Volunteer canvassers collected at most 88,587 signatures in their efforts to put abortion rights on the November ballot, according to Arkansas Secretary of State John Thurston.
That means the Arkansas Supreme Court will now decide the fate of the Arkansas Abortion Amendment. Paid canvassers working for Arkansans for Limited Government, the amendment’s sponsor, collected another 14,143 signatures. If those are counted, that would be more than enough to reach the 90,704 threshold required to make the ballot. But if the court won’t allow any of the paid canvasser signatures to count, the amendment would be a couple thousand short.
In an affidavit filed with the Supreme Court this afternoon, Leslie Bellamy, Director of Elections for the secretary of state’s office, said she “determined that volunteer canvassers collected 87,675 signatures.” Additionally, Bellamy said:
I have also determined that the sponsor submitted an additional 912 signatures on petition parts that do not indicate whether the canvasser was volunteer or paid. Therefore, I was unable to determine whether those 912 signatures should be included in the initial count. […] If the additional 912 signatures were collected by volunteer canvassers, the total number of signatures collected by volunteers would be 88,587.
On July 5, Arkansans for Limited Government submitted a total of 102,730 signatures, according to the numbers in Bellamy’s affidavit. Thurston’s office said on July 10, however, that the group had not submitted a statement, signed by the sponsor, attesting that paid canvassers received a copy of the office’s initiative-rules handbook and had been trained on the rules for gathering signatures, which is required under Ark. Code Ann. §7-9-111(f)(2). Based on this, Thurston rejected the group’s submission in its entirety, saying the group had failed to meet the 90,704 signature threshold.
On Wednesday, the high court rejected an argument from Attorney General Tim Griffin that the secretary of state wasn’t required to count any signatures due to Arkansans for Limited Government’s failure to include the signed statement. Instead, the court ordered Thurston to count all signatures gathered by volunteer canvassers and report that total to the court by next Monday.
What this means for the abortion amendment is unclear, but it basically boils down to two possibilities (apologies for the statutory references — for background, read our previous reporting on the legal twists and turns here, here, here and here):
- If the Supreme Court determines that the failure to include the signed statement under §7-9-111(f)(2) requires disqualification of all signatures gathered by paid canvassers under §7-9-126(a)(8), then the amendment’s sponsors are at least 2,117 signatures short of the required total (or more, if the remaining 912 signatures aren’t allowed either). In that situation, no cure period would be granted, and the fight to get abortion on the ballot this November would seem to be over.
- On the other hand, if the Supreme Court orders Thurston to proceed under the rules of §7-9-111(d), then the group would get a cure period, even if the signatures collected by paid canvassers are disallowed.
Of the two paths, the second appears more consistent with the language of the statutes and longstanding rules of statutory interpretation. The first, however, is what Griffin and Thurston are urging. And only the Arkansas Supreme Court has the power to decide which path to take.
UPDATE: Arkansans for Limited Government released the following statement:
We appreciate the Secretary of State for complying with the Arkansas Supreme Court’s order to count the signatures submitted in support of the Arkansas Abortion Amendment, which found that AFLG volunteers collected at least 87,675 signatures — more than originally estimated.
Since the Secretary of State already had completed his initial count of the signatures gathered by paid canvassers in support of the Amendment, the Secretary has now finished his initial count of signatures for the Amendment. The combined total of paid and volunteer signatures is 102,730. This is well above the number required to move to the next stage of the Secretary’s certification process.
Our optimism remains alive but cautious as we wait for the Arkansas Supreme Court to issue further guidance.
As we’ve made clear since July 10, when the Secretary of State unlawfully attempted to disqualify the Amendment, we are confident that, given the facts of this case and the law, the Amendment should move forward to the next stage of the certification process. We believe that the voices of more than 102,000 Arkansans deserve to be heard.