LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — The Arkansas Secretary of State's office has thrown out an abortion ballot measure less than a week after the group turned in over 100,000 signatures ahead of the deadline on July 5.
In a letter sent by Secretary of State John Thurston, the group reportedly did not submit documents that identified paid canvassers by name as well as a signed statement that they had a copy of the recent edition of the state's initiatives and referenda handbook.
"In McDaniel v. Spencer in 2015, the Arkansas Supreme Court expressly found this requirement to be constitutional," Thurston said in the letter.
Thurston said that since the group did not submit any of these documents, he had to reject the ballot measure.
He continued that even if he didn't reject the submission, the ability to not provided these documents "means that signatures gathered by paid canvassers in your submission could not be counted for any reason."
Arkansans for Limited Government (ALFG), the group behind the abortion amendment, submitted on Friday a total of 101,525 signatures to be checked by officials before qualifying for the November ballot.
Thurston said that if the 14,143 collected by paid canvassers were removed, the measure would then fall short of the 90,704 requirement by 3,322 signatures.
"Therefore, even if I could accept your submission, I would be forced to find that your petition is insufficient on its face for failure to obtain the required 90,704 signatures," he said.
The proposed amendment would allow abortions in the state up to 18 weeks and in the instance of rape, incest, or fatal fetal anomaly. It would also allow an abortion to "protect the pregnant woman's life or physical health."
ALFG Communications Director Gennie Diaz said she feels the state government is using the ballot initiative process as "political weaponization."
"The intent of this process... this law behind paid canvassers and what you have to provide the state is so that the public is not defrauded, right?" Diaz said. "People cannot provide false information when they're doing this... it's accountability that the state government itself has set up through these new processes on the ballot initiative."
"The irony that the state would potentially be disenfranchising over 101,000 Arkansas voters because of something they consider... binding enough to disqualify us from the ballot is really upsetting," Diaz continued. "It's egregious, and it honestly feels like a political weaponization of this process when we know that the state government essentially does not support abortion access."
In response to the proposal being rejected, Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders posted that the "far left pro-abortion crowd in Arkansas showed they are both immoral and incompetent." Attorney General Tim Griffin echoed her sentiment, saying the group has "no one to blame but themselves."
You can read Thurston's complete letter by clicking here.
Arkansans for Limited Government released a statement regarding Thurston's decision to reject the amendment:
"Arkansans for Limited Government is alarmed and outraged by Secretary Thurston’s attempt to disqualify the Arkansas Abortion Amendment from November’s ballot.
We worked with the Secretary of State’s office during every step of the process to ensure that we followed all rules and regulations. At multiple junctures — including on July 5 inside of the Capitol Building — we discussed signature submission requirements with the Secretary of State’s staff. In fact, the Secretary of State’s office supplied us with the affidavit paperwork, which we used. Until today, we had no reason not to trust that the paperwork they supplied us was correct and complete.
The Secretary of State, and the public, knows that we provided the state with a list of our paid canvassers and all of the required information associated with their employment. They know this because the list we provided to the Secretary of State was FOIA’d and released by our opposition in an attempt to intimidate our supporters. Asserting now that we didn’t provide required documentation regarding paid canvassers is absurd and demonstrably, undeniably incorrect.
Arkansas law does not empower the Secretary of State to make an unfounded legal interpretation, which is what he did today by summarily declaring that we have not completed the steps for qualification. We are owed a period to provide a hard copy of the statement, which has been emailed to their office more than a dozen times, if that is what’s needed.
More than 101,000 Arkansans participated in this heroic act of direct democracy and stood up to loudly proclaim their support for access to healthcare. They deserve better than a state government that seeks to silence them.
We will fight this ridiculous disqualification attempt with everything we have. We will not back down."
We will update this article with more information as it becomes available.