State Agencies & Govt'l Affairs- House

Colleagues, hopefully this won't take nearly as long as the morning hour, um, what what House Bill 1221 does. This is a, a short, simple bill dealing with our state's initiative system. What it does is it simply clarifies that a ballot title that has been certified by the Attorney General and the signatures that have been collected for that ballot title are only valid during the election cycle in which they are approved and gathered respectively. In other words, you couldn't get a ballot, you couldn't get a title approved now in the year 2025 and then gather signatures for 3 years or 4 years or 5 years and put it on the ballot in 2028 or 2030 for that election. You would have to use it for the upcoming election, the 2026 election. This is really not a significant change in the law because this is historically how the process has always worked customarily, this, there has never been um an attempt to carry over signatures or ballot titles from one election cycle to the next, um, so I don't think it it it basically codifies a long-standing practice. There's an important reason that we should go in and do this, and that is that allowing initiatives to carry over for more than one election cycle. Would almost certainly result in a massive increase in mistakes, inaccurate signatures, and or downright fraud. Everybody knows that. It's just natural, voters move from one county to another, voters move out of state, voters become deceased over time. Voters become ineligible to vote for for other reasons. These sorts of things happen routinely and if you spread this process out over, you know, this process that normally takes place within a two-year cycle and you spread it out over a longer period of time, you just increase the amount of those sorts of things happening. We already have a huge, huge problem in our state with duplicate signatures. Allow me to explain in 2024, I'll give you one example on the Arkansas medical marijuana amendment. There were 5,839 duplicate signatures. Think about that for a second. It takes just over 90,000 signatures to get a constitutional amendment on the ballot. If 5800 of your 90,000 signatures are duplicates, that is 6.5% of the total required. Imagine if we had an election and then the state Board of Election commissioners did an audit after the election, and they found that 6.5% of the people who voted actually voted twice. Duplicate. There would be outrage all across the state. People would be saying that was an election that was rigged and frankly they would be right. Um, the second thing I want to, and that, and that, by the way, is not particularly uncommon. I can give you, um, other examples in, in 2020, the redistricting amendment contained over 2300 duplicate signatures, um, in 2018, the minimum wage uh act included over 1500 duplicate signatures. The term limits amendment that same cycle contained over 5200 duplicate signatures. So this is a serious problem. The second thing I would point out is that This bill improves the ballot title review process by just limiting it to a two-year cycle. Um, the reason for that is the, the ballot title review process is very complicated and the legal sufficiency of a title could can very often hinge on the meaning of a single word or phrase, and because the General Assembly meets at a minimum once every 2 years when we're down here we pass laws, we repeal laws. We amend and change existing laws. Often we make over 1000 changes to the law in a 4-month period. And when you do that. If a if a section of the code is, is mentioned in a ballot title, a simple change in the law can change the entire meaning of that ballot title, so it's really not fair to the voters who the ballot title review process is designed to protect because they rely on those titles being legally sufficient and not misleading, and it's also not fair, frankly, to the groups that sponsor these issues to go out and spend, you know, thousands of hours gathering sign. spending tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars promoting an issue that could then be rendered moot by a simple change in the law rendering their ballot title um invalid. So that's, that's essentially what the bill does, and I'd be happy to answer any questions. Representative Ray has explained the bill. Representative Collins, you're recognized. Thank you, Representative Ray. I guess, um, all of these things that you mentioned, um, are Reasons I would think that groups don't try to get the signatures so early in advance. They're incentivized to not have the law changed to where it, uh, you know, invalidates what they're trying to do. They also are incentivized to not have people move so that their signatures are invalid and they certainly are incentivized not to have duplicate signatures because those duplicates get thrown out. I mean, we know the numbers of duplicates because they're not counted twice. So I guess, and then you mentioned at the outset that this isn't really something that happens, and I'm assuming that's because it wouldn't be in their interest to do that, something that would hurt their own interests. I guess my point with all this is since they're already incentivized not to abuse the process in this way because it actually just hurts them. Why do we really need this bill? Sure, I, I guess I would make two points in response to that. Um, the first being, I, I actually believe there are incentives in the law to gather duplicate signatures. All you have to look at is the cure period. The cure period provides a really perverse incentive for people to gather as many signatures as possible, no matter whether they're valid or not, uh, because if they reach that threshold to qualify for the cure period. They get extra time. It it would be like if uh your, your assignment for school were due on Friday and you turned it in and you filled out 70% of the sheet and the teacher said, Well, you filled out enough, we'll give you another week to work on it. So I do believe there is an uh in the system that, that, that leads people to gather duplicate signatures, um, but to the other reason why is, why is this necessary in the last election cycle with a lot of these petition groups, and it was not one group in particular, it was many, many different groups. We saw a Desire and an effort to circumvent The rules of the process, uh, in a way that we've not really seen before and, and there was shatter online about um Groups trying to do this that I that I saw on social media, um, and also there were some groups that circulated petitions but did not turn them in. And I don't mind sharing with you. I fear that groups may try to take signatures that they gathered for a previous issue and passed them off on a future issue and so um I think we should do what we can to guard against that. OK, that would, if I believe you would agree that that is already not allowed under current law, so that's a separate violation that this would not solve, but the other thing, um, I guess I would say with this is, don't you think that a disadvantages the more grassroots groups that need more time as opposed to the Highly funded outside uh groups that Many people would say are abusing the process. The people that hurts the most are the ones who are going door to door or place to place, just trying to get signatures on a petition just the ordinary people in Arkansas. I don't believe so because I believe that the ability to get the ability to collect signatures for an issue is heavily dependent on the popularity of that issue. If you're collecting signatures for an idea that has broad buy-in among the public, it will be very easy to gather signatures, and if You're collecting signatures for an issue that is unpopular, it will be very difficult to gather signatures. Um, that's just my opinion. Thanks. Representative Hawk, you recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Representative right to kind of go off what Representative Collins just said, um, there's nothing in this bill preventing the people from getting signatures every time the election year comes up, right? So if the people that got it one year, um, the initiative dies or fails, and they want to bring it back up. Those same people can sign up again, can't they, to, to, to be on the, the initiative for signatures, right that's absolutely right. And in fact, um, they could potentially run the exact same issue over again. Uh, they would just need to go get a clean ballot title approved by the Attorney General, which is the process we've had for many, many, many decades, and then they would need to go gather signatures for that, and there's nothing preventing anybody from putting their name on the, I mean, there's nothing that's gonna marginalize anybody. This is the same people can do it like we've been doing it just from election to election. That's right. This is the historical custom of how the process has been utilized. I'm just codifying what has been. custom for many, many decades. Thank you, sir. Representative Carr, did you have a question? OK. Seeing no further questions by the committee. Is there anyone signed up to speak for or against the bill? Looks like we have at least a couple of individuals signed up to speak against the bill. Steve. Crap Steve Grapp. All right, thank you for being here. If you would identify yourself for the record stating the organization who you're here representing today, and then you'll be recognized to present your testimony. Thank you, Mr. Chair and committee for having us here. I appreciate you letting me testify. Um Uh, and my name is Steve Grat. And I have an organization called Stand Up Arkansas. We're 100% grassroots. We don't get money from outside interests. Heck, we don't hardly get money inside the state of Arkansas because we get a lot of publicity saying, say no to the vote, even though there's nothing behind it. But I just wanted to share with the members of the committee just what it takes to get one of these ballot initiatives on The ballot without being a big financial backer. I'm gonna be the first person to say, um, Representative Ray, I'd love to work with you. I think we should take paid canvassing out of the, I think that that's a problem. There's a, the core of what the direct democracy should be. Is the people holding the legislator accountable or presenting a bill that they believe in. And if we don't have the 70,000 or 92,000 or 55,000 signatures we need. It shouldn't get on the ballot. Because it really comes down to what The pure reason for doing it is. When the Learns Act came up, It was signed into law. And the following Sunday night, like 4 days later, we held a Zoom call and asked anybody that wanted to organize against this for a referendum. And with very little notice, we had 85 people, mostly teachers on that call. And we decided to do it the right way. Or at least what we interpret to be as the right way. And When we look at the Constitution, I passed out some Uh, some things that we're worried about. And in the Constitution, I know you all know it, so I'm not trying to like down talk, but I do want to Read a couple of lines. Article One, right out of the gate says. The legislative power of the people of this state shall be vested. In a in a general assembly, which shall consist of the state and House of Representatives, and I, I looked up what vested means. That means we the people have the power. And we give it to the General Assembly. But it goes on to say, we also reserve the power. At their own option to approve or reject at the polls any entire act or any item of an appropriation bill. That means that it's our power, we loan it to the General Assembly, but we reserve that power for this purpose. We have the authority, not the general assembly. In this purpose. And what we've seen over the last several years is this body. Making it more difficult for grassroots organizations to hold you accountable or to present the initiatives that we want on the table to the body. Separate us out from special interests, million dollar invest campaigns talk, think about the people that are in your district. And I'm really here to talk about 1222, but 12:21 is important because it's unconstitutional. The House of Representatives and the Senate does not have the constitutional authority. To put More on our make it harder for us. We've been fighting these in the courts, we're waiting on the Supreme Court to see it. It's just been sitting there for months and months and months. But it's tough. We formed the 85 people formed capes and I'm sure y'all have all heard of caps. And we and we didn't have attorneys. We couldn't get attorneys to help us because they were afraid of the retribution from the government. So we had to write the bill ourselves and then go to the Attorney General and get it rejected, and I'm telling you, the first one was bad, y'all. I'm not an attorney. But we got better at it and we worked and we resubmitted and resubmitted and resubmitted, but by the time it was done, we had 50 days of the 90 that we were allowed. And we still got 55,000 signatures. We did not pay one canvasser. We're not trying to duplicate the signatures. And we rallied, but most importantly, the night before turning Sunday night, we finally got these things counted and ready to go. We thought we had the signatures and at 3 o'clock in the morning, we realized we were 6700 signatures short. We only had 50 days. At 7 o'clock, we started putting calls out to every county in the state to help us go get more signatures and by 5 o'clock we had had the state of Arkansas collect another 67 or 6000 signatures and deliver them and get them. um, validated. In about an 8-hour period on a work day on a Monday. And there were hundreds of people from across the state of Arkansas. That same group built a coalition. Now we have about 10 attorneys that are on our board or that is an advisors to us. Now we have our organization and our grassroots in 63 of the 75 counties. And I want to share this map. This is the before our kids map for the education initiative that did not have one single paid person on it. All volunteers. And we, and we collected 77,000 signatures in less time than any of the other ballots because we got ours rejected more and more. And y'all, we didn't have money. We had less than $25,000 but there was over $2 million spent to stop us from getting the signature y'all, y'all heard it, stop. The sign. The special interest is trying to stop, and if you go look at who was on that special interest, you're going to be real surprised at what government officials have tied to making it, making that not get on the ballot. And some of the arguments, the cost. There is a cost to this if you're a grassroots organization. We had to print 144 page bill, 100 or 100,000 signatures. The cost on printing was $40,000 alone. There is cost and if you're gonna, and some of these small groups, we know, let's say we wanted to do at-large voting. You're not going to educate the public, raise the money, get the organization, and get the signatures in a year and a half. You're not going to do it. You're going to have to start and you're going to have to build it out. And you're going to have to be able to raise the money and build the organizations and educate the public if you do it right, like we're trying to do it. And if you say it, it ends at, at this point and the attorney general doesn't let us get it approved and we only have 6 months, then we have to start over. We're never going to get anything accomplished. Let's think about the spirit. And if you start talking about duplicate signatures, that is a, that means nothing. It's not a vote. Because how these things are registers go to the Secretary of State's office and once they check off that someone has signed, if there's a duplicate signature, it just doesn't get counted. And, and the fact that someone puts a duplicate signature, isn't the groups trying to go out there and do that. We're not going, hey, sign this twice. That's up to the individuals and I'm telling you, most of them are like, I can't remember if I signed this or not, or I can't remember if this is the one I signed 4 months ago from the last election. So some of those duplicate signatures are there because people are just confused or it's happening too fast, or there's just some information. And the cure period. The, the General Assembly is already tried to attack the cure period, and that is under, under legal checks right now. So now we're trying to put a law that double downs on the law you've already passed. It's, you know, all this criteria is trying to make it more difficult for the people of Arkansas to, to gather and to organize. Yo It's amazing to see how many people out there are coming out of the woodworks because they finally feel like they have a voice. There's apathy across the state of Arkansas. We are ranked dead last in civic or civic engagement, we're dead last in voter engagement. And we need to find a way to engage the citizens of Arkansas, and this is the way to do it. Yeah, we had 8 different ballot initiatives going across the state of Arkansas because they feel like they weren't being heard. And now they feel like they do have a reason or a way to have their voice heard and at least have the legislator know what the will of the people is are did that wrong. But y'all please, this is an unconstitutional bill. You're trying to put rules on something that that we reserve the right, you're trying to take our power away and I just want to know what the what what is everybody scared of? Why don't you let us do what we're trying to do, and I appreciate the time. I'm open for questions. Most of the arguments are coming in 1222, but I'm open for any questions. Thank you, Mr. DA Committee. Do I see any questions of Mr. Grab, uh, Representative Hawk, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you for your testimony, sir. Uh, and I do appreciate what you do. I mean, it takes a lot of work to go out and and do these. You've mentioned multiple times that this is unconstitutional. Is that your opinion? Is that the AG opinion, or is that like your attorney's opinion? Well, we've talked to attorneys about it and there's, we have um we have 6 filed for that reason right now and we're waiting for them to go through. So, yes, it. Is my opinion and the attorney's opinion, but Yeah, I, I, I pretty good idea that it's Supreme Court hadn't said it's unconscious. OK, I just want to make sure on that, and I'm sorry, no, you're fine, and just because you, you had said it a couple of times, I want to make, make that clear. Um, I think that it's going to be overturned because it's unconstitutional. Got you. OK. Uh, my next, my next question, and once again, just staying on this bill. I know you want to talk about 22, and we'll get to that in a little bit, but um, these are just signatures for a single ball. initiatives for a single year. I mean, when I, when I'm looking at this just on, on the basis on what you guys did with capes. You go out and get, you go out and get your signatures, you're not going to hold on to those signatures for the next go around, right? So when it, when you go to this bill, it's just from year to year, correct? It just seems like everything that you said, well may be valid, it doesn't all apply just to this bill, correct? the one thing it does, the one single thing and there are small grassroots groups. Just don't have money that need to be able to say, we want this on the 28th ballot and start working on it now and start working on the legal language and getting approved by the Attorney general. They're saying it straight up out front. I've talked with the Secretary of State's office. The same problems that they go through right now as far as someone dying, moving, duplicates, that doesn't change if it's, if they count them right now or if they count them in 28. If someone moved and then I've been asked. Also, well, what if they change their mind between now and 4 years later. The signature doesn't say that they're for or against anything. The signature just says that they think it should be put to the vote of the people. We have people that are against and for signing the signature. just says that they think it should be put to the vote of the people. We have people that are against and for signing the signatures. So thank you for your time. Appreciate you thank you Mr. Chair. Seeing no further questions by the committee, Mr. Grapp, thank you for being here. Looks like we also have Kwami Abdul Bay signed up to speak against the bill. He got caught in a meeting. Sorry. He's not here. He got caught in the meeting. OK, it's being announced that he got caught in the meeting and couldn't be here and then we have Roan Kuta. Signed up to speak against the bill if you would state your name for the committee and then any organization who you may be here representing and you're recognized to present your testimony. Mr. Chair. Thank you for allowing me the time to speak today. My name is Ronan Kuda. Um, I'm representing myself. I have been affiliated with numerous organizations, um tasked with collecting these signatures, I'm also part of a few different um activist groups at my school. I go to Central and I am currently a senior, but um I've been asked many times to to say that. I do not represent the school. I only represent myself. So I'd like to begin by um Talking about my experience voting for the first time. This November was my first time voting. I turned 18 over the summer. And I remember walking into the voting booth and not being sure exactly what to do and the people there were very, very helpful, and they made sure that I got my ID out. They made sure that I was registered. They made sure of all of these things, and as soon as I sat down to fill out my ballot, I remember um going through the ballot with relative ease, knowing who the people are, I am quite involved with the people who were on the ballot, ballot, so I know who is who, but I do remember. There was one moment voting that evoked the most emotion for me, and it was the moment where I got to the ballot signatures portion of the ballot. And or or the the ballot petition part of the ballot. And the reason it evoked so much emotion in me is because over the summer I had actually uh spent my summer collecting signatures for all 6 major ballot petitions across the state of Arkansas. I collected for the pink tax I collected for the educational rights amendment. I collected for the marijuana reform. I collected for the Freedom of Information Acts, and I collected for the abortion rights protection. Amendment and when I got to that portion of the ballot, all I could think of was the defeat and the heartbreak that I felt when I read the news reports of these ballots being shot down by the Supreme Court in one way or another because the signatures gathered were declared on um invalid. And we're completely voided. I remember the day that the report came out about the abortion amendment and a lot of people were not very surprised by it myself, I, I was personally very surprised by it because I saw the numbers that we had. We had over 90,000 signatures, which is what we needed, and there was no cure period afforded for the abortion rights group. Furthermore, I remember the marijuana petition. It was actually on the ballot and it felt so degrading. To Put my name next to the yes on the ballot and, and, and vote for the marijuana reform petition, knowing that my signature and that my vote would not be counted because the petition was entirely thrown out, mere weeks before the election. So I, I'll dispense with my emotions in that respect, and I'll talk about my actual positions on this. Um, in my experience gathering signatures, I've noticed a few things. Um, the people who are affected by legislation that makes it harder to gather petitions are not the uh lobbying and corporate groups that fund the initiatives. They are the people who actually collect the signatures. I had experience going to the most rural and uh least populated parts of the state, knocking on people's Doors on Sunday afternoons trying to get them to sign different petitions so that they can exercise their civic duty. I registered like 30 people to vote. This process is grueling. There's sweat, there's blood, and there's tears involved with all of the volunteers and advocates that go all across the state to collect signatures for these petitions that are then thrown out after regulations have been passed after technicalities have been brought up. It is genuinely the most grueling and heartbreaking experience that I've had with any political movement or any political development in my entire life, and I understand that I have not lived a lot of life, but it is, it is genuinely the most heartbreaking thing that I can imagine. Now Before I uh present here today, I did read both bills, um, but not in detail. I listened more to uh Representatives Ray's statements about the bill, and I also listened to Hawke's Representative Hawkes, the fence of the bill, and I wanted to respond to a few of the points that were made. Um, at one point, um, Representative Ray said that it is not fair to the sponsors of these groups that the ballot title could be rendered invalid after signatures had been collected and after funding had been dumped into the petitions. I want to begin by saying, first of all, I think that this is a very cynical and quite frankly, pretty disconnected point to make about our political system. We should not be emphasizing the interests of private lobbying groups. We should be emphasizing the interests of the Arkansan people and how they relate to the government that they live under and the government that they should be able to contribute to. I understand that um. There's millions and millions of dollars involved with filing these petitions and trying to get them passed, but it really is the people of Arkansas who volunteer their time and their energy to try to get these issues on the ballot. Um 2nd, secondly, I would like to address um that the point that there are perverse incentives to collect as many signatures as possible, given the um Uh, cure period. I think that this is also a profoundly disgusting sentiment. The cure period is enshrined in our Constitution. The cure period has been afforded to Arkansans for the ballot petition for as long as any of you have been alive. It is I, I have never personally had the displeasure of being around people who so deeply disdained the values that are enshrined in our state constitution and so deeply disdain the values of democracy and the values of liberty and the values of representation within our government. Now I understand that not all of you here may agree with that bill and I sincerely hope that you take action to prevent it from passing. But I want to reiterate that this is just one bill or one or two bills in a long string of bills that is making it harder and harder for Arkansans to participate in our democratic institutions. I think that um We can do better, and I think that if we really care about the interests of the people of Arkansas, we need to prevent these bills from passing. Amend them, throw them out, whatever we need to do to make sure that these bills do not have serious negative implications on how Arkansans relate to their government and how they can interact with the ballot petition initiatives. We need to do that. Um, I will, uh, see the rest of my time to questions. All right, thank you very much. Committee, are there any questions? OK, thank you for your comments. And is there anyone else? All right, it doesn't appear that there's anyone else signed up to speak for or against the bill. This time, I would recognize Representative Ray to close for your bill, Representative Ray, you're recognized. Oh Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm glad I had a lid on that cup. Um It was during the testimony, it was said that the claim was made several times that this bill is unconstitutional, and I just want to spend a moment on that topic because Like all of you, when I was sworn in this term and each of the terms prior to this, I swore an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States and the state of Arkansas, and that is an oath that I take seriously as I am certain that each and every one of you do as well. The state constitution expressly allows for laws to prohibit or punish fraud in obtaining signatures and filing petitions. That's in Article 5, Section 1. It says, but laws shall be enacted prohibiting and penalizing perjury, forgery, and all other felonies and other fraudulent practices in the securing of signatures or the filing of petitions. I explained in a modest amount of detail how allowing for the signature gathering process to spill over from one election cycle to the next will undoubtedly increase the number of inaccurate and or fraudulent petitions that we already have issues that are being submitted that have a very significant number of duplicate signatures of invalid signatures. I could give you. Many, many examples, um, furthermore, the state Supreme Court held in 2015 in the case of McDaniel versus Spencer. That They upheld a series of statutory requirements on page signature gathering, for example, stating that they aided in the proper use of these rights, the the those these rights being the initiative process, and I explained how this bill is actually in furtherance of those rights. It's in furtherance of how they are to be used properly, not improperly. Um, there's also the 1956 case. Washburn versus Hall, where the ballot title review process was challenged. It was also people said at the time that that was unconstitutional. It was upheld for the exact same reason I just mentioned. It was in furtherance of Citizens Amendment 7 rights, and it aided in the implementation of the petition process, and so I do not view this bill as unconstitutional, and with that I am closed for the bill and as a member of the committee, I move to pass. Representative Ray has closed for his bill and as a member of the committee has made a motion to pass. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right, seeing no discussion on the motion, we have a motion pending of do pass all those in favor say aye. All those opposed habit, congratulations, Representative Wright, you've passed your bill. Representative Ray, you're now recognized to present House bill. 1222. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. House Bill 1222. This bill amends our current statute dealing with the attorney general's authority to review ballot titles. Yes. Representative Ray, I hate to interrupt you, but my understanding is that you have an amendment. That's right. There is an amendment. Sorry. All right, I believe the amendment has been passed out. want to give the committee just a moment to review that. It doesn't look that extensive, but Alright, looks like everybody's had. time to review the amendments, Representative Bray, this time I'll recognize you to present the amendment. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The amendment is pretty simple. It just adds a severability clause, and it also rewards the title to more adequately reflect what the bill does, and with that I would take any questions on the amendment if there are none. I'd move for adoption of the amendment. All right, any questions by the committee on the amendment? Seeing no, Representative Ray has made a motion to adopt the amendments during discussion on that motion, seeing none all those in favor of the motion to adopt the amendment, say I. All those opposed, I have it, the amendment has been adopted. Representative Roy, you're recognized to present the bill as amended. OK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As I was stating under our current law, the Attorney General can only find a ballot title to be legally insufficient if it is misleading or designed in a way that is so flawed that it has the opposite effect of what it purports to do. Um, it's very important that we have a ballot title review process if we did not have a ballot title review process at all. It would result in a lot of chaos. The ballot title review process is there to protect the voter who deserves to be able to read these issues when they're on the ballot, understand what they are um and have them presented in a way that is straightforward and fair. Um Unfortunately, I don't believe that our ballot title process as it currently exists is strong enough to protect the voters of our state from other forms of a very problematic ballot language. So this bill would do two things. First, it would give the attorney general when reviewing ballot titles, the authority to reject a ballot title if it were found to be in conflict with the US Constitution or with federal statute. And the second thing the bill would do is it would prevent a sponsor from um submitting more than one conflicting initiative petitions at the same time, which closes an egregious loophole in the process that led to abuse of this process last session. So the, the reasons that I'm proposing this. First of all, uh, the change on the ballot title review process. As we all know, the US Constitution is the supreme law of the land. It supersedes anything that we pass in this chamber or anything in our state constitution. We cannot pass anything that is enacted contrary to it, or it'll be struck down. It would not benefit the voters of this state if they had to weigh in on proposals that ran contrary to the US Constitution. It would not benefit the sponsors who, as I mentioned before, spend months and months gathering signatures and spend raise and spend significant sums of money to advance measures that are ultimately just going to be struck down because they violate the US Constitution or conflict with federal statute and the supremacy Clause. Um, as with our current law. A sponsor feels aggrieved by the Attorney General's decision on a particular ballot title. They can always petition the Supreme Court for proper relief. That's currently in the law and is unchanged by this bill. The second change I want to explain why I'm proposing this. Preventing multiple sponsor submissions with the same text will help prevent groups from trying to subvert our ballot petition process. And I'm gonna explain, I'm gonna spend a minute explaining this because it can be difficult to follow if you're not really familiar with the process. When a sponsor submits a ballot title for the Attorney General to review what they are requesting is a formal opinion from the Attorney General. Uh, many of you, I'm sure have have requested a formal opinions from the Attorney general. You know that is a very detailed legal process. It can take months and months and months, uh, to render an opinion because there's a lot of legal research involved, a lot of case law that has to be researched, uh, you know, and it can take a long time depending on the complexity of the issue. But for these opinions, for the ballot titles that are being reviewed, the law only allows for 10 days for the opinion to be rendered. So when someone submits a ballot title for review. The law gives it the utmost precedents. It takes precedence over your request for an AG opinion. It takes precedence over my request for an AG opinion. It is fast tracked. And 10 days is the amount of time that the Attorney General has, so it's put on an expedited timeline, but what we saw last cycle was there were some groups that were unhappy that their ballot title was not. approved on the 1st try or the 2nd try, which is not uncommon over many attorneys general going back decades. And as a result, They submitted 8 issues at one time. 4 proposals of the same constitutional amendment and 4 proposals of the same initiated act, all with the same underlying text. What sort of problem does this create? Keep in mind, the Attorney general has 10 days to render an opinion. No matter how many of these things are submitted. And so they were trying to flood the system. They were trying to flood the zone with all these proposals in order to get them approved faster. All that does is it waters down the ability of the Attorney General's office to thoroughly review and vet each proposal sufficiently. And I think that is a terrible and disrespectful disservice to the voters who rely on the ballot title review or the ballot title review process and rely on that ballot title to be legally sufficient. It is the voters after all who this process is primarily intended to protect so we saw an egregious abuse of the ballot title review process by some of the sponsors. Uh, I would note this has never been done before and it's not how our system is supposed to work. It's sort of like if you were taking a test in college and Instead of just writing your answer and turning it in, you wrote down 5 different answers and then left a note on the test asking the teacher to tell you which one of those answers is correct. That is not how the system is supposed to work. And the reason it doesn't work like that. It is because the courts have consistently held over the years that it is the job of the sponsor. To submit an appropriately summarized measure. To summarize the measure in a way that meets all of the legal requirements outlined in the law. It is not the Attorney general's responsibility to conduct pro pro bono legal work on behalf. Of a group or an individual submitting a ballot title. And there are functional problems with this too. Beyond the general gaming of the system that I just outlined. If the Attorney General were to approve more than one of these ballot titles as legally sufficient. In which case, in this case, they actually did, then you would have multiple versions of the same issue that are approved to be circulated, which creates even more confusion for the voters. And squanders AG Resources. So that is an explanation of the bill and why I'm proposing it and we'll be happy to try and answer any questions. Representative Ray has explained the bill. Are there any questions by the committee, Representative Cloudy, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Representative Ray, I am, uh, my questions are about this round of questions at least about the first part, um, they give the AG um the authority to determine a constitutional conflict. I guess my question is, can you just explain a little bit how this interacts with the power that the Supreme Court already has to review ballot titles, um, for such a conflict. Well, I suppose someone could could bring a challenge, um, on a ballot title. Uh, on the constitutionality of a ballot title to the Supreme Court. Um, I don't see any reason why they couldn't do that, um, but I think it would be beneficial for the process to have the attorney General vet these on the front end because, you know, Once you, like I said, once you get really far down the line, you've gone through the trouble of The voter, you know, the voters having to gather signature or sorry, the voters having to sign on these things, you go through the process of the sponsors having to exert all of this effort and energy on something. You just heard from an individual who was who had spent time gathering signatures and was very upset that it had been tossed out at the last minute. I think it's just better to get the process buttoned up on the front end before it gets, you know, It's unfortunate. I know for all these groups to have their ballot or their issue tossed off the ballot, just, you know, a couple of weeks or a month or two before the election, because then they've raised all that money, spent all that money, gone through all the the trouble and effort of advancing their issue only to have it be declared ineligible, so I just think it's better to deal with it on the front end. Thank you. I appreciate that just for what it's worth from the groups that I've heard from, they are unanimously against moving this, but I appreciate your um response if the AG Finds it unconstitutional. What recourse is there then for a group? Could they, I mean, I guess the way I'm reading it, it says they could refile or they could appeal that decision to the Supreme Court, um, I worry a little bit that this is taking away power that we have already given to the Supreme Court and putting it in the hands of the AG alone. That's part of my concern. Yeah, the way the ballot title review process works currently is if a sponsor feels aggrieved by the Attorney General's decision. They, they do have the right to appeal that to the Supreme Court. And so that, that avenue to appeal would continue to exist. Representative Collins, you're recognized. Yeah, my question's along the same lines. It, it really seems to me like this is a clear, you know, violation of the separation of powers, you're effectively making the Attorney General into a court interpreting constitutional law, that's not the proper role for the Attorney general. I don't know that they're suited or staffed for that, um, and then I mean you allow them to allow someone who doesn't like the uh decision to appeal, and that makes them sound like an appellate court. I just think. This is, this is very uh strange and uh and it really is a problem in my mind with, with uh the separation of powers where the courts interpret the law, executive branch is supposed to interpret and execute the law. I'm sorry, execute the law. I, I would argue that the AG's office has ample resources to determine the constitutionality of this, we routinely ask the Attorney General to weigh in on matters of constitutionality, uh, both in opinions and with bills and all sorts of things, so, um, I, I don't think they're gonna have any issue vetting ballot titles for conflicts with the Constitution. Well, I understand, but I think that the big difference. is that in all of those other situations you're talking about, it's non-binding. This is a binding effect of law when the Attorney general rules, they reject the ballot title, and it's not an an advisory attorney General's opinion like the the advisory attorney General's opinions we ask for as elected officials. It's also not advisory like when a legislator asks about the constitutionality in the opinion of the Attorney General about some proposed bill. This is actually having the force of law behind it, so that's why it's different. To me, wouldn't you agree? I understand your point and respectfully disagree. Thanks. All right, I also note that we have the Attorney General's office or representatives from the Attorney General's office. In attendance, Mr. Watson. Would you, uh, like to speak to Representative Collins's question. I do think it's a I do think that it's an interesting point. Did not know you were on crutches, Mister Watson, I might not have asked you to do that had I known. I. I do think Representative Collins, uh, has an interesting question about whether or not it essentially usurps the Supreme Court's power to opine on the constitutionality of these measures by requiring the Attorney General to do that, uh, when in fact that'd be a decision for the Supreme Court. So I'd like to hear your opinion and explanation on that. If you don't mind, so you're, if you would just state your name and of course, who you're here representing and you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee. Noah Watson. I'm the Deputy Attorney general for the opinions in FOIA division. Um, so Representative Collins, uh, in answer to your question, I You see, with, with the as it currently is with misleading requirement, we still, the Attorney General is interpreting the law as the Supreme Court has interpreted that term as this body has enacted laws related to that term. And so the extension to federal law is I don't think this is an extension of the Attorney General's power. Instead, what it does is just as Representative Ray said, brings this constitutional question to the front instead of the end of the line, so that. We don't have unconstitutional provisions in our Constitution after the ratification because that would be the only time the challenge could actually arise. Well, and thank you for that, but again, I guess I would say unless it's a court, it's not really the binding interpretation. The Supreme Court's the one that has the authority to bind with its interpretation. It's if it's the Attorney General's opinion, I mean, that's really just an opinion, except for in this law, right? Under understood and uh again, as Representative Ray explained that that's what the appellate process is for. So if someone disagrees with the Attorney general's decision, they can of course go straight to the Supreme Court, right? They get special treatment and you go straight to the Supreme Court under Amendment 7, to have the Supreme Court make that determination. Mr. Watson, we do ask the Attorney General to opine on the constitutionality of measures pretty routinely, do we not? Fair enough. Thank you for that. Uh, looks like we also have Representative Hawk, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Representative Wright, going back to the multiple initiatives being submitted, um, I agree, we, we, we don't need to flood the system, but let's let's hypothetically say somebody puts one in, it gets rejected. This bill's not going to prevent them from submitting another one, correct? No, it would not prevent them from doing that. If you look on page 2, starting on um around line 13. This is where this section comes into play, and it says uh. Uh, starting on line 15, except as follows. So these are the exceptions to the multiple submissions of, of conflicting measures, um. is if an initiative petition or referendum petition is certified under law, sponsor may submit, um, after the date of the next general election so they could submit it again the next cycle or B. B says if an initiative petition or referendum is rejected under this section. They may resubmit it. So if, if the first version of their title is rejected, they can resubmit it. That, that is how the process has always worked. That is always how the process has worked. This new um This sort of novel idea of submitting 8 different measures at one time was basically just, in my opinion, design to short circuit the review, the 10 day review process. Um, and so there are um allowances in here for people to be able to resubmit petition, or sorry, a ballot titles that have been rejected or if the election cycle passes and theirs is not adopted by the voters, they can try again. OK, thank you. Representative Wooldridge, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um, I'm not sure if this is for Representative Ray or the AG's office, but you had talked about the Attorney General's opinion. What's the turnaround time for an opinion. So if I requested one today, how long does that take to get? So, the way that we calculate that is, is all opinions, so including these 10 day requirements, there are some other statutory deadlines. If you look at all of those, we're at about 50 days right now for all opinions turnaround time. OK, one follow up. Would this take some sort of different priority if this were enacted or is it still fall into that 50 day window and are you speaking of uh ballot title opinions, uh, so yes, whenever we receive a ballot title opinion, it goes to the front of the line because of that 10 day and, and it would still go to the front of the line. Here, the difference would just be one sponsor would not be able to submit multiple of those that come to the front of the line all at the same time. Understood. Thank you, sir. And, and Representative Wooldridge to, to follow up on your question. It may be prudent for me to clarify, this does not prevent anyone from submitting multiple measures at the same time. All it prevents are conflicting measures. So if you want to submit a measure on taxes, a measure on education. A measure on health care, a measure on transportation, you can submit as many of these things as you want. What you can't do under this bill is submit multiple versions of the same underlying tax with different titles, uh, basically trying to subvert that 10 day window to get quicker approval. Representative Collins, you're recognized. Thank you. And my question actually is right on that topic. Um, so when you say conflicting measures, the definition of conflicting measures, I, I'm trying to wrap my head around it. One example of conflicting measures has covered the same subject matter and you gave some examples of things that would not be the same subject matter like taxes, education, etc. So are you saying that 2 measures dealing with education as broadly as education would be conflicting because education's a huge topic and there's, you know, it's a huge part of our budget. It's obviously there are ways that measures could have nothing to do with each other functionally, but both be about education. Would those be conflicting measures? No, I don't, I don't think those would conflict. I think if you uh just to create a hypothetical, if you were to submit a ballot title on the topic on the subject of teacher pay, which is clearly education, and then a ballot title on the topic of what curriculum is required to be taught in schools. Those would both be education related, but they're not conflicting in any way. They're just broadly You know, related. Well, that may not be conflicting in your interpretation, but by this they do cover the same subject matter, which is education, not further defined. So let me ask you another one. What about totally different curriculum measures, one dealing with certain, you know, English curriculum and one dealing with social studies curriculum. Are those conflicting measures? I'm not trying to be pedantic. I'm really trying to figure out what we're I understand, and it's a fair question. Look, I'm not the Attorney general. My, my opinion would be no, that those two things don't conflict, um, but, um, you know, ultimately that will, that will be a, a decision that the Attorney General renders in an opinion. Not a court. They don't interpret this, it could be. I mean, obviously if it were if the sponsor felt aggrieved, then they would have the right to uh petition the Supreme Court, and then the Supreme Court would make a determination. OK, and then on the same thing, see, I truly don't understand what it means contain different language. Why does that make something a conflicting measure with something else that the two measures contain different language. Uh, that is the definition, this definition of conflicting measure is used elsewhere in the code and so we are, I'm keeping the exact same definition as it exists elsewhere so that there's not competing definitions of what is a conflicting measure, and that's fine and that's a good, good practice, but I actually just don't know what it means. So if two measures contain different language, they're considered to be conflicting. I'm sorry, 22 measures that contain different language. are considered to be conflicting. That doesn't seem like what you would intend. I that is what it says. No, I'll tell you what, how this, how this played out you had. 4 different measures that were constitutional amendments submitted at one time, 4 different measures that were initiated acts submitted at the same time. And they all had the same underlying text, but the title, as I understand it, but the title varied. They submitted different variations of the title and so. That is, that is the definition that's what they're talking about is the definition of a conflicting measure. Well, I understand that, but I don't think that's what this actually says, but I, with what you're saying, I get, and I would be fine with that, but I don't think that's what C says here just FYI. All right, thank you. Representative Clowney, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair and maybe I just really wanna, uh I'm really bothered by that language too. Um, I'm grateful to representative Collins for pointing it out. Maybe the AG's office can weigh in here since y'all like I guess will be the ones interpreting it. Um, can you put some meat on the bones of cover the same subject matter, I mean, if that is what the text says, um, you know, Representative Ray, I appreciate you saying that you could appeal this to a court who may find it differently, but I think it would be perfectly fair to for a court to interpret this as meaning initiatives having to do with education. I think that's completely fair under what the text says here. So can the AG's office maybe shed a little light on that? I would start uh and yes, I'm on. OK, I would start by saying that there are 3 elements here that that have to be read together, so I Take your point that covered the same subject matter might be this broad umbrella of education, but when we move on, that all three of these have to be met, uh, they also have to be for the same purpose. I think that's where a lot of this is gonna diverge from the examples that have been given. So, you know, teacher salaries versus curriculum. These are not the same purpose within education, um, and then as you move down the line, that's, that, that's how that would get played out. So what if it were, say, to just to piggyback on the example of learns, repealing. We want to repeal the part of learned, some part of learns that has to do with curriculum. Another initiative from the same group say wants to repeal a part of loans that has to do with um educational freedom accounts, right? Um, Would those not be considered for the same general purpose to repeal parts of Les? Without seeing the specific language about for for any particular ballot title or ballot measure. I hesitate to, to, you know, opine prematurely on that, but um I just think if we're going to be sending this language to to a court to interpret if, as Representative Ray says parties feel aggrieved, right, if they want to use their constitutional right to appeal this, um. Well, surely we can come up with some tighter language that accomplishes what it is we're trying to accomplish, which I understand Representative Ray, the problem that you posed and wanting to find a solution to it. This feels entirely too broad. It feels like we are just opening the field for things to get rejected and really not even giving the Supreme Court any language to use to say. to help them meet exactly the situations that you're intending to. I, I would disagree with that, Representative Clowney. I appreciate Mr. Watson for pointing out what I should have, which is that these are 3 items in a list, and they're, it's 12 and 3. So if you read them all sequentially, I think it, it, you can envision in your head the hypothetical that you may be uh wanting an answer on and just apply those three things, um, it, it would have to meet all three. And what are the three prongs again? It's on page 2 line 30 to 33, it would be a cover the same subject matter. are for the same general purpose and contain different language in any part of their full text ballot titles or popular names. OK. Representative Rose, you're recognized. Thank you Mr. Chair Uh, yeah, I had two questions. The, the first you guys just kind of answered, which was it is all three of those, it's not any one of those three, it's all 3 of them included together. And the second one was we were talking about um you know, whether the Attorney general should be making these determinations or not, and I just want to make sure that I had the correct understanding that more or less for the vast majority of time since 1943, the Arkansas Attorney General has made these decisions under both Republican and Democrat, uh. administrations. Is that correct? That's right. The ballot title review process has been around for a long time. It has always been housed with the Office of the Attorney General, except for a two-year window in which it was moved to the state Board of Election commissioners, that was struck down by the Supreme Court and it was moved back in the 2023 session to the AG's office. All right, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Representative Clowney, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Does that include the AG's determination binding determination of whether a proposed initiative is unconstitutional. No, the Well that, that, that is, that is a new provision that's being proposed in this bill. Thank you. Yes, so it has not been in effect since 1943. Well, the review process has been in effect, since 1943. Well, the review process has been in, but not, not this provision that would, you're you're correct. Also states not just uh for a review of the constitutionality with the United States Constitution, but federal statutes as well, is that right? Yes, that's correct. And so someone sent me a Question About how this might affect. Marijuana given federal statutes. About the legality of marijuana at the federal level and proposed initiatives related to that subject in Arkansas, anybody got any opinions about that? Think like everything else if there's a federal statute that conflicts with what's being um proposed, then the Attorney General would have the ability to reject that ballot title. I do not think it would, it would not impact any existing laws that we have. This would obviously just be for new proposals. All right. Very good. Any other questions by the committee. All right, seeing no further questions by the committee. Thank you, Mr. Watson. Thank you, Representative Ray. We do have individuals signed up to speak for and against the bill, maybe actually just against the bill. It appears that Mr. Grapp has signed up to also speak against this bill, so Mister Grab, once again, if you would identify yourself for the record, state any organization you're here representing, and then you'll be recognized to present your testimony. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is Steve Graph. I'm with Standup Arkansas. Um I'm just confused. And I, I really this isn't being rhetorical. Because I've gone through Two sessions' worth of processes doing this. And the first thing we have had to do is go to the Attorney General, like they've done since 1940, whatever. For him to interpret whether it was good or not. And when we've met with their office, the explanation that was given to us was that they had to make sure that this would hold up in court. That's why the Attorney General looks through it to make sure that it's going to hold up in court and we go to collect these signatures and they're going to stand for what it is. And that the ballot Catle lines up, but just this last year. The marijuana petition went through that process and they had their bill looked at multiple times by the Attorney General and eventually moved, yet when that went to the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court said the Attorney General was wrong. And now we're talking about federal. Interpretation of the law. And we let the attorney General and the marijuana one is the perfect example because there's clearly multiple states with recreational marijuana. Yet if the Attorney General's opinion, opinion. Was that, well, this petition conflicts with federal law where you can't run it. That's the exact example that this is wrong. I don't want to keep saying unconstitutional because it hasn't been, but this is just wrong. And here's the thing, the excessive signature. Rejection, it runs, it makes it even harder for the grassroots volunteer to to get it together. And it Especially in the referendum process when you have 90 days to get something done and they, every 10 days they reject it. So, this is a threat to voting rights. It, it dramatically increases the likelihood of voter signatures being thrown out because you're telling them upfront a reason to challenge it in court. You're giving the opponents of these bills. The Attorney General is giving them. opportunity. Now here's the thing. On these bills, And, and Representative Collins was talking about uh multiple Submissions. What keeps A group of people saying, well, we're going to form 8 ballot question committees and we're all going to do what I think that's wrong and I think what they're doing is wrong for the record. I don't think you should do that, but what keeps somebody from organizing and 8 different organizations doing something that's slightly different with the with the title. It, it, it doesn't make sense. This is a law that you're trying to pass that isn't going to circumvent anything. If people are going to find a way around it, they're going to find a way around it. This is also a disproportionate burden on grassroots. I want y'all all to think about this. You're making the the process more difficult, so it's going to take more money, more legal all these interests in order to get something even on the ballot and that disproportionately impacts the grassroots. People that are working to try to get this done. Also, this creates more legal challenges and political interference. Don't give the process. Something to make it more difficult. We should be working to help the citizens of Arkansas. So I have 3 key questions. And I want everybody to ask, is this benefit the people of Arkansas? or does it hurt? the people of Arkansas. And I'm talking about don't point of order. All right, Representative Crawford, what's your point of order? Would you either quit hollering. Oh yes, ma'am or get away from the microphone, please thank you. on just a second and I appreciate that point of order. Mr. Grab, we appreciate your testimony. Certainly nothing wrong with being passionate, uh, but we can hear just fine, so just uh just keep that in mind. Go ahead. All right. My apologies, Representative Crawford. Um What we're just trying to do is to keep government overreach. From Halting the process of the people getting involved in the process. We want more people involved. We want more people trying to impact the laws. We want more people trying to work with the representatives and what this is going to do is is going to cause people to say it's just too hard, and this is discouraging the process, not encouraging the process. And uh we've talked about all the other stuff y'all heard me, I'm not gonna repeat it. But please, this one really does overstep and it makes it almost impossible for grassroots organizations to get anything passed. With that, I'll I will open for questions and try not to be loud. All right, Representative Bennett, you're recognized. Thank you, Chairman. Um, thank you for testifying today. How will this impact volunteers? Well, we're all volunteers in our organization. So it's gonna impact us in multiple ways. The first is trying to get a bill that we can use to go out and collect signatures. The other is going through this process and it's tough and it's mentally draining, emotionally draining, and then you finally get a bill that the Attorney General says go get signatures, and we go out and get signatures and we spend 6 months in the heat of August. And then it gets thrown out anyway. And then we have to wait to to resubmit like it, it just makes the, makes it more difficult for volunteers, and it gives the special interest, a way to come in and be more powerful, and that's what we're trying to defeat, I think in this. You're OK. What is your experience with the current process of title approval. Um I think that between the referendum and the for our kids. We have submitted 7 or 8 times to the Attorney General. And it was always something a small interpretation that got it kicked back. And again it was an interpretation of the law that we disagreed with. I mean, we sat and had an argument about constitutional law with the Attorney General's office and Dean De Pippa, the constitutional professor at UALR Law School was on our side arguing that they were not right and what they were saying was unconstitutional. So this is just an interpretation and opinion, but now you're going to make it binding in law. All right. Any other questions by the committee. Seeing none, Mr. Grapp, thank you for your help. Representative Barry, you're recognized. Uh, thank you, Mr. Chair. Um, Ultimately, at the end of the day, the Secretary of State, the ones that have to verify all these. Signatures they're present here. I just wondering if they have any comments at all. That they'd like to share with the committee. Well I see him sitting back there, they're not exactly jumping up, but I'm gonna ask them to. If they don't mind to uh And I will say we've worked with the Secretary of State's office many, many times and they have always been the best to work with, so thank you. Once again, if you would just identify yourself for the record I'm Leslie Bellamy. I'm the director of elections for the Arkansas Secretary of State's office. Uh, I really feel on this part of the the petition process, we don't. Really too much get involved, we'll take whatever's approved and then we just simply verify the signatures. Um, and that's administratively what we're designed to do. We're not, we're not designed to approve a ballot title or the the wording of the ballot measure. Just wanted to give them an opportunity if they had anything to add to it. Thank you. Ms. Bellamy, is that, is that all you had? OK, thank you. All right, Mister Gray. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Next we have sign up to speak against the bill, Sam Watson. Mr. Watson, just identify yourself for the record in any organization you're here representing and then you're recognized to present your testimony. Yes, sir. Thank you, Mr. Chair and thank you to the committee. My name is Sam Watson. I'm the content director for for our people, and you may recognize the name we were behind uh the Arkansas abortion amendment last year, uh, I'll keep it short. I don't want to take up too much of your time or repeat too much what Mr. Grapp said, but we do think that this is an unconstitutional bill that would give the attorney General a substantial amount of gatekeeping power during a process which is already quite difficult. Um, I also want to note that Representative Ray, as he was describing in particular section 1, he kept referring to the ballot title process, which is indeed the section of code that that section is altering. But the specific line that he's adding is not use the term ballot title. It says that the Attorney General will compare quote the text of the proposal, not the ballot title, to the United States Constitution or existing federal law, so Representative Ray is, um, I'm not, I don't ascribe any, um, you know, negative, you may have just made that mistake, but that is a distinct difference, um, I actually used to work for you all in the BLR, so I'm pretty well versed in Parsing through legislative language like that, and I think that that is a very significant change indeed in that section of law. Uh, I also want to note that uh again, as I'm sure you're all aware again we did not prevail at the court, but as someone who was out there in the heat of July collecting signatures in that last manic push. I am so grateful that we got the chance to try. To bring our our ballot before the people of Arkansas and It takes time to bring those lawsuits if we feel that we're aggrieved at the at the outset against the attorney attorney General up to the Supreme Court. It takes money and grassroots organizations as Mr. Grapp pointed out several times don't tend to have a lot of money, don't tend to have a lot of time. And so this is really just adding a significant hurdle vested in one partisan, you know, he's elected, he runs on party grounds at the front of the process and really Just makes it much more difficult for the people to indeed rule in the state of Arkansas, so happy to take any questions. Thank you, Mr. Watson. Committee, are there any questions? Mr. Watson, all right, seeing none. Thank you, Mr. Watson. I appreciate your testimony. Thank you very much. And then last, it appears we have Mr. Roan Kuta, again, sir, you're recognized if you would go ahead and identify yourself again for the record, who you're representing and of course, uh, then you'll be recognized to present your testimony. Thank you, Mr. Chair. My name is Ron Kuda. Um, I am representing myself. Um, I will try to keep my testimony, um, shorter, more concise and more blunt than my last, um, I took a few notes on this bill. I'm going to pull them out. Um, I, I want to begin by saying I am, I'm relieved to see the pushback on this bill in particular because of its implications on the um process of our legal systems and the structure of our institutions and how they are balanced within each other, um, I think that a lot of my main concerns with this legislation have already been addressed, but I would like to, um, begin by uh at least contextualizing some of the issues that this bill is trying to address. Um, I understand that um Representative Ray thinks that it is a very A big concern that um numerous petitioners submitted multiple petitions of the same ballot title, uh, with the same purpose, um, last cycle to try to circumvent the 10 day process. I would like to contextualize this decision made on behalf or made by the petitioners. Um, I would, uh, like to say that this happened because the Attorney General delayed the CapeES initiative by at least 30 days before they were allowed to collect signatures for relatively benign reasons such as the size of fonts or very, very specific verbiage that don't, that doesn't really change the purpose of the um petition that was being fronted. I would like to contextualize why these people fronted all of these petitions that were of the same purpose and of the same title, um. So moving on, I would, I would like to address my, my big concern, and it is the possibility that this spill opens up for a complete um autocratic um taking over of the direct democracy system that we have in Arkansas. I understand that um the Attorney General has had the ability to reject or approve of ballot uh titles for about 100 years now. Um, I also understand that there are a lot of processes involved with filing these petitions, um, but I want to state that the idea that um Petitioners could easily access this avenue to um repeal the decision that the Attorney General makes. I think that this notion is very, very flawed. First of all, petitioners do not always have the money to afford the attorneys that it requires to repeal the decisions of the Attorney General. And furthermore, the Attorney General could continue to Reject and reject and reject these petitions and get caught up in legal processes that last longer than the election and outlast the potential for those ballots to even be or those ballot initiatives to be on the ballot in the first place. Um, so, He's, I have a, I have a big question that I want to pose to everybody here, and I understand that there are a lot of conflicting um opinions about this, this legislation. I understand that um earlier Representative Ray was grilled about um what constitutes um the same purpose, what constitutes the same general subject matter, I would like to open the discussion of It's not really representatives raise's decision in this legislation to make that determination. I would like to ask the bigger question, do we as a committee and do we as a state want to afford the Attorney General the exclusive privilege of being able to determine what is constitutional and further what is a conflict of uh purpose or what is a duplication of purpose, that is to say, I don't think that um We should be letting somebody who is ostensibly part of the executive branch of the government determine these things that are generally left for the Supreme Court. I'll end with a hypothetical. I want everybody in here to imagine for a moment that Representative Ray footed a different kind of legislation. We don't really have to specify what the legislation is, just anything that he was passionate about, and the Attorney General walked into this room, took the chair of the chairman and declared Representative Ray's legislation as unconstitutional and circumvented the process by which everybody in this room would pass that legislation. I want to ask what would be the reaction among everybody here. How would you feel about that? Would you feel that there is an abridge of your ability to pass and approve of legislation, would you feel that it is a Complete conflict of um our process of government, I mean, I feel like this legislation completely demolishes the systems by which we pass laws. The whole purpose of direct democracy is letting the people of Arkansas be able to foot their own legislation and be able to pass their own legislation and to afford the Attorney General the right to determine whether or not this is constitutional or not. I Essentially the exact same as affording that right to the Attorney General to determine whether or not legislation that was passed in a session is unconstitutional or not. Effectively, whether it's a direct democracy uh petition, or whether it's something that's passed in an actual legislative session, it's still legislation. The constitutionality of it is still determined by our judicial system. So I, I see the rest of my time for questions. All right. Thank you, Mr. Kutto. Are there any questions by the committee, Representative Rose, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Uh, While we may disagree on policy, I just want to say thanks for sharing your passion and experiences today, um, I think when I was 18 years old, there's no way I would have known what the Attorney General did or used words like ostensibly and contextualizing arguments. So, uh, just wanted to say thank you and I guess to have a question. You said you were 18, correct? Yeah, so thank you for your involvement. While we may disagree, you know, good for you for being involved and, and learning about the process. Thank you for your time. Yeah, I second that very well stated. All right, seeing no other individuals sign up to speak for or against the bill, Representative Ray, you're recognized to close for your bill. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and thank you committee, for your patience. I know it's been a long day. Um. I know you've got an email saying that this, this legislation, this bill guts the initiative process, takes away the people's right to uh run an initiative. None of that is true. This bill does two simple things. It strengthens the ballot title review process, as I mentioned, this is a process that has existed for 80 years, we're adding the ability for the Attorney General to vet these ballot titles for uh constitutionality and conflicts with federal statute and we're banning the submissions of multiple conflicting measures at one time. That has never been an issue before. That is over. 8 decades of ballot title review and over basically 100 years of the initiative process being in effect, that's never prohibited anyone from being able to get an issue on the ballot. This problem just popped up in the last two years because groups are getting increasingly aggressive and inventing ways to circumvent the rules that have been around for a long, long time, and so this, this bill just addresses those two issues and um You know, the other thing I'll, the, the last thing I'll say, and I'm Going to go back to Uh, the 1956 case in Washburn versus Hall because this keeps getting this point of unconstitutionality keeps getting brought up. That Washburn versus Hall case was a case challenging the constitutionality of the Attorney General's ability to review a ballot title and the court said, this is a direct quote from that decision. This statute in no way curtails the operation of Amendment number 7, but it, but it is in aid of the amendment and ensures the giving of the signer of the petition as much information as is possible. I believe this. Bill is congruent with that statement and I'm closed for the bill and as a committee member, I move to pass. as amended given that there was an amendment. Yes, do pass as amended. All right. Representative Ray has made a motion to pass as amended. Is there any discussion on the motion, Representative Clowney, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll be short. I know it's been a long day for all of us. Um, I just, I'm voting no and I wanna explain my two reasons why the first representative Ray just read, um, a quote that I think none of us here would agree with, it is certainly constitutional for the Attorney General to review ballot titles. Um, what this is doing is not a small change. This is adding, uh, this is giving the attorney General new power than in the history of our state he has never had, he or she has never had, which is to review a talent title for its constitutionality, um, that is a big change and it's gonna make a big difference. Uh, the second thing that I want to just point out is I really, really remain uncomfortable with lines 30 through 33. I understand, um, that for something to be considered conflicting, it does have to meet all three of those requirements has to cover the same subject matter before the same general purpose and contain different language, um, that's a very, very low bar. I want to be clear that I'm not at all casting aspersions on any one attorney judge, certainly not our current attorney general's ability to do this job or his intentions, um, but when we pass a bill, it's gonna become law for every attorney general from here on out. We are giving any future attorney general, truly what I see, I cannot read as any other way than a blank check to deny anything that is even closely related. That's what these three prongs supposed the 3 different prongs really do accomplish. Um, it's very concerning to me moving forward and that's why I'll be a no. All right, any other discussion on the motion. Seeing no further discussion on the motion, we have a motion on the floor of Du pass as amended. All those in favor say aye. All those opposed. No. The odds have it. Congratulations, Representative Ray, you passed your bill. Thank you committee. All right, on to the next bill, House Bill 1223, Representative Ray, you're recognized. OK, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Last one, I will try and be as quick as possible here. House Bill 1223 deals with uh officeholder titles being used as prefixes uh on the ballot, uh, between last session and this one, I, this was a topic I. tried to dive into a little bit and begin researching, um, under what circumstances people could use titles and so forth and um I noticed that there was a discrepancy in the law actually uh BLR in some research I asked them to do, found this for me, where under the current law, if someone has been appointed to a district court or a circuit court position and they've held that position for 12 months, then they can use that prefix on the ballot if they're running for a nonpartisan judicial race, but If you're an appointee to a court of appeals position or the Supreme Court under the exact same set of circumstances, you can't use your officeholder title as a prefix, and I'm not aware of any policy distinction for why two of the uh court positions would be able to use it and the other two not, uh, so I thought I would introduce a bill that brought some parity to how this area of the law treats the different court positions. As you can see, it's a pretty short bill and we'll be happy to answer any questions. Representative Ray has explained his bill. Are there any questions by the committee? OK. Seeing no questions by the committees or is there anyone sign up to speak for or against the bill. We have no one signed up to speak for or against the bill. Representative Ray, you're recognized to close for your bill. I'm closed for the bill and as a member of the committee, move to pass. Representative Ray has closed for his bill. He's made a motion to pass. Is there any discussion on the motion? Seeing no discussion on the motion, all those in favor say aye. All those opposed. Guys have it, congratulations, Representative Ray. The bill is passed. That concludes all the items that we had on our agenda for today. I believe we are now finally adjourned. Thank you all so much.