Massachusetts officials have rejected a challenge to a ballot initiative that seeks to significantly roll back the state’s marijuana legalization law by repealing regulated sales.
Weeks after cannabis activists filed a complaint with the State Ballot Law Commission under the Secretary of State’s office—alleging that petitioners with the anti-cannabis campaign used misleading tactics to convince voters to support its ballot placement—the body on Thursday overruled the objection.
The commission said advocates who challenged the ballot measure raised “unsupported allegations” about the propriety of the signature gathering process that they said warranted official scrutiny.
The claim “rings hollow given that absolutely no admissible evidence has been presented or offered supporting the allegations made,” the commission’s ruling said.
“With this decision, the certification of this round of petitions has now formally ended, and all eleven initiatives are now before the Legislature,” Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin (D), who chairs the commission, said, referring collectively to all ballot petitions advancing in the state this year including on other unrelated issues. “If the Legislature chooses not to pass any of the initiatives, the petitioners will have the opportunity to begin the final round of signature gathering in May.”
This represents a setback for
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