The Arkansas Supreme Court sided with state officials in a ruling on Thursday that will keep an abortion rights question off the ballot in November over what is, essentially, a paperwork issue.
The court upheld state officials’ decision to reject certain signatures that were collected by paid petitioners. The officials had found that the organizers behind the effort to get the amendment on the ballot — which would protect abortion access in the state — submitted the signatures in a way that did not comply with state law.
Per the Associated Press:
Election officials said Arkansans for Limited Government failed to comply with state law primarily because it submitted documentation regarding paid signature gatherers separately and not in a single bundle. The group argued that it should have been given more time to provide any additional documents needed.
“We find that the Secretary correctly refused to count the signatures collected by paid canvassers because the sponsor failed to file the paid canvasser training certification” in the way the law requires, Justice Rhonda Wood wrote for the 4-3 majority.
A dissenting justice wrote that the decision strips Arkansans’ of their rights and effectively changes the state’s initiative law.
Nepo baby-turned-Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders — who is vehemently anti-abortion — celebrated the decision, and even took credit for the ruling in a tweet on Thursday.
Abortion is currently banned in Arkansas, with exceptions only if the pregnant person’s life is in danger.
“This effort has generated a wave of fiercely engaged Arkansas women,” Arkansas for Limited Government, the group behind the measure, said in a statement to the AP. “We are outraged. We will not back down. And we will remember this in November.”
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Good grief — is she still a thing?
What a despicable human being. Take away rights and then game the system so they can’t be restored.
Vote blue up and down every ticket nationwide.
The Koch playbook.
Fugly bitch.
Some of the most anti-women people are, ironically, women.
When they go low, they go subterranean.