Across the Desk - S6E:12 (OK SQ820 & Democracy Killer Bill Shepard)
Last edited Tue Oct 4, 2022, 10:11 AM - Edit history (1)
This week on Across the Desk, Kit talks about the failed privatization of signature verification for Oklahoma state questions as SQ820, for the end of marijuana prohibition, fails to meet the deadline to be put on the 2022 ballot despite those signatures being turned in almost 5 months in advance of any 2022 ballot deadline, only to be denied by the Oklahoma Supreme Court because the private company Western Petition Systems slow walked the count and/or was also very inefficient and showed poor leadership when it came to verifying the signatures in a reasonable amount of time. Thereby delaying the ability of SQ820, and direct democracy, to be on the ballot. And we paid $300K per year to make it happen 10x as long and cost nearly 3x as much... And who owns and runs Western Petition Systems? That would be Bill Shepard, who also is the owner and CEO of Sooner Poll and is also a guest blogger for OCPA, a conservative think tank.