Fraudulent signatures have been found among more than 200,000 turned in last week by Protect Marriage Washington toward a ballot measure overturning the state's marriage equality law, but not enough to significantly affect the amount necessary to do so, Q13FOX reports:
Preserve Marriage Washington, blocked the gay marriage law signed by Gov. Chris Gregoire last Wednesday by submitting an estimated 232,000 signatures — nearly 100,000 more than the 120,577 minimum -- to get a referendum on the November ballot. On Monday, the Secretary of State’s office said at least 51 of the petition sheets containing about 1,000 signatures were found to be “apparently fraudulent.” Petition fraud is a class C Felony punishable by up to 5 years in prison and a $10,000 fine.
I just don't get these people like Democrat Fred Phelps of Westboro Baptist Church who hate on me for being gay. It's shameful.
Posted by: Alan | Jun 11, 2012 7:52:03 PM
@Alan
I guess that it is really a great thing that you were not born in Uganda. Those people would be trying to make it legal to kill you for being gay. Only vigilance will prevent those people from taking over in this country. They exist in the churches and towns of America hoping for America to be taken back to the 1600's.
Posted by: vanndean | Jun 11, 2012 8:23:36 PM
Have the people in Washington State not heard about Proposition 8 in California? When the people vote to take away a civil right that has already been given, that is unconstitutional, not to mention against the very pillars of democracy. Someone needs to step in and nip this effort in the bud, and let them know that you cannot vote away the civil rights of a minority.
Posted by: David | Jun 11, 2012 9:17:22 PM
While I do think that this petition drive is reprehensible, the political realist in me is going to have to step in for a minute here. These things happen virtually all the time, from both parties, on all sorts of topics. That's a big part of why they turn in many more signatures than is necessary. The simple fact is that an 'issue' will send out blank sheets to all of it's peons on the ground, and ask them to walk around, getting friends and random people to sign them. 99% of people will, some others will just get lazy and fill in random names. Until the government starts to prosecute the people that do so, it is safe to assume that in any petition, 1-5% of signatures will be fake.
Posted by: Matt | Jun 11, 2012 10:13:04 PM
Unlike in North Carolina, this will be on an actually ballot and everyone can go in to vote on the matter. So hopefully, there will be more than only a third of registered voters that turned out given that it's a real election and ballot. Also, there seem to be a lot more people in Washington that are willing to let all people be treated fairly, unlike NOM.
Posted by: Garst | Jun 12, 2012 12:14:01 AM
The anti equality forces will continue to waste time and energy as long as they can. Anything to make our lives more difficult. No Compassion, No doing onto others as they would have done onto themselves, no trying to understand another's viewpoint. No being bothered by social science that shows that gays are capable of having long term relationships and that so called reparative therapies do not work and only do harm.
Posted by: Tom in long beach | Jun 12, 2012 12:41:30 AM
I wonder if they could rule that all of the signatures are suspect and thus throw out all of the petitions
Posted by: Luke | Jun 12, 2012 12:42:15 AM
Unfortunately, this is but a small bump in the road for the evil ones. They will, ultimately, lose, but not on this account.
Have you made your Pride Month donation? http://washingtonunitedformarriage.org/
Posted by: David R. | Jun 12, 2012 12:52:44 AM
Don't read too much into this. These were signatures turned in by someone paid to collect signatures. This sort of things happens frequently in this state. The Secretary of State will spot check 3% of the signatures to see if they are valid. If there is a problem his office will check all the signatures.There has never really been any doubt that the anti-marriage equality folks would get enough signatures to put this referendum on the ballot. Unlike California's Prop 8, this was a law enacted by the Legislature but never put into effect. The signature effort is to place this before all the voters as a referendum.
Posted by: Linden Groves | Jun 12, 2012 2:49:56 AM
"Have the people in Washington State not heard about Proposition 8 in California? When the people vote to take away a civil right that has already been given, that is unconstitutional, not to mention against the very pillars of democracy. Someone needs to step in and nip this effort in the bud, and let them know that you cannot vote away the civil rights of a minority."
David,
If you read the Prop 8 opinion by the 9th Circuit, you'll see that they reached a narrower thing affecting Prop 8 Specifically, where a right was granted to gays and then taken away from them 5 months later.
If R74 is not approved, no marriages would have taken place to be taken away, therefor the Prop 8 case law would not take hold in California.
There is a Nevada case called Sevcik v. Sandoval where they are challenging the separation between domestic partner and marriage. That would be a more expansive scale ruling that would also effect Oregon as well.
Posted by: Gray P. | Jun 12, 2012 4:53:34 AM
This is non-news unless they find and prosecute the perpetrators.
Posted by: Mike B. | Jun 12, 2012 5:28:36 AM
Who cares? We need to have this vote and WIN. It's important to have a ballot intitiative where we beat the bigots to put an end to the narrative that "the voters have never approved of SSM wherever it came up for a vote." Washington is our best shot so far. In fact, it looks like a winner.
Posted by: plinx | Jun 12, 2012 9:23:00 AM
I agree Plink. I expect Washington and Maine to approve gay marriage and Maryland and Minnesota to narrowly reject it. But if even ONE of the four states voting on it approves it, this is still a step forward. Opponents of SSM do use the "it's never been approved by the voters in an election" theme every chance they get.
Posted by: Mary | Jun 12, 2012 9:30:46 AM
We are fighting hard and we will win! We just raised a ton of money at our last event!
Posted by: Bryce Ageno | Jun 12, 2012 11:26:50 AM
My parents beat me.
Posted by: Alan | Jun 12, 2012 12:46:07 PM
Repukes whine about voter fraud yet are the ones doing the fraud.
Posted by: mmike1969 | Jun 12, 2012 9:30:18 PM