{"id":78,"date":"2023-01-10T10:30:00","date_gmt":"2023-01-10T10:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/progressmo-gotv-2022.lndo.site\/sunt-est-dolorem-officiis\/"},"modified":"2023-01-10T10:30:00","modified_gmt":"2023-01-10T10:30:00","slug":"missouri-house-bills-after-your-voice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gallant-mclaren.18-188-198-158.plesk.page\/index.php\/2023\/01\/10\/missouri-house-bills-after-your-voice\/","title":{"rendered":"The Missouri House Is Back, And They\u2019re Coming For Your Voice"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Last Wednesday, the Missouri State House convened for their 2023 session, rolling out a slate of <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/house.mo.gov\/LegislationSP.aspx\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">more than 600 proposed bills<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. In the throughline of their legislative priorities, the House made it abundantly clear that their number one problem is your power.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">13+ Bills Breaking the Ballot Initiative Process<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The House has seen our success in passing meaningful, progressive reforms like <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2018\/08\/08\/636568530\/missouri-blocks-right-to-work-law\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">blocking Right-to-Work<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.joplinglobe.com\/news\/local_news\/missouris-minimum-wage-set-to-increase\/article_37f5bf8c-8855-11ed-ad1b-87fcabf879fd.html\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">raising the minimum wage<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, and <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.stltoday.com\/news\/local\/marijuana\/marijuana-legalization-in-missouri-takes-effect-thursday\/article_dfef851b-c4b3-5f37-b722-030d5fdb8fc0.html\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">legalizing marijuana<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> through statewide ballot initiatives. And like an indignant child losing a game on the playground, when the House doesn\u2019t like the results, they\u2019ll just change the rules.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The House\u2019s goal is to make it harder to put any initiative on the ballot in the first place, and when that fails, they want to make it harder to pass the initiatives that sneak through. Any number of reforms are up for discussion, including:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Requiring a two-thirds majority vote to pass ballot initiatives<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mandating a majority of registered voters vote to pass ballot initiatives, instead of a majority of voters in that election<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Needing up to 15% of the registered voters in each Congressional district to sign the petition to land on the ballot<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Making It Harder to Vote<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In case stripping our ballot initiative process isn\u2019t enough, the Missouri House is ready to make it harder for you to vote for candidates, too.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">First, legislators in Jefferson City want to close our primaries, meaning you <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/house.mo.gov\/Bill.aspx?bill=HB31&amp;year=2023&amp;code=R\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">can\u2019t participate in a primary election unless you register with a party 23 weeks before the election<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. To participate in general elections in Missouri, you only need to register <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/vote.gov\/register\/mo\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">4 weeks before the election<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. Extending the deadline for primary elections is a blatant attempt by the state legislature to limit who is participating in our elections. They don\u2019t want real Missourians calling the shots.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The most blatant disregard for voting rights in this year\u2019s bills comes from <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/house.mo.gov\/Bill.aspx?bill=HB31&amp;year=2023&amp;code=R\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">HB 691, which would require Missourians voting by mail to pay for their own postage.<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> That\u2019s right: if you need to vote by mail, the Missouri House wants you to pay for it. Our power comes from our vote, and politicians who want to protect their own interests shouldn\u2019t be allowed to make us pay for it.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Making Our Government Less Transparent<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Finally, and least shocking of all, our friends in Jefferson City are doing everything in their power to keep you in the dark about what\u2019s going on in the Capitol. Two bills on the docket in the House are designed to make records about themselves and their friends less accessible to the public.&nbsp;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Not only are they working to <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/house.mo.gov\/Bill.aspx?bill=HB31&amp;year=2023&amp;code=R\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">increase the costs of records themselves<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">; they are adding more and more kinds of records to the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/house.mo.gov\/Bill.aspx?bill=HB31&amp;year=2023&amp;code=R\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cexceptions\u201d list that can be kept private.<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Even some records about legislation will be kept in the dark and out of the public eye.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Bottom Line<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In a democracy, your vote is your power, and Missouri\u2019s lawmakers are terrified of the power real Missourians have to push for change and improve our lives. They\u2019re fighting to make it harder for us to fix the problems we face every day. Missouri voters have a right to know what\u2019s really happening in Jefferson City and for their voices to be heard.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n<p>Posted January 10, 2023<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last Wednesday, the Missouri State House convened for their 2023 session, rolling out a slate of more than 600 proposed bills. In the throughline of their legislative priorities, the House made it abundantly clear that their number one problem is your power. 13+ Bills Breaking the Ballot Initiative Process The House has seen our success [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":79,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-78","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallant-mclaren.18-188-198-158.plesk.page\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallant-mclaren.18-188-198-158.plesk.page\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallant-mclaren.18-188-198-158.plesk.page\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallant-mclaren.18-188-198-158.plesk.page\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallant-mclaren.18-188-198-158.plesk.page\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gallant-mclaren.18-188-198-158.plesk.page\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallant-mclaren.18-188-198-158.plesk.page\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallant-mclaren.18-188-198-158.plesk.page\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallant-mclaren.18-188-198-158.plesk.page\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallant-mclaren.18-188-198-158.plesk.page\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}