shouldn’t deport them, detain them, or make them fear we might, and they shouldn’t vote, but we shouldn’t do anything to ensure that they don’t.
Consider the Tenth Circuit case of Blomquist v. Thomson, 739 F.2d 525 (10th Cir. 1984).
Will Oklahoma have to change its abbreviation from OK?
https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/does-the-ok-now-signify-white-power-6170543/
I have worked petitions in Oklahoma on two occassions. It was already more difficult than average there. They had no legitimate reason to make it even more difficult.
That doesn’t sound like an objective or disinterested observation to me.
The reason you had to work those petitions is because the state has an interest in limiting how many issues voters have to decide on in an election, what level of public support proponents need to demonstrate to burden all the state’s voters with having to serve as unpaid legislators on the issue or deal with all the rest of the state’s voters deciding it without their input, etc.
Making it as easy as possible for proponents, volunteers, donors and hired contractors to qualify isn’t the state’s objective.
Averages of other states aren’t relevant. You’re probably not counting the majority of states where the difficulty level is infinite, but even if you are, each state should be able to chart its course independently of each other on this.
How does Trump feel about this? That’s all that matters.
Very few initiative and referendum petitions qualified for the ballot in Oklahoma prior to this, so it was not as those voters there were burdened with too many issues on which to vote.
@RW,
You may be misconstruing the bill, or your presentation may cause readers to infer something that is not correct.
By mentioning the two largest counties, you may cause careless readers to believe that only 11.5% of total signatures may be collected in the two largest counties, and that the remaining 77% must be collected elsewhere.
First, the base requirement is 8% of the statewide gubernatorial vote.
No more than 11.5% of the gubernatorial vote may be collected in any county.
If a petition did reach the 11.5% limit in Oklahoma and Tulsa counties, only 6% need be gathered in the remainder of the state.
The law simply prevents piling up signatures in a few counties.
Gallivan v Walker required a minimum number of signatures to be collected in most counties. Rather than setting a ceiling, it set a floor. The facts in Oklahoma are different than in Utah. The only way to apply the Utah case is to get an innumerate judge.
Blomquist v. Thomson is not applicable. There is a reason to have widespread support for an initiative, that is not applicable to qualification to a political party. There should be no “qualified” parties in the first place.
Andy: very few is in the eye of the beholder. Some people think any at all is too many, which again is in fact the law in most states.
Jim Riley makes good points here, other than that there should be no qualified parties. I think party labels provide voters with useful information so long as parties have the right to dissociate from candidates they don’t want to be associated with. But, that’s not the subject of this discussion and can be discussed on a more appropriate post.
On the points more closely related to this particular topic, Jim Riley nailed it.
OK scheme —
another violation of 14 amdt ep cl
Brown v bd of ed 1954
some voters less equal in higher pop counties
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will OK become TT === tyrant trump ???
There’s no 14th amendment obligation for any state to allow initiatives. The federal constitution should have nothing at all to do with state initiatives.
@AZ,
The 11.5% limit is applicable to all counties.
Oklahoma is not OK!