Nebraska Voters Will Decide On Medical Marijuana Legalization At The Ballot This November, Officials Announce

Nebraska voters will get a chance to decide on a pair of medical marijuana legalization initiatives at the polls this November, state officials have announced.

While advocates have faced repeated setbacks in their push for cannabis reform in prior election cycles, the secretary of state’s office confirmed on Friday that Nebraskans for Medical Marijuana (NMM) submitted enough signatures to secure ballot placement.

NMM had turned in more than 114,000 signatures for each of the proposals in July, and officials said about 89,000 have been verified so far, surpassing the 87,000 signature requirement for ballot placement. They also met the 5 percent threshold for signatures in 51 counties, exceeding the 38 that are required.

This marks the third time the campaign has attempted to let voters decide on medical cannabis legalization in recent years.

“After years of hard work, we are beyond excited that Nebraskans will finally have the opportunity to have their voices heard on this issue in November,” Crista Eggers, campaign manager of NMM, said. “Our fight has been long, it has been hard, but we have never given up.”

“Today we celebrate that very soon, patients in this state will have access to medical cannabis treatment,” she said. “We want to thank all of the Nebraskans who dedicated countless hours and days of their lives to make this possible, and we look forward to the final certification by the Secretary of State in the coming days.”

The secretary of state’s office said that the Elections Division has not yet formally certified the petitions, but that is simply a procedural step given that the state has already determined the measures “have met the 100 percent signature threshold required for verification and certification, and subsequently, will qualify for the general election ballot once verification and certification has been completed.”

“Our office is providing this update to keep voters informed of where county election offices are in the signature verification process,” Secretary of State Bob Evnen (R) said in a press release on Friday. “Election workers are checking every voter’s signature on the remaining petitions, and we will have petitions verified before the September 13 deadline to certify the November ballot.”

📄 News release: Secretary of State provides updates on remaining petitions.

🔗 Read the full release here: https://t.co/ZcfAqzDDeG pic.twitter.com/Yug3gBW5HV

— NE Secretary of State Robert Evnen (@NebraskaSOS) August 30, 2024

NMM had prioritized meeting a separate requirement to gather signatures from at least 5 percent of voters in a minimum of 38 counties across the state, and activists were successful to that end.

The campaign worked to put medical cannabis on the ballot for two prior election cycles. But the loss of critical funding in the last election cycle and intervention by the state Supreme Court in the prior attempt led to defeat.

The first of the two current ballot initiatives from the campaign would require lawmakers to codify protections for doctors who recommend cannabis and patients who purchase and possess it. The patient-focused measure says that its aim was to “enact a statute that makes penalties inapplicable under state and local law for the use, possession, and acquisition of limited quantities of cannabis for medical purposes by a qualified patient with a written recommendation from a health care practitioner, and for a caregiver to assist a qualified patient in these activities.”

The other initiative would create a new a Nebraska Medical Cannabis Commission to provide “necessary registration and regulation of persons that possess, manufacture, distribute, deliver, and dispense cannabis for medical purposes.”

The campaign got an early start on signature gathering this round. In addition to meeting the county-based threshold, activists successfully collected signatures from at least seven percent of registered voters statewide to qualify for the ballot.

Volunteers had been petitioning since last July, about two months after turning in the pair of complementary legalization initiatives to the secretary of state’s office.

Gov. Jim Pillen (R) has voiced opposition to the reform effort, saying last year that legalization “poses demonstrated harms to our children,” and that medical cannabis should only be accessible if its approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

One of NMM’s earlier campaigns gathered enough signatures for ballot placement in 2020, but the measure was invalidated by the state Supreme Court following a single-subject challenge. Supporters then came up short on signatures for revised petitions in 2022 due in large part to the loss of funding after one of their key donors died in a plane crash.

Nebraska lawmakers, including campaign co-chair Sen. Anna Wishart (D), have also attempted to enact the reform legislatively, but cannabis bills have consistently stalled out in the conservative legislature.

Wishart’s medical cannabis bill received a hearing in the unicameral Judiciary Committee last year, but it did not advance. She attributed the inaction to changes in committee membership. An earlier version of the measure ultimately stalled out in the GOP-controlled legislature amid a filibuster that supporters could not overcome.

Meanwhile, two adult-use cannabis legalization bills also received a hearing in the Judiciary Committee in August ahead of a special session convened by the Republican governor. They have not advanced further at this point.

Separately, lawmakers during a special session this summer considered a sweeping property tax relief bill that initially contained a steep new tax on consumable hemp and CBD products, but that provision was removed prior to final passage.

A prior tax bill for the earlier regular session initially contained a 100 percent tax rate on consumable hemp products. But following industry and consumer pushback, the proposed rate was reduced to 30 percent for the special session before being taken out of the bill.

Arkansas Activists Turn In Final Batch Of Signatures To Put Medical Marijuana Expansion On The Ballot

Photo courtesy of Philip Steffan.