SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) – Two voter advocacy groups combine forces to oppose a bill they say has the most extreme geographic petition signature requirements in the country.
House Bill 1169 requires ballot measure petitions to receive at least 5% of signatures from each of the 35 senate districts based on the last gubernatorial election turnout.
Currently, to get an initiated measure on the ballot, a petition needs signatures equal to 10% of the vote cast in the last gubernatorial election for the entire state.
“We would go from having no geographic distribution requirement to the worst in the country,” said Matthew Schweich with the Voter Defense Association of South Dakota.
The bill has passed the House and Senate and awaits Gov. Larry Rhoden’s signature.
The Voter Defense Association and the League of Women Voters are urging Gov. Rhoden to veto HB 1169. If he passes it though, the groups said they will immediately launch a referendum signature drive to refer HB 1169 to the 2026 ballot, blocking it from going into effect July 1.
“Voters, not politicians, can have the final say in this major change to our initiated amendment process,” said Amy Scott Stoltz with the League of Women Voters of South Dakota. “We believe that South Dakota voters will deem it extreme, misguided and unfair, and they will reject it at the ballot box.”
The two groups have multiple issues with the bill.
One of the major ones is logistically how the voter percentage in a senate district is calculated. Currently, the state doesn’t report election results from the 35 districts, only by county. Because they don’t release that information, people won’t know how many signatures they need to collect to reach 5%.
There’s also the issue of a single district having the power to block an initiated measure from getting on the ballot if they decide not to sign it.
“Just one state senate district, if they don’t like an initiative, could choose not to sign it and block it, even if the entirety of South Dakota wanted an opportunity to vote on that constitutional amendment,” Schweich noted.
Another problem the groups can foresee happening is this alienating voters from signing petitions if their district petition isn’t available.
“It’s already hard enough to get people to sign,” Schweigh said. “Imagine having to carry multiple clipboards to accommodate any voter you might encounter.”
Reynold Nesiba, a former state senator and will-be sponsor of the HB 1169 referendum, added that this could lead to less people signing petitions.
“If you’re going to go to the farmers market on a Saturday morning and be a citizen trying to petition your government, you have to have 35 clipboards, because people come from all over the place,” he said.
Republican Sen. Michael Rohl has been vocal in his opposition to the bill and is also ready to sponsor the referendum if Rhoden passes HB 1169. Rohl said he’s met with the governor and briefly discussed the bill.
“I appreciated him taking the time to hear my concerns about the dangers of moving constitutionally guaranteed rights out of the reach of the everyday citizens that the law is meant to serve and protect,” Rohl said in an emailed statement to KELOLAND News on Friday.
