HELENA — Anyone who wants to get a ballot measure in front of Montana voters in the 2026 elections has until mid-June to turn in thousands of signatures from registered voters. Now, committees proposing initiatives are having to make decisions about how to get that work done.
“Things have to align – stars have to align, the time has to align,” said Jeff Mangan, founder of the Transparent Election Initiative.
(Watch the video for more on the current ballot measure campaigns.)
TEI is campaigning for what it calls “The Montana Plan”: an attempt to go around the federal Citizens United decision by redefining the powers of corporations and other “artificial persons” to exclude spending money in elections.
This week, the Montana Supreme Court rejected TEI’s initial proposal for an amendment to the Montana Constitution, saying it violated a state requirement that amendments only make one significant change at a time. Just a few days after, however, Mangan announced they had submitted two new proposed versions – which means they will have to go through the full legal review process again.
“Even if we were starting to collect signatures today – which we were hopeful that we'd be able to do, but clearly we're not – that would be a significant effort for us to undertake in the state of Montana,” said Mangan. “Now, it will be a Herculean effort.”
One of the new proposals is another constitutional amendment, revised in an attempt to get in compliance with the Court’s ruling. It now would limit artificial persons’ powers by excluding political spending, then threaten to revoke their charter if they failed to comply.
The other proposal is similar, but would be a statutory initiative – meaning it only changes state law, not the Montana Constitution. A statutory initiative is less permanent because it can be changed by the Montana Legislature without a vote of the people, but it doesn’t have to comply with the single-change requirement for constitutional amendments.
Mangan says his preference is to move forward with the constitutional amendment, but at this stage of the process, he believes it’s important to keep open the greatest chance for voters to weigh in on this issue.
“I ask citizens every day, ‘Do you think there's too much money in politics?’” he said. “They all say yes. When you boil it down, it's as simple as that. And we say that we have a way to get money out of politics, that's what they want to hear. They know that's what the Montana Plan is about, and that's how we're moving forward.”
Meanwhile, two separate committees got cleared to begin collecting signatures on two separate initiatives with a single goal: amending the Montana Constitution to require that judicial elections remain nonpartisan. Now, those two groups are joining forces.
Constitutional Initiative 131 and Constitutional Initiative 132 were very similar. Montanans for Fair and Impartial Judges, the group behind CI-131, began the process earlier. However, Montanans for Nonpartisan Courts, the sponsors of CI-132, had brought in significantly more money for their campaign.
On Thursday, MNC released a statement, announcing that MFIJ was withdrawing CI-131 and putting its support behind CI-132. In it, Ted Dick of MFIJ said there was a “united effort” to keep judicial elections nonpartisan.
“Montanans for Fair and Impartial Judges believes Montanans for Nonpartisan Courts has a strong policy and the resources to ensure the initiative qualifies for the ballot, which is why we have chosen to formally endorse CI-132,” he said.
MNC officially began gathering signatures for CI-132 in November.
“We know that Montanans want to protect their right to judicial elections free from the influence of political parties and politicians,” said Caitie Butler, a spokesperson for MNC, in the statement. “We are proud to stand with those who have endorsed CI-131 and CI-132 and begin the work of qualifying this critical initiative for the November ballot.”
In order to qualify a ballot measure, it takes at least 30,121 signatures for a statutory initiative and at least 60,241 signatures for a constitutional amendment.
There are now five remaining active efforts to qualify initiatives for the 2026 ballot, according to the Montana Secretary of State’s Office. In addition to TEI’s campaign and CI-132, they include:
- Constitutional Initiative 130, a proposal to cap the annual increase in property valuations, in an attempt to reduce the growth in property taxes. It is a revised version of CI-129, a similar proposal that would only have applied to residential property. CI-130 has already been cleared to begin gathering signatures.
- A proposed constitutional amendment with the temporary title of Ballot Issue #8, which would add more specifics to the state constitution’s guarantee of the right to propose ballot measures. It was rejected by Attorney General Austin Knudsen’s office, after they ruled it also violated the single-change requirement. The sponsors have appealed the decision to the Montana Supreme Court.
- A proposed statutory initiative titled Ballot Issue #7, which would establish standards for dog breeding and welfare. It is currently undergoing a review by legislative staff, before being sent to the Attorney General.
