Morning Digest: Missouri judge says abortion rights amendment should not appear on ballot

But the state Supreme Court will hear an appeal on Tuesday morning

Supporters of Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, the main group backing an amendment to restore abortion rights in Missouri (credit: Missourians for Constitutional Freedom Facebook)

Leading Off

MO Ballot

A state judge ruled late on Friday that an amendment to restore abortion rights in Missouri should not appear on the November ballot, prompting an immediate appeal that will be heard by the state Supreme Court on Tuesday morning. Judge Christopher Limbaugh, however, stayed his ruling from taking effect until Tuesday, which is the statutory deadline for removing measures from the ballot.

Limbaugh agreed with plaintiffs, who include Republican legislators and conservative activists, that the measure should not go before voters, concluding that the petitions circulated by supporters to obtain voter signatures were defective. Those petitions, said Limbaugh in his ruling, failed to comply with a state law requiring that they identify "all sections of existing law or of the constitution which would be repealed by the measure."

Supporters of the abortion rights measure, known as Amendment 3, argue that it "does not repeal any law or constitutional measure" but rather "[c]reates a new constitutional right of reproductive freedom." Citing a previous decision by the state Supreme Court, they note that proponents of a ballot initiative are required to list only those laws that "would be in direct conflict" with their proposal and need not "ferret out" all provisions that "could possibly or by implication be modified by the proposed amendment."

Limbaugh, a cousin of the late conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh, was first appointed to the bench in 2021 by Republican Gov. Mike Parson, whom he'd served as general counsel. Parson elevated Limbaugh to his current post last month. Prior to working for Parson, Limbaugh had been county prosecutor in Cape Girardeau County, a historically Republican county in southeastern Missouri home to many politically connected members of the Limbaugh family.

Limbaugh's decision will be reviewed by a state Supreme Court that rebuffed one past attempt to derail Amendment 3. Last year, after lower courts rejected Republican Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft's attempt to draft a ballot summary "replete with politically partisan language," the justices declined to hear his appeal.

Ashcroft also lost another court battle on Thursday, when a state court ordered him to use a rewritten summary of Amendment 3 that will be posted in polling stations. Calling Ashcroft's version "unfair, inaccurate, insufficient and misleading," the court drafted its own language explaining that the amendment would, among other things, "establish[] a constitutional right to make decisions about reproductive health care."

For The Downballot's complete guide to every abortion rights amendment slated to go before voters in November, please click here.

House

MT-01

Democrat Monica Tranel has responded to an AARP survey showing her down 6 points to Republican Rep. Ryan Zinke with an internal poll that has her trailing by just 2 in the race for western Montana's 1st District. Tranel's poll, conducted late last month by Impact Research, finds Zinke leading 46-44, with 4% going to "the Libertarian candidate," Dennis Hayes (who is unnamed in the pollster's memo).

Impact's writeup also includes previously unreleased trendlines showing a narrowing race: Zinke was ahead 46-42 in July and 52-43 in February. By contrast, the AARP's poll, which was also in the field in late August, put Zinke up 49-43; that survey was conducted jointly by two firms, one Democratic and one Republican. Neither the AARP nor Tranel released numbers for the presidential race. Donald Trump carried this district 52-45 in 2020.

House Majority PAC

The House Majority PAC, which is the top Democratic super PAC involved in House races, just began filing disclosures detailing its first ads of the cycle directed toward the November general election. Immediately after Labor Day, the PAC unveiled new TV spots in 11 different races, but outside groups typically have 48 hours to submit independent expenditure reports to the FEC. (That window shrinks to 24 hours in the three weeks before Election Day.)

The new filings, which cover $4.2 million in spending across 14 districts, were first noted by analyst Rob Pyers. (The three additional districts are California's 45th, New York's 19th, and Oregon's 5th.)  We'll have a detailed summary of these outlays, and any others by top House groups, when we next update our bookmarkable tracker in Tuesday's Digest.

Ballot Measures

CO Ballot

The main group looking to institute a top-four primary in Colorado has reserved $5 million in TV time for the November general election, reports the Colorado Sun, while opponents are almost penniless.

The campaign behind Initiative 310, which would implement a system similar to that used in Alaska, has been heavily financed by wealthy former healthcare CEO Kent Thiry, who's put almost $1.5 million into a group called Colorado Voters First. By contrast, notes the Sun, the leading organization opposing the measure, Voter Rights Colorado, has raised just $26,000 all year.

However, even if Initiative 310 passes, it may never be implemented, as we explained in a recent Digest.

Other Races

Maricopa County, AZ Recorder

An internal poll of the race for recorder in Arizona's Maricopa County taken for Democrat Tim Stringham, first obtained by ABC15's Garrett Archer, gives Stringham a 45-42 lead over Republican state Rep. Justin Heap, a member of the legislature's far-right Freedom Caucus. This survey from Blueprint Polling is similar to a recent independent poll from Noble Predictive Insights that found Stringham ahead 38-34, albeit with far more undecided voters.

The recorder is responsible for overseeing elections in Arizona's largest county, which is home to more than 60% of the state's residents. In the GOP primary in late July, Heap defeated incumbent Stephen Richer, who had infuriated election conspiracy theorists by persistently pushing back against lies about recent elections.

WA Land Commissioner

The day after election officials certified Democrat Dave Upthegrove as the second-place finisher in Washington's top-two primary for lands commissioner by 49 votes, the state Republican Party filed a lawsuit asking that several thousand votes in the state's biggest and bluest county be discarded.

In a terse complaint filed in state court, the GOP argues that more than 2,000 ballots with signature problems that were fixed with the help of a third-party website should not be counted. The challenged ballots are all in King County, the home of Seattle, which was Upthegrove's best county and his largest single source of votes. (Upthegrove won King with 35% of the vote, amounting to more than 186,000 votes.)

Republicans already have a candidate in the general election, former Rep. Jamie Herrera Beutler, who finished first in last month's primary. But as KUOW's Jeanie Lindsay notes, the state GOP endorsed third-place finished Sue Kuehl Pederson ahead of the primary. And should Kuehl Pederson advance instead of Upthegrove, the general election would feature two Republicans and no Democrats.

In a statement, the Washington Democratic Party derided the lawsuit as an "embrace of election denialism." Kuehl Pederson doesn't appear to have commented on the case, though as the Seattle Times noted, her campaign issued a statement conceding the race on Wednesday only to claim hours later that its statement had been "rescinded."

November ballots must be finalized soon, in part so that they can be printed and sent to overseas voters at least 45 days before the election, so there's little time for the courts to act.

Ad Roundup

• AZ-Sen: Ruben Gallego (D); Gallego - anti-Kari Lake (R); Lake - anti-Gallego (here and here)

• MD-Sen: Angela Alsobrooks (D) and the DSCC - anti-Larry Hogan (R); Hogan (here and here)

• PA-Sen: Bob Casey (D-inc); American Action Fund - anti-Casey

• TX-Sen: Colin Allred (D) - anti-Ted Cruz (R-inc) (in Spanish)

• WI-Sen: EMILYs List - anti-Eric Hovde (R)

• NH-Gov: Kelly Ayotte (R); Cinde Warmington (D)

• CA-13: John Duarte (R-inc)

• VA-02: Jen Kiggans (R-inc)

• WA-03: Joe Kent (R)

• WI-03: Derrick Van Orden (R-inc) (here and here)