South Dakota is officially set to decide on whether to legalize medical cannabis in the General Election in November of 2020.
On Thursday, South Dakota Secretary of State Steve Barnett announced that his office had validated a petition that was submitted for an initiated measure on legalizing cannabis for medical use.
The measure, titled Initiated Measure 26, only required 16,961 valid signatures to qualify for the ballot but ended up having a total of 25,524.
“Per South Dakota Codified Law § 2-1-16,” stated Secretary Barnett. “Our office conducted a random sample of the petition signatures and found 74.65 percent to be valid.”
Once a ballot measure has been filed, citizens may challenge its validation by the Secretary of State, in accordance with South Dakota Codified Law § 2-1-17.1.
To challenge, citizens must submit an original, signed affidavit within 30 days of the validation; electronic submissions are not accepted.
The deadline to file a challenge to Initiated Measure 26 is Monday, January 20, 2020.
There are petitions for one remaining ballot question that were submitted before the November 4, 2019 deadline and are currently under review by the Office of the Secretary of State reviews.
The Office reviews ballot questions in the order that they are received.
