Trial concludes in challenge to Alaska ranked choice voting repeal petition

A trial concluded Wednesday in a case that could determine whether Alaskans get to vote later this year on keeping the state’s ranked choice voting and nonpartisan primary system.

The voting system was narrowly adopted by Alaskans in a 2020 ballot initiative and first used in 2022. Shortly after, a group of conservative Alaskans launched a new ballot initiative to repeal the voting method and return to closed primaries and traditional pick-one general elections. Since then, the organizers of the repeal effort have been plagued by allegations of violating Alaska’s law concerning campaign ethics and signature collection.

Supporters of Alaska’s ranked choice voting and nonpartisan primaries filed suit earlier this year alleging that the repeal initiative organizers had violated state laws by leaving signature booklets unattended, leaving them open to fraud.

The lawsuit targeted the Alaska Division of Elections for certifying the ballot question despite questions about the initiative organizers’ conduct. The initiative organizers themselves joined the lawsuit as intervenors, arguing that even if there were some concerns about some unattended ballots, they were not enough to throw out the ballot petition entirely.

During the six-day trial before Superior Court Judge Christina Rankin, witnesses testified about possible suspicious or questionable behavior by signature gatherers.

Attorneys for the plaintiffs in the case, including Scott Kendall — one of the primary authors of the 2020 ballot measure that put in place Alaska’s current voting system — alleged that the behavior by some signature gatherers violated Alaska law to a sufficient degree that the petition should be thrown out.

The Division of Elections had counted that the initiative organizers gathered 37,000 signatures, meeting threshold requirements in 34 out of 40 House districts — exceeding the required 26,000 signatures representing a minimum percentage of voters in 30 out of 40 districts. The plaintiffs argued that 11,000 signatures should be thrown out. If the judge rules in their favor, the initiative would not meet the minimum statewide requirement nor the geographic distribution threshold.

The authors of the ballot initiative seeking to repeal ranked choice voting, who are represented by former Alaska Attorney General Kevin Clarkson, argued that even if some signature gatherers violated the law, it was because they were ignorant of the laws rather than because of malicious intent, and the behavior was not widespread enough to disqualify more than a handful of signatures.

Rankin has already dismissed part of the lawsuit filed by the plaintiffs, finding in June that the Division of Elections acted properly when it allowed the sponsors of the repeal petition to correct problems with signature booklets after they were submitted.

Rankin is expected to issue an order in the case before July 20. She could either dismiss the plaintiffs’ complaint altogether, or find that the Division of Elections should throw out some or all of the signatures that plaintiffs pointed out could be cause for concern. If she rules that some signatures should be thrown out, the Division of Elections must then count the remaining valid signatures to ensure they meet the minimum threshold of roughly 26,000 signatures from Alaska voters, including a minimum representation from most voting districts around the state.

This isn’t the only allegation of improper behavior that the ballot initiative organizers have faced. They were previously fined more than $94,000 by the Alaska Public Offices Commission for violating the state’s campaign finance requirements, including by forming a tax-exempt religious organization through which they funneled most of their funding. The fines were largely upheld in court recently after the initiative organizers challenged them.

The trial included testimony from multiple people who volunteered as signature gatherers for the initiative, people who witnessed the signature gathering, and an expert in signature verification who has worked on multiple ballot initiatives in Alaska and elsewhere.

The expert, Jay Costa, founded a company called eQual that works with ballot initiative organizers to ensure the signatures they gather meet legal requirements. He testified during the trial that it is common for signature gatherers to collect fewer than 100 signatures per day, and that in less than 1% of instances did signature gatherers collect more than 150 signatures per day.

Phillip Izon, the author of the ballot initiative and organizer of the signature drive, had in one day gathered 580 signatures.

“That seems to stretch the bounds of credulity,” Costa said when testifying on Tuesday.

During testimony on Wednesday, Izon said that he had gathered those signatures during an event in February 2023, and credited the high number of signatures to the motivation of event attendees to repeal Alaska’s voting system. Alaska law required the signature gatherer — in this case, Izon — to witness every signature. Izon said he was able to do so by having multiple signature booklets in front of him at a time.

“I’m just really good,” Izon said when asked how he was able to gather 580 signatures in a day. “If people are motivated to sign, they’re going to show up. And they did.”

“I was very, very secure with every book that I had,” said Izon.

Costa said that in the course of the trial and depositions, several petition circulators testified that they had left booklets unattended or allowed their booklets to be circulated by another person, in violation of state statute.

“My conclusion following the review of testimony is that indeed, it seems like there was a significant impropriety with regard to the circulation of this petition,” said Costa.

Clarkson, representing Izon and the other initiative organizers, conceded that some laws were violated but said it was not enough to throw out the petition, arguing ahead of the trial that the violations affected at most around 1,400 signatures.

The decision timeline in the case could allow any party to appeal the case to the Alaska Supreme Court ahead of the certification of the November ballot, which is set to take place after the August primary.