Advocates of an initiative to tighten Michigan voting laws and require voter identification on Friday submitted petition signatures, a move those in opposition say was intended to “veto proof” their efforts after the submission was previously delayed.
Secure MI Vote petition leaders, Michigan lawmakers and about a dozen volunteers hauled the boxes full of 514,294 signatures out of a truck and into the Richard H. Austin building, which houses the Bureau of Elections, in Lansing on July 29.
At a press conference before the signatures were turned in, Secure MI Vote Executive Director Jeff Litton thanked those individuals and the thousands of volunteers he said aided the effort. He said that the petition initiative will help restore voter faith in secure elections.
“The last 25 years, Americans have been losing confidence in the faith of our elections,” Litton said. “That’s not just one side. That’s both sides.”
Secure MI Vote would amend the state constitution to require photo ID for in-person voting, as well as a photo ID, driver’s license, state ID or partial social security number for absentee ballot applications. State-funded IDs would be given to people “with hardships.” Voter registration would also require partial social security number.
The petition failed to meet the May 31 deadline to turn in signatures for the November general election ballot. The delay by organizers is due to what Secure MI Vote Spokesperson Jamie Roe called “an abundance of caution,” after the group found about 20,000 fraudulent signatures.
Organizers did so despite the 435,000 signatures secured before the deadline — far more than the 340,047 statutorily required — without including the fraudulent signatures.
Related: Michigan voter ID campaign finds fraud, delays submitting petitions for November ballot
This go around, Litton said 10,000 additional fraudulent signatures were found, but none were included in the petitions delivered on Friday.
Those in opposition to Secure MI Vote believe that delaying the signature submission was a calculated. Instead, the group will bring the initiative in front of the Republican-led legislature, where it has a better chance of being voted into law.
Since this route was taken, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer does not have the ability to veto the proposals if adopted.
Nancy Wang is executive director of Voters Not Politicians, Michigan’s leading voting rights organization. She said in a written statement that Secure MI Vote has “misled voters in its effort to make it harder to vote in Michigan.”
“Everything about the Secure MI Vote campaign is the opposite: From day 1, the campaign has made clear that this is a package of voter suppression bills disguised as a citizen initiative,” Wang said. “They are turning in signatures not to qualify for the 2022 ballot – because they have missed the deadline to do that – but to put these measures to the state legislature to pass veto-proof legislation that will undermine our democracy.”
Sen. Tom Barrett, R-Charlotte, and Rep. Matt Hall, R-Marshall, attended Friday’s Secure MI Vote press conference and said they are excited to vote on the initiative once it’s received in the legislature.
The pair of Republican lawmakers called on Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson to quickly verify the signatures so the legislature can vote once lawmakers return in the fall and the new rules can be in place before November’s general election.
“We’re calling on Secretary of State Benson, not to delay, but to review these swiftly and to certify these petitions so the legislature can get back and put these into law,” Hall said. “We’re going to lose so much that holds us together as a state and so this is a reasonable and measured step to do that and to restore people’s confidence.”
Petitions must be filed at least 160 days prior to the general election, in November of every even year, to assure placement on the ballot. The legislature has 40 session days from the time it receives the petition to enact or reject the proposed law or to propose a different measure on the same question. If not enacted, the original initiative proposal and any different measure passed by the legislature must go before the voters in the next general election as a ballot proposal.
Benson and the Bureau of Elections, under a democratic administration, could wait until 2024 to review the signatures and move the process forward.
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