Who’s afraid of Oklahoma voters? The lawmakers who represent them

Oklahoma lawmakers are clearly scared to death of their constituents, and who could blame them?

After all, voters in recent years have forced our lawmakers to come face-to-face with the terrifying reality that average Oklahomans can band together to circumvent the Legislature’s will and force the passage of new progressive laws and block boneheaded conservative policies.

In short, by taking matters into their own hands by expanding Medicaid access for the working poor and reducing the state’s over-incarceration rates through criminal justice reforms, voters have repeatedly been serving lawmakers an unwanted reminder that the influence of rural Oklahoma is dwindling as the state’s population continues to shift to more politically diverse urban centers.

I can understand how that must be a scary prospect for a Republican-led governing body whose members typically take immense pride in thinking up conservative policies. And, I suspect that’s probably why lawmakers continue to monkey around with Oklahomans’ constitutionally guaranteed right to put their own proposed laws or constitutional amendments on the ballot.

It’s already an uphill battle to qualify measures for the ballot considering the enormous signature collection requirements — over 92,000 for a statutory change and over 172,000 for a constitutional amendment — and the 90-day window to gather those.

But just when you think it can’t get any worse, Republican lawmakers, led by House Speaker Kyle Hilbert and Sen. David Bullard, are telling us to hold their beer. In case you’re not familiar with the idiom, it’s what people say when they’re about to do something extremely foolish that they’ll likely regret later.

Oklahoma lawmakers are plowing ahead with a bizarre — and likely unconstitutional — scheme that seeks to disproportionately inflate the influence of rural voters at the expense of urban and suburban ones. 

They want to cap how many people living in each county can sign petitions. At most, that means only 20.8% of signatures can come from one county, which potentially disenfranchised tens of thousands of their constituents. 

And, among other things, their latest scheme also prevents people who live outside the state from working here to collect signatures, requires them to only be paid by Oklahoma entities and allows an appointed bureaucrat with no legal experience to decide how ballot summaries should be worded.

Supporters say these changes will ensure rural voters have a bigger say on what’s included on the ballot by forcing signature collectors to visit rural communities. Critics argue it attempts to dilute the influence of those living in urban counties.

Whatever the reasoning, the entire concept is an expensive lawsuit waiting to happen. Taxpayers should expect to foot that bill because the moment Gov. Kevin Stitt’s pen turns this into law, our state is going to get sued for violating people’s constitutional rights. 

And, they should.

Last time I checked, we lived in a state where every citizen is worth the same regardless of where they live. It’s mindboggling to argue that rural perspectives are worth more in a state where about 50% of the population lives in urban areas.

And, I’ve always lived with the philosophy that the more choices we have on the ballot, the better for our democracy. Voters, after all, deserve choice because they aren’t stupid. I may not agree with every ballot measure, but I respect my neighbor’s ability to put it up for a vote.

Unfortunately, I don’t think many of our lawmakers have that same philosophy. Let’s be honest, how often do we hear Republican legislators insult our intelligence by insisting that we don’t know what is best for ourselves or we didn’t understand what we voted for. 

Lawmakers always think they know what’s best for us — until voters are given the power to put some of those crazed ideas in their proper place — the trash can.