Republicans Will Try To Make Citizen Initiative Petitions For Statewide Votes More Difficult To Achieve

(Jefferson City) The success of the ballot initiative to legalize recreational marijuana appears to have rallied more lawmakers who want to make it harder to change the Missouri Constitution by citizens of the state.

Several bills have been pre-filed in the Missouri House and Senate that would place limits on the initiative petition process, making it harder for outside activist groups to rally citizens into passing issues that lawmakers tend to neglect.

It would also make it more difficult to pass, even if the proposal makes it past the petition phase.

Now the initiative petition system was also used in 2018 to add Medicaid expansion to the state constitution after the republican super majority in both chambers kept blocking those expansion efforts.

State Representative Mike Henderson of Desloge is a strong and vocal supporter on passing one of these bills into law.

He’s brought this issue up several times while being interviewed on Regional Radio.