Supporters of an initiative petition to open up Oklahoma primaries filed an objection against the Oklahoma Secretary of State, who ruled they had insufficient signatures to put it on a ballot in March.
State Question 836 would have included all candidates for an office on the same ballot and allowed all registered voters to participate in primary elections, regardless of their party affiliation.
Organizers collected 209,000 eligible signatures by the late January submission deadline, the petition said. That number exceeded the state's required 172,993 signatures for the ballot measure.
In March, Secretary of State Benjamin Lepak rejected 57,841 of those signatures because they failed to meet the state-required four out of five voter data points for verification. With roughly 142,000 remaining valid signatures, the ballot measure failed.
"We all want more faith in our government, but trust is not built by summarily rejecting more than 57,000 signatures without providing a sufficient explanation as to their exclusion. We simply want the ability to identify which signatures were excluded so we can evaluate if they should have been counted," Ken Setter, a SQ 836 volunteer, said in a Vote Yes 836 press release.
Until the passage of a 2024 state law, signatories only had to present three of five data points, which include legal first name, legal last name, zip code, house number and date of birth, for their signatures to be considered valid.
The objection argues Lepak imposed an "unconstitutional burden" on signatories by using machine processing to validate signatures and only reporting an aggregate number of matches rather than supplying evidence of the signatures thrown out.
The petitioners argue Lepak's method did not accurately reflect the number of registered voters who signed the petition. State law requires an individual be registered to vote to be counted toward a petition.
Lepak has only reported aggregate totals and has not identified the rejected signatures, the objection states. It argues if machine processing could reject signatures, it should also identify individual signature data, which has not been disclosed.
The objection argues that the machine rejection of nearly 58,000 signatures is not plausible, and the mandated four-to-five data point match hinders the right to petition.
"The Secretary's machine rejection of 57,841 signatures is not plausible. 57,841 citizens did not lie," the objection reads. "The far more plausible explanation is that the legislatively mandated four-to-five data point match … is an extraordinary and prohibitive burden on the exercise of the right to participate in an initiative petition."
The petitioners are questioning the machine's ability to read some handwriting. The objection also argues petitioners could write a nickname, maiden name or submit a deviation from their name on their voter registration file.
The objection asked the Oklahoma Supreme Court to order Lepak to provide data on rejected signatures and an accounting of individual signatures not provided and establish a procedure for petitioners to review signature data and challenge their rejection. Absent that, they ask for the court to allow the state question to move forward.
Supporters of SQ 836 told KOSU in October that an open primary model would have made important elections fairer and more accessible, allowing Independent voters to have a say before the general election. For the first time in a decade, Independent voters will not have the opportunity to vote in the state's 2026 Democratic primaries.
Some conservative lawmakers and party leaders criticized the question, arguing that open primaries would dilute the influence of Republican voters.
KOSU reached out to Lepak's office, state Labor Commissioner Leslie Osborn, who co-filed the objection, and former Sen. AJ Griffin, who supported the campaign for SQ 836, but did not receive a response by the time of publication.
This report was produced by the Oklahoma Public Media Exchange, a collaboration of public media organizations. Help support collaborative journalism by donating at the link at the top of this webpage.
