Morning Digest: The Utah GOP wants the power to overturn citizens' ballot initiatives

The goal? Protect Republican gerrymanders.

Voters in Utah protest against gerrymandering (credit: Better Boundaries Facebook)

UT Ballot

Utah's Republican-dominated legislature voted on Wednesday to place a constitutional amendment on the general election ballot that would explicitly allow lawmakers to amend or repeal voter-approved initiatives―including a 2018 measure that could put an end to partisan gerrymandering.

Republicans called a special session just weeks after the state Supreme Court unanimously ruled that legislators had acted improperly when they gutted the redistricting reform initiative voters passed six years ago. While the justice did not strike down the state's congressional map, which was designed to ensure that Republicans would control all four of Utah's U.S. House seats, an attorney for the plaintiffs expressed optimism that new districts could be drawn in time for the 2026 elections.

The GOP, however, is now asking Utahns to amend the state constitution so that the legislature can rewrite or overturn such citizen-sponsored initiatives. The Republican amendment, which needs only a simple majority to pass, also contains a separate provision that would bar foreign entities from contributing money to state initiative campaigns.

The inclusion of that seemingly unrelated ban is central to the GOP's strategy of convincing voters to cede some of their own power. Republicans have engaged in similar chicanery in Missouri, where the practice is known as stuffing an amendment with "ballot candy"—sweeteners the Kansas City Star defined as "inserting unrelated but popular ideas into a measure to encourage people to vote in favor of it."

The term does not appear to have caught on outside the Show Me State, though as Utah's legislature demonstrated on Wednesday, Republicans across the nation understand the tactic.

Nor did Utah Republicans go to any lengths to conceal the cynicism behind their gambit. State Senate President Stuart Adams acknowledged to reporters Tuesday that he was unaware of any foreign entities attempting to influence state elections but insisted passage of the amendment was vital to stop such a thing.

If this plan passes, it could impact far more than redistricting. The legislature also has scaled back voter-approved amendments intended to legalize medical marijuana and expand Medicaid. The state Supreme Court's July ruling did not address these other issues, but a win for the GOP's amendment would likely render the matter moot.

The Downballot Podcast

Episode: Great news for House Dems—from *Alaska*

If you're looking for signs of good news for House Democrats, look no further than … Alaska? Believe it or not, yeah! On this week's episode of The Downballot podcast, co-hosts David Nir and David Beard lead off with the remarkable Mary Peltola, who continues to defy political gravity. Despite sitting in the reddest House seat for a Democrat, she's pulling in a majority of the vote in Tuesday's top-four primary—a result that can't have Republicans feeling great about unseating her in November.

And we're getting super nerdy in our deep dive this week. Our guest is Doug Kronaizl from Ballotpedia, a site you know well because it's one of the most indispensable resources for elections research on the internet. Kronaizl tells us how his organization tracks tens of thousands of races every year and why in recent years it's expanded even further down the ballot. He also discusses the sorry fact that so many local elections go uncontested—including more than half for school board—but explains how Ballotpedia can help remedy the problem.

The Downballot podcast comes out every Thursday morning everywhere you listen to podcasts. To make sure you never miss an episode, you can subscribe right on our site, where you'll also find a complete transcript.

House

NH-02

Democrat Colin Van Ostern has asked local TV station WMUR to stop airing a new attack ad from VoteVets, arguing that the spot is "false and defamatory." Among other things, the ad claims that Van Ostern went back on a promise not to accept corporate PAC donations. However, in a letter from an attorney, Van Ostern says he made his pledge earlier in 2024—eight years after receiving the corporate contributions that are cited in the ad during his unsuccessful bid for governor.

VoteVets' efforts are aimed at boosting Van Ostern's rival in the Sept. 10 primary, former Biden official Maggie Goodlander. However, a spokesperson for End Citizens United, which calls itself "the arbiters of the no corporate PAC pledge," said in a statement that it "can confirm that both candidates have stayed true to their pledge to reject corporate PAC money in their campaigns."

There's no word yet as to how WMUR, the main broadcast station in New Hampshire, has responded to the takedown notice from Van Ostern, a former member of the state's Executive Council.

NJ-09

Democratic Rep. Bill Pascrell died Wednesday at the age of 87 after being hospitalized twice in the last few weeks due to a respiratory illness. Pascell spent the last 28 years representing his hometown of Paterson and other nearby New Jersey communities in Congress, and in June, he won renomination for a 15th term in the 9th District.

Democratic leaders in the three countries that form his North Jersey constituency―Bergen, Hudson, and Passaic―have until Aug. 29 to choose a new candidate. Whomever they pick should have no trouble winning a constituency that, according to election results compiled by The Downballot, favored Joe Biden 59-40 in 2020.

It's unclear, though, whether Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy will be able to schedule a special election on Nov. 5 for the remaining two months of Pascrell's term. If not, his seat would remain vacant until the start of the 119th Congress in January.

Pascrell's successor will replace a congressman who was frequently described as "scrappy" during his long career. In 2020, Pascrell shed some light on why he'd earned that epithet in describing his first political gathering at the age of 16, which his uncle, a Democratic war leader, had brought him to.

"Ten minutes into the event, a chair goes flying by my head," he recounted to NJ.com. "There were fights here, there were fights there. And I said to myself, ’I might like this.'"

Pascrell, as the New Jersey Globe writes in a must-read look at his life, initially sparred with local power brokers in his battle to "democratize" the party. But by the early 1990s, he'd become a dominant figure in Passaic County politics who served both as mayor of Paterson and as a state assemblyman.

(New Jersey politicians often simultaneously served in the legislature and municipal office before a 2007 bill banned the practice. That bill did not force incumbents to give up either of their posts, however, and three Democratic legislators still remain in local office.)

Pascrell got his first opening to run for Congress in 1992 when longtime Democratic Rep. Robert Roe unexpectedly decided to retire, but Pascrell announced that he preferred to stay on as mayor. Democrat Herb Klein's win that year in what was then numbered the 8th District seemed to guarantee that Pascrell would remain in Paterson for some time to come, but everything changed two years later after the 1994 GOP landslide helped Republican Bill Martini narrowly unseat Klein.

Democrats badly wanted to take back what had been a longtime stronghold, and this time, Pascrell was all in. After he successfully deterred potential primary opponents, including Klein, Pascrell focused on tying Martini to Speaker Newt Gingrich and his hardline politics.

Both candidates benefited from heavy spending, but the battle lines were much fuzzier than they would be today. The Sierra Club, one of the nation's most prominent environmental groups, ran ads on Martini's behalf, something almost unthinkable in contemporary politics.

Pascrell, known for his folksy language, denounced Martini as "full of donkey dust," while the incumbent tried to argue that the Democrat was doing a poor job leading his city. Martini managed to keep things close during a tough year for Jersey Republicans, but it wasn't enough: Pascrell prevailed 51-48 as President Bill Clinton carried the 8th District 58-34 against Bob Dole, according to data from analyst Kiernan Park-Egan.

The new congressman quickly became secure at home, and he didn't face a serious threat for well over a decade. Everything changed, however, after New Jersey lost a congressional district following the 2010 census and the state's redistricting commission adopted the GOP's preferred map for the new decade.

What followed was a competitive 2012 Democratic primary between Pascrell and fellow Rep. Steve Rothman, a longtime friend who was also elected in 1996, in what was now numbered the 9th District. Rothman, who served the last incarnation of the 9th, already represented 54% of the new district's denizens, while Pascrell served only 43% of them. 

But Pascrell had several advantages that helped him overcome this geographic disadvantage. The new map relocated Rothman's hometown of Fair Lawn to GOP Rep. Scott Garrett's 5th District, and Rothman turned down entreaties from prominent Democrats to take on the far-right congressman in a much redder district. Pascrell portrayed his opponent as a coward for declining to do so and claimed that, if he were in Rothman's position, he would have challenged Garrett.

Pascrell, counterintuitively, also benefited from backing the losing candidate in the titanic 2008 presidential primary between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. Bill Clinton rewarded Pascrell four years later by energetically campaigning for him against Rothman, who had favored Obama. The president hosted Rothman in the Oval Office just ahead of the primary but maintained the pretense of neutrality.

Both congressmen counted on running up the score on their home turf, and both of them did. Rothman ended up carrying Bergen County 73-27 and performed similarly in the small portion of Hudson County that was part of the 9th.

But Pascrell more than made up for Rothman's strong showing by taking Passaic County by an astounding 90-10 margin. That performance propelled him to an overall 61-39 win. Pascrell had little trouble months later dispatching the Republican nominee, "celebrity rabbi" Shmuley Boteach, and he never faced another notable opponent for the rest of the decade.

While there was speculation this cycle that Pascrell's support for Israel could make him vulnerable for renomination in a district with a large Muslim American community, several notable politicians decided not to take him on. Prospect Park Mayor Mohamed Khairullah did challenge the congressman, but Pascrell turned him back 76-24 in what proved to be his final campaign.

Ballot Measures

AZ Ballot, MO Ballot, MT Ballot

Two more states have confirmed that constitutional amendments protecting abortion rights will go before voters in November, while reproductive rights advocates in a third state are headed to court to challenge language summarizing their measure that they call "deceptive and misleading."

Late on Tuesday, the Arizona Supreme Court rejected a lawsuit alleging that activists' description of their abortion amendment on petitions they used to gather signatures was legally insufficient. The decision allows the measure, which would guarantee abortion until fetal viability, to appear on the ballot as Proposition 139.

On the same day, Montana Secretary of State Christi Jacobsen certified that a similar amendment had qualified for the ballot. That proposal, known as Constitutional Initiative 128, would likewise protect the right to an abortion until a fetus is said to be viable outside the womb, which is generally around 24 weeks into pregnancy. Jacobsen had previously sought to keep the measure from going to voters, but the state Supreme Court late last month rejected a challenge she brought.

Meanwhile, in Missouri, organizers have filed a lawsuit challenging language describing their amendment drafted by Republican Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft, who has repeatedly used the powers of his office to undermine their campaign.

Ashcroft's summary, which would be posted next to sample ballots at polling places, claims the amendment would permit abortion "at any time of pregnancy" and "prohibit any regulation of abortion," including any laws that might target "anyone who performs an abortion and hurts or kills the pregnant women."

Last year, Ashcroft wrote a similarly slanted synopsis of the amendment that would have appeared on actual ballots but was repeatedly shot down by the courts, including the state Supreme Court, which declined to hear an appeal. Ashcroft certified the measure, known as Amendment 3, earlier this month.

Legislatures

FL State House

Former U.S. Rep. Dave Wheldon saw his comeback campaign for lower office fail dramatically on Tuesday when state Sen. Debbie Mayfield beat him 65-35 in the Republican primary for a conservative open seat in the Florida state House.

Wheldon's loss came the same night that another former congressman, Democrat Alan Grayson, took a distant third place in his bid for the state Senate. Weldon, though, retired ahead of the 2008 election that first sent Grayson to Congress, so the two never served together―and now probably never will.

Mayfield, for her part, attracted attention last November when she was one of five Florida legislators to announce that they were abandoning Gov. Ron DeSantis' doomed presidential campaign and endorsing Donald Trump. Trump went on to reward Mayfield, who was termed out of the Senate, with his own endorsement of her campaign to remain in the legislature.

WY State Legislature

The Wyoming affiliate of the far-right Freedom Caucus had a strong night in Tuesday's Republican primaries that leaves it in a strong position to dominate the 62-member state House.

Maggie Mullen writes in WyoFile that the bloc, which was 26 strong going into the election, is now assured of securing at least three more seats because 29 Freedom Caucus members are running unopposed in the fall. Those ranks could increase by another half-dozen, though, as six more candidates aligned with the group could still prevail against Democratic or independent opposition in November.

One of Tuesday's biggest gains came at the expense of House Speaker Pro Tempore Clark Stith, who chairs the rival Wyoming Caucus and went down to a 56-44 defeat against Darin McCann, who is unopposed in November. Last month, Stith warned about the consequences of the faction's ascent when he told the Jackson Hole News & Guide's Jasmine Hall, "[I]f the Freedom Caucus takes over there will be a dismantling of programs that ordinary citizens come to depend on."

The caucus, writes Mullen, appears set to keep running the state Senate, though she describes the upper chamber's far-right bloc as a "less formally organized group" than its counterpart in the House. The most high-profile contest saw Freedom Caucus-backed newcomer Laura Pearson score a 61-27 victory over Speaker of the House Albert Sommers, who was seeking a promotion to the Senate.

The Freedom Caucus is hoping that these gains will set it up for bigger things in 2026, when Gov. Mark Gordon, a Republican who has feuded with the faction, will be termed out.

"If we want to change how this land is governed," said state Rep. Jeanette Ward, "we need to change the butts in the seats, including the governor." In some small comfort for the Wyoming Caucus, though, Ward's 56-44 loss to challenger Julie Jarvis means that she will not be occupying one of those seats.

Ad Roundup

• MI-Sen: One Nation - anti-Elissa Slotkin (D)

• MT-Sen: Tim Sheehy (R) and the NRSC - anti-Jon Tester (D-inc)

• OH-Sen: American Chemistry Council - pro-Bernie Moreno (R)

• WI-Sen: One Nation - anti-Tammy Baldwin (D-inc)

• NC-Gov: RGA Right Direction PAC - anti-Josh Stein (D); Mark Robinson (R) - anti-Stein

• NH-Gov: Chuck Morse (R) - anti-Kelly Ayotte (R)

• CA-41: Americans 4 Security - anti-Will Rollins (D)

• NC-01: American Chemistry Council - pro-Don Davis (D-inc)